Articles by Lazer Gurkow
Pekudei: Having A Bad Day?

Looking Up
If your life is anything like mine, then you have good days and bad. Days when you feel like G-d is on your side and days when nothing seems to go right. When you are in the midst of a full blown bad day, you just want to go …
Shabbat Zachor: Memory Is A Bridge

Remember
Can you imagine driving down the street and suddenly realizing that you forgot where you are coming from? If you don’t know where you are coming from, you can’t know where you are going or why. Severed from the past, the present has no bridge to the future.
Tweet
Ki Tisa; Don’t Fix It

If It Ain’t Broke
If it ain’t broke don’t fix it, is a pithy saying from the American South The idea is that if something has a track record of success, don’t tinker with it.
Over the last few decades, the words ‘Jewish continuity’ has become a catchphrase. What can we do …
Vayakhel: Right Down The Middle

One Long Rod
Baseball training begins this week and you know what that means. Everyone is waiting for the fastball right down the middle. Pitchers hope it will blow right by the batter and strike him out. Hitters hope to slap it right out of the ball park. Balls thrown inside …
Tetzaveh: No Name Brand

When The Ship Goes Down
Do you pay extra for a name brand? Some do, personally, I don’t. If the no name brand is of the same quality as the name brand, I am quite happy with it. The name is for others. The brand is for me. Sometimes the no …
Terumah: The Crown

For G-d
Three of the Temple’s sacred vessels had crowns around their perimeter. There was a crown around the incense altar, a crown around the show-table and a crown around the holy ark. Our sages taught, the crown around the altar was taken by Aaron, whose children were destined for the …
Mishpatim: Festival And Season

The Name
The Jewish festivals celebrate the miracles of our history. The festival of Passover celebrates the exodus. Shavuot, celebrates the giving of the Ten Commandments. Sukkot, celebrates the miracles that our ancestors experienced during their journey through the desert.
The festivals are named according to the miracles that they commemorate. The …
Yitro: An Unpleasant Truth

Unpleasant
What is the difference between Torah truth and scientific truth? By science I mean every branch of human knowledge that isn’t Torah. One is pleasant the other is unpleasant.
The answer is best presented with a joke I’m sure you’ve heard. It’s about the Jew who was caught reading a Nazi …