October 11, 2025 – 11:45 pm
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The radical transition from the Yom Kippur solemnity to the Simchat Torah revelry can be dizzying, but it makes sense. There is a method to the madness.
Sunday: All at Once
Every Jew was required to donate a half shekel, no less and no more, yet the entire half had to be donated at once; intermittent or gradual payments were not accepted. This seems odd. The total sum was not a complete denomination, only a half, yet the …
Inadvertent Slide
Purim celebrates the reversal of assimilation. The Talmud teaches that well before Haman, Jews in Persia had begun a slide into assimilation. There were Jews in the highest enclaves of commerce and government.[1] They were admitted into the most exclusive social clubs. And when the Persian king, Achashverosh, gave …
We eat because we must live, but according to the Torah, eating is even more important than life.
One of the most profound messages in the Torah is captured in this verse. “Man does not live on bread alone, but on the word of G-d.” There are many layers of meaning …
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 …