This week’s parashah is startlingly appropriate to our current situation. We are all aghast at the violence that has broken out in Israel – although the fact that Israel remained relatively quiet as the region seethed struck many as a miracle that could not last – and our hearts are broken for the suffering andContinue reading “Shabbat Pinhas: Peace in the Midst of Violence?”
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Shabbat Balak: Truth Also Comes From Darkness
This week’s parashat hashavua finds us in the Book of Numbers (BaMidbar, “in the wilderness”, is its Hebrew name) in chapter 23. We are offered a curious perspective in this parashah. There are a few places in the Torah in which a non-Israelites teaches the Israelites, but this is the only place in which anContinue reading “Shabbat Balak: Truth Also Comes From Darkness”
Shabbat Hukkat: Where Anger Will Get You
This week we read beginning from Numbers 20 verse 7, in parashat Hukkat, as we continue in this second year of our Triennial Cycle to start not at the beginning of each parashah, but at the beginning of the middle third of it. We begin with a simple story, nothing out of the ordinary: the IsraelitesContinue reading “Shabbat Hukkat: Where Anger Will Get You”
Shabbat BeHa’alot’kha: G-d is my GPS
In this third parashah of the Book BaMidbar, we are finally on the move; after over a year camped at the foot of Mt. Sinai, after receiving the Torah, constructing the Mishkan, organizing the priestly sacrificial system, and learning a lot of halakhah on how to maintain the appropriate atmosphere for the Mishkan in ourContinue reading “Shabbat BeHa’alot’kha: G-d is my GPS”
Shabbat Naso: G-d is in the Annoying Details Too
This week the parashat hashavua (“text of the week”) is called Naso, a word related to the Hebrew idiom for counting. It literally means “lift up the head”, and underscores the importance of truly seeing each person whom one is counting. This is different from the Western idea of “counting heads”, which only tells you howContinue reading “Shabbat Naso: G-d is in the Annoying Details Too”
Shabbat BeHukotai: What Kind of G-d Does This?
In this final week of reading from the Book VaYikra (Leviticus), we are presented with a most unpleasant text, known as the Tokhekhah, “Rebuke”. The parashah has begun with a beautiful picture of the lovely life that we will enjoy if we follow G-d’s mitzvot: “If you follow My laws and faithfully observe My Commandments,Continue reading “Shabbat BeHukotai: What Kind of G-d Does This?”
Shabbat Behar: Between the Peak and the Valley
mah inyan shemitta eytzel har Sinai? This is the classic Jewish form of the question you might recognize as “what does that have to do with all the tea in China?” or “what’s Hecuba to you, or you to Hecuba?” “What does shemitta have to do with Mt. Sinai?” This week’s parashat hashavua is named Behar, for “on the mountain”, i.e. Mt.Continue reading “Shabbat Behar: Between the Peak and the Valley”
Shabbat Emor: Acting Our Age
In parashat Emor, the first words describe G-d speaking to Moshe – not unusual. But then G-d goes on to tell Moshe to speak to Aharon, who in turn is to instruct the priests, his sons and their descendants. The parashah later will turn to the rest of us, the b’nei Yisrael, often translated “children ofContinue reading “Shabbat Emor: Acting Our Age”
Shabbat Kedoshim: Looking Through the Fear
As this Shabbat approaches I am thinking a lot about the Jews of Ukraine, especially my friends of Kyiv Congregation HaTikvah, where I served as Rabbi in 1993-1994. The words of this week’s parashat hashavua will be read in Kyiv as in Paris as in New York as in Portland, Oregon. We all read the sameContinue reading “Shabbat Kedoshim: Looking Through the Fear”
Shabbat hol hamo’ed Pesakh: What Does It Take To Make A Clean Break?
I believed that the Soviet Union was dead and gone; I even thought that war between the nations of Europe was a thing of the past. I was certain that people carrying giant placards depicting the face of Stalin in Red Square during political rallies in the past twenty years were hopelessly anachronistic. I wasContinue reading “Shabbat hol hamo’ed Pesakh: What Does It Take To Make A Clean Break?”
Torah for the 21st Century by Rabbi Ariel Stone 