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Choosing Words

Jun 26, 2004 By Lauren Eichler Berkun | Commentary | Korah

“Use your words!” This is a refrain that I have heard parents recite over and over again to small children. As a new parent, I am prepared for my future of disciplinary tactics: “No, Jeremy, we do not bite.no, we do not hit.use your words.” Failure to use his words will surely result in a “time out” for my little son. This parenting technique comes to mind as I read this week’s Torah portion.

Why Was This Time Different?

Jun 12, 2004 By Lewis Warshauer | Commentary | Shelah Lekha

The Torah’s telling of the Israelites’ journeys in the wilderness is in many ways a story of shortage: shortage of food (at least, desirable food) water – and hope. One commodity was rarely in short supply: fear.

Overcoming the Past

Jun 12, 2004 By Ismar Schorsch | Commentary | Shelah Lekha | Rosh Hashanah

This week’s parashah strikes a note that reverberates throughout the liturgy of our High Holy Day services: “I pardon (salahti), as you have asked (14:20).” Prayers for forgiveness (selihot-same word) punctuate the season of introspection from the week before Rosh Hashanah to the end of Yom Kippur. Not surprisingly, this verse from our parashah appears often in these prayers. The concept of atonement enables us to bridge the chasm between divine expectation and human reality. It prevents the perfect from becoming the enemy of the good. For humans, holiness is always a temporary state of being. Without forgiveness, we would find ourselves forever alienated from God.

A Paradox of Greatness and Humility

Jun 5, 2004 By Ismar Schorsch | Commentary | Beha'alotekha

America does not like wimps. We want our leaders to exude certainty and resolve, vigor and self-confidence. We deem a leader wise when decisive. The image, though, hardly comports with that of scripture. In the portrait of Moses offered up by this week’s parashah, we are treated to a leader conscious of his own fallibility. The Torah does not stress, to the exclusion of all other traits, Moses’ special charisma. True, unlike other prophets, he is on such intimate terms with God that God addresses him at any time of day in unmediated fashion. No need for somnolence and dreams. In reprimanding Aaron and Miriam for their presumption of equality, God affirms Moses’ unique stature: “With him I speak mouth to mouth, plainly and not in riddles, and he beholds the likeness of the Lord” (12:8).

The Lamp and the Oil

Jun 5, 2004 By Matthew Berkowitz | Commentary | Beha'alotekha

Partnership is one of the core concepts of Torah. One individual cannot sustain the entire world. One family cannot build a people. And one nation cannot single handedly effect redemption. Or in the discourse of philosopher Abraham Joshua Heschel, God needs Israel just as much as Israel needs God. This message is communicated quite eloquently in an illustrative midrash: “Rav Aha said, ‘Israel is likened to an olive tree: ‘A leafy olive tree fair with goodly fruits’ (Jeremiah 11:16). And God is likened to a lamp: ‘The lamp of the Lord is the spirit of man’ (Proverbs 20:27). What use is made of olive oil? It is put into a lamp and then the two together give light as though they were one.’ “

Blessings of Peace

May 29, 2004 By Melissa Crespy | Commentary | Naso

In a world filled with continual violence, where killings of Americans, Israelis and Iraqis by horrific means have become, to our great sorrow, daily items in our news – we ask ourselves: When will peace come? When will we be able to turn on our television sets, read our newspapers, and learn that no more bloodshed has occurred, that former enemies are speaking to each other, and parents can go to sleep at night knowing that they will find their children alive in the morning?

Bialik’s Radical Subversion

May 22, 2004 By Ismar Schorsch | Commentary | Bemidbar

The overture to the book of Numbers is decidedly upbeat. All appears in order for a quick journey through the wilderness. We are at the start of the fourteenth month since the exodus from Egypt. A month before Moses had erected the Tabernacle, commemorating the first anniversary of Israel’s freedom. Just three months after its redemption, Israel experienced God’s revelation at Mount Sinai. The opening chapters convey an aura of invincibility. With exactly 603,550 fighting men above the age of twenty, Israel is arrayed around the Tabernacle in military formation with four tribes on each side. The ultimate power of this force is spiritual, for the Tabernacle at its center protected by the Levites, is not only the repository of the tablets of the covenant, but also the abode of God on earth. As a shrine, it serves as an earthly microcosm of God’s cosmic dwelling.

Let Me Count the Ways

May 22, 2004 By Rachel Ain | Commentary | Bemidbar

“How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.” Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s opening line to her love poem are extremely meaningful to us as we begin to read the fourth book of the Torah, the book of B’midbar, or Numbers. The counting of the Israelite people is a central part of this week’s parashah. The parashah begins with God instructing Moses to take a census of all the congregations of the children of Israel.

Proclaiming Freedom

May 15, 2004 By Ismar Schorsch | Commentary | Aharei Mot | Kedoshim

On our way to Shavuot from Pesach, we read three Torah portions that epitomize the deep structure of Judaism. The challenge of freedom is to make it a blessing. How can we avoid frittering it away in dissipation, keeping it from morphing into a curse? The Hebrew names of these parshiyot bear the message: mountain, laws and wilderness. The Torah forges a religion designed to get us through the chaos of an engulfing wilderness with a ramified system of legal prescriptions whose inspiration is rooted in the revelation at Mount Sinai. A faith-based community is the matrix of individual survival in a hostile environment.

The Hardest Mitzvah?

May 15, 2004 By Lewis Warshauer | Commentary | Behar

Which of the mitzvot of the Torah is the most difficult to observe? The prohibition on coveting? Or, perhaps, being forbidden to gossip? Each of those choices represents a never-ending challenge. One is supposed to avoid ever coveting or gossiping. When viewed in terms of frequency, the mitzvah that begins this week’s parashah could be seen as easier to perform. The sabbatical year, or shmittah, falls only once every seven years. Yet it could be the most difficult. During that year, farmers must not plant or harvest. Refraining from planting or harvesting for an entire year seems highly risky. If there is not enough reserve food from prior years, people will starve; surely the Torah does not want people to endanger their lives.

The Continuing Revelation

May 8, 2004 By Joshua Heller | Commentary | Emor

“What did he know, and when did he know it?” seems to be a particularly current question, but it can be effective in exploring the meaning of ancient texts as well. When applied to this week’s parashah – Emor, it helps provide a rare insight into the process of revelation and the evolution of Jewish law. Was revelation limited to one flash of prophetic vision and forty days of fast and furious dictation atop Mount Sinai or was it a process that took place over months and years?

Sharing Our Blessings

May 8, 2004 By Matthew Berkowitz | Commentary | Emor

Traditional rabbinic thought argues that words of Torah are never superfluous. There is a distinct economy in the way that words are employed. And so, when we encounter repetition, Torah is coming to teach us something unique. The challenge for us, as readers, is to understand the import of repetition. Parashat Emor offers us one such opportunity. Although the law of pe’ah, leaving one corner of the field to the poor, is legislated a few chapters earlier in Parashat K’doshim (Leviticus 19:9), it is placed this week in a list of festivals. What is the significance of restating such law in the midst of our parashah?

Our Neighbor’s Blood

May 1, 2004 By Melissa Crespy | Commentary | Kedoshim

What’s in a translation? When the translation is of a verse in the Torah – there is potentially quite a lot. Therefore, in reading the Etz Hayim Humash’s translation of Leviticus 19:16, I was struck by its rather non-literal translation of Lo ta-a-mod al dam ray-ekha. In the context of surrounding verses concerning fair and just treatment of others, Etz Hayim translates our verse: “Do not profit by the blood of your fellow”, and the commentary on the verse tells us that, in context, the verse seems to mean: “Do not pursue [your] livelihood in a way that endangers another or at the expense of another’s well-being.” (p. 696) This translation and commentary do seem to fit the context of the surrounding verses.

Passover in the Light of Yom Kippur

If the first half of this week’s double parasha reminds you of Yom Kippur, despite our proximity to Passover, you are not in error. The two Torah readings for that solemn day are both drawn from Aharei Mot. Chapter 16, which we read at Shaharit on Yom Kippur morning, depicts the annual ceremony on the tenth day of the seventh month for cleansing the tabernacle of its impurities and the people of their sins. The English word “scapegoat” preserves a verbal relic of the day’s most memorable feature – the goat destined to carry off symbolically the collective guilt of the nation into the wilderness. Chapter 18, reserved for Minhah in the afternoon, defines the sexual practices which were to govern the domestic life of Israelite society.

Miracles of All Kinds

Apr 24, 2004 By Ismar Schorsch | Commentary | Tazria | Yom Hazikaron-Yom Ha'atzma'ut

Conspicuous miracles move us more swiftly and deeply than inconspicuous miracles. The latter elude our detection because they are an everyday occurrence. The commonplace numbs our sense of wonder, even as the daily experience of grandeur strips us of awe and radical amazement. It is surely one of the functions of religion to keep our wellsprings of wonder from running dry.

Abracadabra!

Apr 24, 2004 By Rachel Ain | Commentary | Metzora | Tazria

Abracadabra! These words, recited by magicians all over the world, when broken down into smaller words introduce us to the truest mystery-the creation of the world. A’bara K’adabra – I will create as I have spoken. Just as magicians claim to have the power to change the reality that is in front of them with words, so too, when God created the world it was done not with hands, not with tools, but with speech. In Genesis 1:3 the first thing that God does is to speak. This verse reads, “And God said: ‘Let there be light’; And there was light.” What is it about the power of the spoken word that causes it to transform worlds?

Fiery Zeal

Apr 17, 2004 By Lewis Warshauer | Commentary | Shemini

The Bible presents an idealized picture of life – how good it could be – but tempers that picture with frequent intrusions of tragedy. The creation story itself sets that pattern. The Garden of Eden is perfect, but human beings do not live there for long. Adam and Eve disobey God, and are banished into a world increasingly gripped by cruelty.

The Story of Pig As Taboo

Apr 17, 2004 By Ismar Schorsch | Commentary | Shemini

In 1922, Professor Mordecai Kaplan of the Seminary faculty confided in his diary, “There can be no question that sooner or later Judaism will have to get along without dietary laws.” Though he personally observed kashrut both inside and outside his home, the pressure of the melting pot was definitely not conducive to keeping kosher. How astonishingly different are the prospects today! In the fall of 1990, an observer of the kosher food industry in America wrote that about 18,000 kosher products were then on the market, with ever more companies switching to the certification of new items. By 2002 there were over 75,000. The industry has grown to a $6 billion market involving some 9 million customers who look for kosher products. We live in a country where, it would seem, kashrut has taken on a significance far beyond its role in the Jewish community!

The Polarities of Judaism

Apr 13, 2004 By Ismar Schorsch | Commentary | Ki Tissa | Shabbat Parah

The instructions of God to Moses concerning the building of the Tabernacle culminate with the command to observe the Sabbath. Holiness in time follows holiness in space. As the Tabernacle constitutes a sacred space in which the nearness of God is a felt experience, so the Sabbath is a portion of the week set apart to admit God into our lives. Whereas the holiness of the Sanctuary is sharply delimited and restricted in access, that of Shabbat is universally accessible. The Tabernacle is a public space, the community’s link between heaven and earth, administered by a priestly hierarchy and subject to laws of purity.

How We Wear Our Judaism

Apr 6, 2004 By Lewis Warshauer | Commentary | Shabbat Zakhor | Tetzavveh | Purim

The more we know about animals, the more they seem to have what we consider to be human capabilities. Beavers build dams and porpoises communicate in sophisticated ways, while apes use tools and may even reason on some level. But, human beings are the only species to make their own clothes. The wasp’s nest has no garment district.

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