Torah Columns
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If you would have collected a group of world-renowned military strategists, 40 years ago on Yom Kippur, Oct. 6, 1973, and asked them, at 4 p.m. Israel time, for a prognosis on the status of the events unfolding on the Golan Heights that afternoon, they would have probably told you Israel should be preparing the airport and shipping ports for a massive evacuation. And in all honesty, they would have been right. more
The Talmud in Niddah (31a) records that there are three partners in the creation of every human being: the Holy One, a father, and a mother. Scientific advancement has allowed the process to include what some might call an “assist” by medical professionals, but everyone’s genetic makeup comes from one male and one female, while G-d’s contribution makes it all come together. more
Every year, on Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year, we read the story of the expulsion of Yishmael (Avraham’s first son with his handmaiden Hagar), and the binding of Yitzchak (Isaac). Both are stories of the sons of Avraham, and both involved Abraham’s ability to be willing to sacrifice or let go, of a son. more
In our efforts to get closer to G-d in the days leading up to Rosh Hashana, every person employs a different strategy. more
The bulk of Parshat Ki Tavo is occupied by the Tokhacha, the great Rebuke that is promised to the Israelite nation in exchange for their infidelity to G-d. Prior to the curses and promises of destruction, there are 14 verses of blessing which, were we to keep our end of the deal, paint the Israelite existence in the Land as the most fantastic we could ever dream to experience. more
In our post feminist world, a case in Devarim 22 is very troubling. After consummating his marriage, a man finds that he hates his wife. Instead of following the Torah’s instruction for how to absolve a marriage through divorce (as described in Devarim 24), he chooses to invent charges against her that she was unfaithful, most likely to get out of having to pay her Ketubah. To save a few shekels, he tries to destroy her reputation. more
There is a strange little village alongside one of Israel’s borders that I came across on one of my reserve duty stints. Without detailing, for obvious reasons, its location, it was a curious place because I could not figure out how on earth it came to be in such a strange place. Any history buff who studies anthropology readily discovers that there are always historical, geographical and often economic reasons that will explain the nature of a city’s location and growth, and whenever I was on reserve duty in different corners of Israel, I always enjoyed my own secret game of sleuth, trying to uncover the mystery of how local villages came to be situated wherever they were. more
For as far back as I can remember, I have heard rabbis and community leaders utilize such catch phrases in public lectures as “We must stem the tide of assimilation!” and “Intermarriage rates are skyrocketing!” more
This week we celebrate Rosh Chodesh, the beginning of Elul, the month that leads up to Rosh Hashanah. In four weeks we will stand before G-d in judgment, and we will ask for a good year. One of the central prayers of the day makes abundantly clear the fact that on this day, at the beginning of the New Year, our fate is determined: “Who will live and who will die? Who in their time, and who in an untimely (young?) manner? Who (will die this year) by fire and who by water? … Like the shepherd whose flock pass beneath His staff, (G-d) passes His sheep (us) beneath his rod (club?)…” more
I can still hear the blast ringing in my ears, still hear the screams of the wounded, and still see the horrible images of that terrible afternoon. I still get a lump in my throat when thinking of Chana Nechenberg, a young wife and mother who has been in a coma these past ten years, or of Malki Roth, a 15 year girl full of so much life who is still, ten years later, a 15 year old girl, because she never reached her 16th birthday. more
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