“Into the Woods” and into Elul
Aug 24, 2002 By Marc Wolf | Commentary | Ki Tavo
“Once upon a time in a far-off kingdom, lived a young maiden, a sad young lad, and a childless bakery” thus opens the story that develops into Stephen Sondheim’s current revival on Broadway, Into the Woods. Cleverly weaving our classic fairy tales from the Brothers Grimm, Sondheim composes a fable with classic, yet new significance. He begins with the foundation of the moral lessons of the children’s fairy tales like Cinderella, Little Red Riding Hood and Jack and the Beanstalk, and builds upon them by watching as their characters interact with one another.
Read More
The Trouble with the Rebellious Child
Aug 17, 2002 By Joshua Heller | Commentary | Ki Tetzei
There are those who think that the world and human nature, are ordered and deterministic, that people can be profiled and categorized, their behavior predicted by psychological or statistical models. Having a child has made me newly appreciative of the role that disorder and unpredictability play in the world. On the day鈥搕o鈥揹ay level, all plans and schedules have taken on a new level of tentativity, and getting through an airport security checkpoint suddenly requires a whole new level of coordination.
Read More
Caring for Yourself and Others
Aug 3, 2002 By Lauren Eichler Berkun | Commentary | Re'eh
“ATTENTION PLEASE: In the event of a change in cabin pressure, first place the oxygen mask on your own face and then assist the child sitting next to you.” This airline announcement has always troubled me. It is difficult to imagine that in the midst of a crisis, a parent would allow a child to suffer while attending to his or her own needs. However, the practical wisdom of these instructions teaches us that there are times when we must take care of ourselves first, despite our best instincts.
Read More
Teaching Our Children
Jul 20, 2002 By Joshua Heller | Commentary | Va'et-hannan
The words of the first paragraph of the sh’ma, taken from this week’s parashah 惫补鈥揺迟丑补苍苍补苍, are among the most important in all of Jewish liturgy and learning 鈥� the closest thing we have to a catechism. The words of Deuteronomy 6:4鈥�9 proclaim the unity of God and declare the deepest commitment of faith. They mark the doorposts of the Jewish home, they are recited morning and evening and they were the last words of martyrs in many generations.
Read More
Like a Gazelle Crying for Water
Apr 29, 2006 By 91快活林 Alumni | Commentary | Metzora | Tazria
By Rabbi Aubrey L. Glazer
The gazelle is always in motion skipping through the mountains if she is not getting pierced by Thorn bushes. Surely she doesn’t feel it. Let’s say it another way. Already. She cannot delay.
鈥擜yelet Solomon, Aphorisms on the Persistence of the Gazelle (2004)
To give birth or to be given birth 鈥� that is the question! At the heart of this week’s Levitical regulations concerning the new mother is a highly legal section of Torah that seems less concerned with the new mother’s experience of birth than with how to conceptualize, order, and contain it through law.
Read More
Miracles of All Kinds
Apr 24, 2004 By Ismar Schorsch | Commentary | Tazria | Yom Hazikaron-Yom Ha'atzma'ut
Conspicuous miracles move us more swiftly and deeply than inconspicuous miracles. The latter elude our detection because they are an everyday occurrence. The commonplace numbs our sense of wonder, even as the daily experience of grandeur strips us of awe and radical amazement. It is surely one of the functions of religion to keep our wellsprings of wonder from running dry.
Read More
Rabbi Akiba, Bar Kokhba, and the State of Israel
Apr 13, 2002 By Ismar Schorsch | Commentary | Lag Ba'omer | Yom Hazikaron-Yom Ha'atzma'ut
The Jewish calendar is more than a catechism of our faith. It is also a synopsis of our history. The biblical festivals of Pesah and Shavuot frame the period of the Omer, which is laden with days of commemoration of events that are all post-biblical, indeed largely set in the twentieth century. We move quickly on an emotional roller coaster from Yom Hashoah five days after the end of Pesah (27 Nisan) to Yom Hazikaron and Yom Haatzma’ut the following week (4 and 5 Iyar) to Lag Baomer thirteen days later (18 Iyar). The linkage between the Holocaust and Israel, embodied in the first three commemoratives, is surely warranted.
Purifying Waters?
Apr 28, 2001 By Melissa Crespy | Commentary | Metzora | Tazria
“These are the verses that try men’s souls.” Or better, these are the verses that pain the souls of numbers of serious Jewish women. I refer to Leviticus 12:2鈥�5 in Parshat Tazri路a, and Leviticus 15:19鈥�24 in Parshat Metzora. The first verses describe the laws regarding the days of a woman’s “uncleanness” (tum’ah) after giving birth to a child, which last twice as long if she gives birth to a female child. The second verses refer to the “impurity” of a menstruating woman (niddah). Anything she lies on or sits on becomes “unclean,” and any man who has sexual relations with her also becomes “unclean.” While almost all of the Torah’s impurity laws became obsolete after the destruction of the Temple, these laws, regarding postpartum and menstruating women, remain on the books.
Read More