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From Teaching to Tikkun (Repair)
Jan 13, 2013 By Matthew Berkowitz | Commentary | Terumah
From the details of law to the minutiae of a building plan, Parashat Terumah moves us into the inner sanctum of the Tabernacle.
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Hamavdil鈥擳he Holy One and Separation
Jan 8, 2013 By Samuel Barth | Commentary
We tend to think that the role of religion is to affirm and support an increasing sense of unity in the world. There is much to support such a view. At the end of 鈥榓濒别颈苍耻&苍产蝉辫;(a prayer at the end of every Jewish service), we quote Zechariah 14:9, affirming 鈥� . . . on that day, Adonai will be One and God鈥檚 Name will be One.鈥� The text is enigmatic, but certainly speaks of a vision of great unity. Many other texts, in prayers and elsewhere, speak similarly of a quest and vision for this unity. Scholars of mysticism speak of the unio mystica, the experience of unification that is often associated with testimonies of enlightenment.
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Not Rhetoric, but Reality
Jan 8, 2013 By Marc Wolf | Commentary | Va'era
One of the more disheartening reports about Israeli society these days is that our brothers and sisters in Israel are simply not as concerned with the struggle for religious pluralism to the degree that we are in North America. Reporting , Ben Sales added his voice to the chorus of journalists writing about what many in the Diaspora consider to be of preeminent importance, but what many in the Israeli population are, at best, disinterested in.
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From Slaves of Pharaoh to Servants of God
Jan 8, 2013 By Matthew Berkowitz | Commentary | Va'era
The opening of Parashat Va’era shows God reiterating the ancestral promise of redemption to a still reluctant Moses.
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Morality and Memory
Dec 31, 2012 By Matthew Berkowitz | Commentary | Shemot
As we welcome this coming Shabbat, we turn to the second of the Five Books of Moses, Exodus.
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Keva鈥揔avanah (Liturgy鈥揚rayer)
Dec 31, 2012 By Samuel Barth | Commentary
My teacher in London, Rabbi Dr. Jonathan Magonet, wrote a fascinating and inspiring poem-meditation exploring the concepts of prayer and liturgy, which I would associate with the traditional rabbinic terms keva and kavanah (the connection is not 100 percent perfect). Our synagogues are often in fact places of liturgy, where prescribed rites and rituals are carried out, with the gathered congregation participating and/or witnessing. Many among us yearn and dream for synagogues to be places of something else, something more transcendent. Let us turn to selections from Rabbi Magonet鈥檚 words:
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Good for the Midwives
Dec 30, 2012 By Walter Herzberg | Commentary | Shemot
What exactly was the good that God did for the midwives? This question has engaged the commentators throughout the generations.
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Menuchah Nechonah鈥擯erfect Rest
Dec 20, 2012 By Samuel Barth | Commentary
鈥淕od filled with mercy, grant perfect rest, menuchah nechonah, under the wings of Your Presence, the Shekhinah . . . to the souls of all those slain, young children and teachers, at Sandy Hook School. May their resting place be in Gan Eden, the Garden of Eden, and may their souls be bound up in the gathering of all life. May they come to be at peace in their place of rest and we say: Amen.鈥�
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From Pain to Peace
Dec 20, 2012 By Matthew Berkowitz | Commentary | Vayehi
The response of Joseph鈥檚 brothers in the aftermath of Jacob鈥檚 death is dramatic: 鈥淲hen Joseph鈥檚 brothers saw that their father was dead, they said, 鈥榃hat if Joseph still bears a grudge against us and pays us back for all the wrong we did him!鈥欌�� (Gen. 50:15).
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For the Sake of my Brothers, Sisters, and Friends
Dec 19, 2012 By Samuel Barth | Commentary
The siddur is full of selections and quotations, from the Bible, the Talmud, Midrash, and even the mystical Zohar. There is great fascination and reward to be found in 鈥渦npacking鈥� the paragraphs and pages to which we return so often in the cycles of community (and private) worship.
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Unanticipated Consequences
Dec 19, 2012 By Marc Wolf | Commentary | Vayiggash
Joseph鈥檚 brothers got very lucky. What started as an act of malice inspired by jealousy and spite turned out to secure the future of the Jewish People. Did they imagine the implications of their action? Did Joseph鈥檚 brothers know that their initial plot of murder and their eventual sale of Joseph into slavery would ultimately save their own lives? No, they did not.
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It鈥檚 Not What You Say . . .
Dec 19, 2012 By Deborah Miller | Commentary | Vayehi
We have learned that two trees do not make a pattern鈥攊t takes three. So we have to look at a series of events in order to learn about Jacob. What can we discern?
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Seeing the Big Picture of Joseph’s Life
Dec 19, 2012 By Matthew Berkowitz | Commentary | Vayiggash
Over the past few weeks, we have been immersed in the story of Joseph, from the fateful gift of the striped robe, to his sale to the Ishmaelites and Midianites, to his imprisonment in Egypt, his meteoric rise, and finally the family reunion.
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Or Chadash (New Light): Electromagnetic or Supernal?
Dec 12, 2012 By Samuel Barth | Commentary
鈥�Or chadash al Tsiyon ta鈥檌r, venizkeh kulanu m鈥檋eirah le鈥檕ro鈥� (Cause a new light to shine on Zion, and may we all quickly have the privilege to benefit from its radiance). Each morning, before reciting the Shema鈥�, there is a blessing that opens with a quote from Isaiah praising God, 鈥渨ho forms light and creates darkness,鈥� and looks back to the first great act of Creation鈥攖he creation of light and the establishment of cycles of light and darkness, designated as day and night.
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Fruits of the Land, Song of the Soil
Dec 12, 2012 By Matthew Berkowitz | Commentary | Miketz | Hanukkah
The Joseph narrative continues its dramatic twists and turns as Joseph, through his talented dream interpretations, rises to become the second most powerful figure in the land of Egypt.
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Holy Innovation and the Festival of Hanukkah
Dec 11, 2012 By Daniel Nevins | Commentary | Hanukkah
What is the essential message of Hanukkah, the beloved Festival of Lights? Like many of our holidays, this celebration is protean, shifting shape to accommodate our changing Jewish needs.
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Forgetting to Remember for Posterity
Dec 5, 2012 By Rabbi Abigail Treu | Commentary | Vayeshev
Remember the Sabbath day. Remember what Amalek did to you in the wilderness. Remember what God did to Miriam. Remember that you were slaves in Egypt. Memory is integral to our identities as Jews and as individuals. What happens when we lose our memories, or our ability to remember altogether?
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These Lights Themselves Are Holy
Dec 4, 2012 By Samuel Barth | Commentary
Soon we light the candles of Hanukkah, which symbolize so many things. In this reflection, let us turn aside for a moment from the complex history and theology, and allow ourselves to enter the realm of kodesh鈥攖hat which is holy. Hanerot Halalu (Siddur Sim Shalom, 193) is a curious text that we read, or sing, after lighting the hanukkiyah. It is not a blessing or a prayer, for it is not addressed to God; rather, it is a reminder to all who are gathered around the Hanukkah lights that we should not make use of them for any worldly purpose, for they are holy (kodesh hem).
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Shomer Yisra鈥檈l鈥擳he One Who Guards Israel
Nov 28, 2012 By Samuel Barth | Commentary
In the weekday liturgy, after the 鈥楢尘颈诲补丑, we find in the siddur a little-known sequence of prayer texts known as tachanun (supplications); it can be found in Siddur Sim Shalom of the Conservative Movement, pages 59 through 63. It is not difficult to detect some ambivalence about tachanun, for there is a long list of days on which it is to be omitted, including Shabbat and all Holy Days, and all days of celebration鈥攅ven the birthdays of famous rabbis.
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Assumptions and Appearances
Nov 28, 2012 By Nancy Abramson | Commentary | Vayishlah
Things are not always as they appear to be. And when assumptions are based on circumstantial or incomplete evidence, we are often surprised or disappointed by what unfolds.
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