Listen to an audio version I Am A Rock by Paul Simon A winter’s day in a deep and dark December I am alone gazing from my window to the ground below The earth’s beneath a freshly fallen silent shroud…
Tag: Messianic
B’reishit – Facing Our Other Side, East of Eden
As we begin to explore this story of humankind outside the Garden of Eden, we like Cain should be uncomfortable with our first encounter being fratricide. Yet if we are honest with ourselves, we need to admit that we walk…
Ki Tetse – Making Sense of the “Texts of Terror”
If we are to be perfectly honest, much of the law codes reorganized and restated in the book of Devarim seem oddly archaic, highly impractical, and at times, even disturbingly unethical! This week’s parashah, Ki Teitse is chocked full of…
Korach – You Say You Want a Revolution
Do you ever have a really bad day, when it seems like everyone and everything is working against you? Moses sure did. In fact it must have seemed to him like he had fourteen thousand and six hundred days like…
Emor – Kiddush Hashem
Listen to an audio version It is no wonder that Americans grow ever more cynical regarding organized religion. I think few people are totally surprised by the recently exposed sexual abuses that have been going on within Catholic parishes, since…
Tetsaveh – Do Not Forget!
The Torah portion for this week, Tetsaveh, literally “means you shall command.” It contains the remainder of the divine instruction for the building and operation of the Mishkan, the unique tabernacle in which Hashem promises to dwell with Israel during…
Shabbat Shuvah: Re-Righting Our Stories
Listen to an audio version “ I am now one hundred and twenty years old, I can no longer be active.” With that surprising realization, Moses begins his final address to the children of Israel. When Moses completes this address…
Tish B’Av – A View From the Rubble
People don’t get along all of the time. We are often tired or stressed out and it can be hard to keep our cool when someone cuts us off on the highway during the commute, let their kids run amuck…
Purim, the Church and Jewish Marginality
This is a “leap year” for Israel’s lunar calendar. The Jewish “leap year”, which occurs seven times in a 19-year cycle, has 13 months instead of the regular year’s 12. This is so that the lunar-based Jewish year should remain…