Do you peddle in relative truths, or are you a stickler for the absolute truth? This essay examines the two types of truth and posits that G-d’s truth is absolute.
Read the full story »Naso: The Recovering Addict
The Dilemma of the Blanket
Have you ever laid yourself to sleep with a short blanket? You cover your toes, but your shoulders are cold. You pull up the blanket to cover your shoulders, but now your toes are exposed. Your sleep is restless and fitful, what do you do? Finally …
Bamidbar: To Count Or Not To Count?
Are you Still Counting?
A newly minted millionaire sought entry into an exclusive society club. When the secretary asked for his net value he proudly replied, $13,403, 374. The crisp response was not long in coming. “If you’re still counting”, said the secretary, “you need not bother with our club.”
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Bechukotai: Is G-d Vengeful?
Why So Exacting?
The first tenet of all religions is that good deeds are rewarded and bad deeds are punished. Each religion explains it in its own way; each trying to present G-d as merciful, not vengeful. Judaism takes a different track. Suffering, says Judaism, is not a punishment, but a …
Behar: When Bin Laden Was Gone
Good Things Are Worth Waiting For
One of CNN’s first articles the morning after Osama Bin Laden’s assassination featured reaction from people on the streets of America. One reaction that drew my attention was, “I never thought this day would come; I had given up hope.”
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Emor: The Role of the King
The Nature of Monarchy
The world was enthralled with the royal wedding between the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge. It was more than the star power of celebrity
that drew our attention; to the British Commonwealth this was personal – England received its future queen and it’s prince took a wife This …
Kedoshim: Is Asceticism Jewish?
The Contradiction
The great mystic Rabbi Yehudah Lowe, otherwise known as the Maharal, once explained that Matzah, the impoverished bread, comprised of merely flour and water, is a symbol of freedom because those who are truly free are unencumbered. Ordinary bread is slaved to sugar and yeast for flavor and texture. …
Passover: The Freedom To Commit
The Burden of Freedom
What does freedom mean to you? Thousands of people dream every day of wealth, fame and freedom from life’s drudgery. They are tired of poverty and penny counting, tired of overworking and constantly answering to employers. They want wealth and power; they want to be free.Those who …
Passover: Removing the Chametz
Before Pesach we have a flurry of rituals aimed at ridding our homes of Chametz. One ritual layers over the next creating a labyrinth of overlapping traditions that leaves one dizzy. The following article is intended to make sense of the seeming chaos.The Torah prohibits not only eating but also …
Parsha Insights »
Ki Tetze: A Happy Marriage
Marriage
Having attended two weddings this month and planning to attend two more next month, marriage is no doubt on my mind. Everyone says that marriage is hard work, yet at a wedding, when an innocent young man and woman are initiated into an endless cycle of hard work, we rejoice …
Yearly Cycle »
Passover & Purim: Is there a Connection?
Diametric Opposites
We have recently celebrated the holiday of Purim and are currently preparing for the holiday of Pesach – Passover. These two holidays are not only different from each other they are almost antithetical to one another.
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Concepts »
Vayera: The Moral Sense
The moral sense is the innate human conviction that kindness and fairness are good, and cruelty is bad. We can’t explain why this is so, but if anyone would claim that cruelty is good and challenge us to explain why it is bad, we would throw up our hands in …
Rabbi’s Desk »
What Can We Do?
These past two days have been the most difficult for our people in the last fifty years. It was Simchat Torah, a time for rejoicing, yet it was a time of horror. Nearly a thousand members of our family were brutally murdered, more than a hundred were taken hostage, and …
