Did Moses Die for Us?
Jul 31, 2015 By Stephen P. Garfinkel | Commentary | Va'et-hannan
What a magnificent and rich Torah reading we have this week, Parashat Va’et-hannan! It’s as if the Torah wants to compensate the Jewish community for the week gone by, a week during which we commemorated Tishah Be’av, the putative anniversary of so many devastating events that have occurred throughout Jewish history. This week’s “reward” is a reading that incorporates a restatement of the Ten Commandments (Deut. 5:6-17) followed almost immediately by the first paragraph of the Shema (6:4-9).
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Life Is Good
Sep 23, 2006 By Arnold M. Eisen | Commentary | Rosh Hashanah
One of the things we look forward to as the holidays approach is the renewed encounter with melodies and rituals, texts and tastes, which we have developed great affection for over the years. It’s like the feeling one has at the sight of old friends coming down a path to greet us, prompting recollections of the good times we have enjoyed together. I feel that way about the Torah portions that we read on the two days of Rosh Hashanah. I know them well, after all these years, but as with good friends I still wonder what they will have to say to me this year, and I to them.
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Creation As Preparation for Sinai
Oct 21, 2006 By Arnold M. Eisen | Commentary | Bereishit
Why did the Torah begin where it does, at the very Beginning, rather than with the first commandment given the children of Israel, which comes well into the Book of Exodus?
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Guided by the Covenant
Jan 12, 2007 By Arnold M. Eisen | Commentary | Shemot
There is a wonderful midrash in Pesikta de-Rav Kahana that suggests a profound relationship between the arrival of the manna described in Parashat Be’shallah and the giving of the Ten Commandments recounted in the following parashah, Yitro. Just as the manna tasted different to each and every Israelite, Rabbi Yosi teaches, so each was enabled according to his or her particular capacity to hear the Divine Word differently at Sinai (12:25).
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The Giant and the Ants
Jul 24, 2015 By Raysh Weiss | Commentary | Devarim
As literary critic Erich Auerbach highlights in “Odysseus’ Scar,” the opening chapter of his monumental work of literary criticism, Mimesis, the Bible favors a comparatively terse literary style, presenting even heightened emotional episodes in verb-heavy narrative, largely bereft of extensive dialogue or literary embellishments. Accordingly, those rare instances in which the Torah elaborates in its description of people, places, or events should command our attention as both unusual and worthy of further consideration.
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Making Space for Life
Jul 10, 2015 By Joel Alter | Commentary | Pinehas
It’s not for nothing, this reputation God has for consuming anger. The Torah itself makes the case. Our parashah opens with yet another instance of God hovering at the brink. God is prepared to wipe us out in a rage over our incessant violations of the inviolable.
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Balam: Prophet, Sorcerer, Saint or Sinner?
Jul 3, 2015 By Jonathan Lipnick | Commentary | Balak
Reading Parashat Balak along with Rashi, the medieval 12th-century French exegete par excellence, one quickly discovers how vilified Balaam is in midrash. But not all biblical commentators side with Rashi. There’s a fantastic chapter by Nehama Leibowitz in Studies of Bamidbar entitled “Prophet or Sorcerer?” Rabbi Jacob Milgrom, too, has an article on the subject entitled “Balaam: Saint or Sinner?” in his extraordinary JPS Commentary to Numbers.
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Modeling Ritual
Jun 26, 2015 By Mitchell Cohen | Commentary | Hukkat
Recently I visited a group of Ramah teens on their one-week Poland experience, just prior to their summer trip to Israel. While visiting Jewish cemeteries in Krakow, I stood to the side and did not enter the area of the graves. Two of our teen participants, also both kohanim, asked me why I wouldn’t enter the cemetery, and I told them about the traditional prohibition of kohanim coming within six feet of a grave. Both decided to adopt this custom—at least for the days we were together—and both told me that even though they couldn’t explain why, it just felt right.
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