Do you believe in cause and effect? The opening of this week’s parashat hashavua insists on precisely this: events follow in the wake of other events in a causative fashion. Let us be more precise: do you understand the effect of your acts on others, on your society, and on the world in which youContinue reading “Shabbat Ekev: How To Be Loyal (not to Haman but to Life)”
Tag Archives: Ekev
Shabbat Ekev: Listen With Care
Which of us is not angry, disappointed, even resentful, of the way our lives have changed in the past few years? Aren’t we all getting very tired of the stress served up daily by the media, infusing our every interaction with each other? Of course, there is more than one response to this situation. InContinue reading “Shabbat Ekev: Listen With Care”
Shabbat Ekev: What Happens When You Listen
This week our parashat hashavua (parsha, “section”, of the week) is named Ekev. The word literally means “heel”, as in Jacob/Yaakov’s name, given to him because he emerged from the womb holding on to his brother Esav’s heel. This same word ekev paired with another conjugation of shema leads the Jewishly attuned ear to an entirelyContinue reading “Shabbat Ekev: What Happens When You Listen”
Shabbat Ekev: Seeing What Is Being Born
איזהו חכם? הרואה את הנולד – Ayzehu hakham? HaRo’eh et haNolad, “who is wise? One who sees what is being born.” (Pirke Avot 2.9) So few of us, then, can think of ourselves as wise. We try in so many ways to affect our future, would give anything to know our future, to affect it inContinue reading “Shabbat Ekev: Seeing What Is Being Born”
Parashat Ekev: showing up is safer than hiding
A minyan is traditionally defined as ten Jewish men but by Progressive Jews as ten self-identified and committed Jews of any gender; any way you define it, what it means is that we need critical mass. What is critical mass? it’s the number you need to get the job done. In order to evoke holiness inContinue reading “Parashat Ekev: showing up is safer than hiding”
Torah for the 21st Century by Rabbi Ariel Stone 