Bereshit: Genesis 1.1-6.8

Creation and Relationship

Beginnings are a very powerful time in Judaism.  I guess the best place to learn about them is at THE BEGINNING.  When the Torah describes God creating human beings God says something strange: "Let us make humans".  The classic Jewish commentaries ask: "Why us?"  Clearly the Torah sees God as only One.  Who is God talking to?  Rash"i, Probably the Torah's most famous commentator says that God wants to use the humble "we".  Though it is God making humans, humans are such an incredible creation that God teaches us humility by saying "Let us make the human."  I can't do it alone. 

I think there may be another answer also. For us humans, creation of other human beings always requires relationship.  Sex is a manifestation of deep relationship and only through it can we create as God did.  Perhaps the Torah is teaching us that new creations require relationships to make them so.  

We are all now on the brink of something very new, and hopefully very creative.  To make this not just another year but a truly new creation, one that will be profound, requires these 2 things, humility and relationship.  May you merit the humility to learn from your teachers, and the ability to have deep relationships with those in your community through which you can learn so much and create something big.

Bereshit 2

Science and Creation

"In the beginning G-d created the heavens and the land."  Rashi (11 century) comments, "...The Torah is not attempting to describe the order of the creation...for if it was how could the Torah say, 'the spirit of G-d hovered over the water,' before it has spoken of the creation of the waters...thus it must be concluded that the Torah is not trying to tell us about the order of the creation at all."  This Rash"i seems a bit unconventional though it is a similar approach to that of Maimonides in the Guide to the Perplexed where he writes that if he had philosophically agreed with Aristotle that the world had never been created, he would have understood the story of creation in the Torah metaphorically. 

Today there are many arguments as to the need to teach creationism or science.  So many other religious people and indeed some of our fellow religious Jews may be apt to put their critical and scientific thinking on a back burner when it comes to studying Torah.    But the Torah wants us to keep our wits intact, not to shy from struggle when things are difficult to understand.  We believe the Torah is G-d's word, and our best spiritual guide, yet we do not compromise our G-d given minds and abilities, and our intellectually honest desire to make sense of both the text and our world.  Indeed, when we are willing to engage all parts of ourselves, all that we know in the struggle to understand Torah, only then is the world that was created from the Torah nearer to completion.

Berashit 3

Adam and Eve: Two Stories, Two Personalities

In this week's Torah portion, Berashit, the first humans, Chava and Adam are created.  The story of their creation is told twice in the Torah, the first in chapter 1 and the second in chapter 2, with many differences.  In the first story Adam and Eve are created at the same time in the image of G-d.  They are commanded to harness the world and rule over the creatures.   End of story.  In the second telling, Adam is created first from dirt.  G-d then breathes into him the 'breath of life.”   Adam is lonely.  G-d tries to find him a mate by creating all the animals but to no avail.  Finally G-d makes Eve from Adam's side and Adam immediately realizes that she is right for him.   G-d puts them in the Garden of Eden to watch over it and tend it.  The snake comes, they sin and are exiled.  According to Rabbi Joseph Solovetchik these two very different stories are metaphors for different types of humans, different paradigmatic personalities and approaches to life and the world.

This Shabbat give some thought to which story resonates most with you and why.  What can we learn from each about how to live our lives and how to achieve holiness and fulfillment?  May it be a Shabbat of great beginnings!

Noach: Genesis 6.9-11.32

The Power of Prayer

This week's Torah portion is Noah.  Many of the commentaries on this portion focus on Prayer.  But what does prayer have to do with Noah and the flood?  The answer I think lies in a question that is often asked about Noah: Was he really a righteous man compared to Abraham, or only righteous compared to the terrible people surrounding him (see Rash”i Genesis 6:9)? 

Indeed, Noah is the man who never speaks and Abraham is the man known for speaking up.  When God tells Abraham that He is going to destroy the cities of Sodom and Amorah, Abraham speaks up in their defense.  But when God tells Noah that He is going to destroy the world, Noah is silent.  It is precisely here, in the portion of Noah, that we must learn instruction for how to speak up, how to pray, and the power of words.  Only in us speaking and praying with true depth, not just seeing prayer as a reading of words, but as an intense, meditative Godly process can we create a tikun, a fixing, for the sin of Noah, the sin of silent obedience.

Lech Lecha: Genesis 12.1-17.27

Becoming a Vessel

This week's Torah portion is Lech Lecha in which God tells Abraham to leave his land, his family and his birthplace, and "go to a land which I will show you."   Why, ask the commentaries, doesn't God just tell him where he is being led; to the Land of Israel?  Why all the mystery?  The Sefat Emet, Rabbi Yehudah Leib Alter of Ger (19c.), answers that there is something valuable to be learned from following without full knowledge.  Abraham is forced to give up so much with out retaining control over his destiny.  There is great value in making oneself a vessel for the will of the Divine, letting go of our need for control and dominance.  At times, it is only through this nullification of the self that we can become fully open to spiritual experience.  May we merit a Shabbat of letting go of ourselves and our ties to all the physical, to become vessels of reception for the spiritual.

Vayera: Genesis 18.1-22.24

Abraham and Sara’s Tent

In the beginning of this week's Torah portion (Vayara) we find Abraham talking to G-d. Suddenly he sees three nomads coming toward him. Immediately Abraham runs out to greet them, brings them into his open tent and cooks them a meal. (It is this preoccupation with over feeding people that deems him the first Jew.) In contrast to Noah, whose place is a hermetically sealed ark, Abraham's place is an open tent encouraging hospitality. The commentaries suggest that perhaps this is why the world was destroyed in Noah's day and not in Abraham's, and why Abraham was the first Jew and not Noah.

We live at a time of great strife and we must live up to the challenge of Abraham, keeping our Jewish mission to be open and giving like Abraham and not sealed off and indifferent like Noah.  This attitude in Judaism is called chesed or kindness and is the source of many mitzvoth.  This week choose one new mitzvah of kindness to do toward another person.  Just one action.  In the merit of our chesed may the world merit peace and holiness.

Vayera 2

Outspokenness and Obedience

In this week's Torah portion, Vayerah, God tells Abraham that he is going to destroy the city of Sodom.  Abraham's response is, "Will you destroy the righteous with the wicked?  Perhaps there are 50 righteous people in the city...far be it from You, to kill the righteous with the wicked...will the judge of the entire world not do justly (Genesis 18:24)?"  God agrees with Abraham, though after bargaining God down to 10 righteous people it turns out there aren't that many.  Latter in the portion God tells Abraham "Take Isaac your son, whom you love, and bring him as an offering on the mountain which I will show you (Genesis 22:2).” Abraham does not reply to God but gets up early the next morning to do God's bidding.  (In the end Isaac is not killed, and so we are all here).  The question we must ask is:  What is the Torah teaching us?  Why in one place does Abraham plead with God for the lives of the Sodomites and yet say nothing when God tells him to sacrifice his son Isaac (Isaac was 37 years old at the time)? 

Perhaps there is a time to stand up, even to take God to task ("Will the judge of all the world not do justly?"), and a time to be a humble servant.  Perhaps they are both sides of the same coin of who Abraham was and what we must learn from him.  When do you think we should stand up (even to God) and when do you think we should be obedient humble servants?

Chayei Sarah: Genesis 23.1-25.18

Rebecca and Isaac’s Love

In this week's Torah portion, Chayay Sarah, "The life of Sara", Rebecca meets her intended mate Isaac for the first time.  When she sees him for the first time she covers her face with a veil.  The Rabbis tell us that Rebecca wanted Isaac to love her for who she really was and not for what she looked like.  Indeed Rebecca was known for her kindness and in fact its her great actions that tell Isaac's matchmaker earlier in the portion that Rebecca is the right woman for Isaac.  The Torah then says that they got married and afterward that Isaac loved Rebecca.  For Isaac and Rebecca love was not the reason they got married but rather their love emerged out of really knowing and appreciating each other for who they really were.  What do you really love about people?

Chayei Sara 2

Conversation’s of our Ancestor’s Servants

In this week's Torah portion, Chayeh Sara, Sara dies and then Abraham wishes to find a wife for Isaac who is 37 years old at the time.   (He signs Isaac up for J-Date but since he is the only Jew alive at the time no one else is registered on the web site.)  Abraham then appoints Eliezer his servant to find a wife for Isaac and makes him swear that he will go to Abraham and Sara's relatives to find a wife for Yitzchak and not to the people of Cannan.   The Torah then describes in great detail the trip Eliezer takes and how he finds Rebecca, namely by making a deal with G-d that whom ever he meets at the well and offers him water and water for his camels, she will be the wife for Isaac.   Rebecca meets Eliezer at the well and offers just that, then Eliezer gives her rings and goes to meet her family where he retells the whole story and the Torah records his words for us.

Rash"i is bothered by the long detailed depiction of Eliezer's trip and then the almost verbatim repetition of it in the Torah when Eliezer tells it to Rebecca's family.   Rash"i's explanation is that, quoting the words of the Midrash, we see from here that, “The everyday conversations of the servants of our ancestors were more dear to G-d than the Torah of their progeny,” for we see that latter in the Torah, when the mitzvot are given, they are given in much less detail than the story of Eliezer finding a wife for Yitzchak.

How do you understand this notion that the everyday conversation of our ancestors and even their servants is dearer to G-d than the details of law latter in the Torah?   How do you see the function of the first 2 books of the Torah which are mostly narrative, as contrasted with the last 3 books which contain a great deal of law?   What does this say about the purpose or purposes of the Torah in general?   Discuss amongst yourselves.....and have a Shabbat Shalom.

Toldot: Genesis 25.19-28.9

You Dig?

In this weeks Torah portion, Toldot, the Torah tells us that, "Isaac re-dug the wells his father Abraham had dug, for the Philisteins had stopped them up.  Isaac renamed the wells just as his father Abrahm had."    If the Torah carefully picks and chooses what it tells us about our ancestors, why bother to tell us that they dug wells?  What are we meant to learn from this? 

The word for "well" in Hebrew is "Ba'er" which can also mean "to explain" or "to bring meaning to".  The Sefat Emet tells that our ancestors dug wells for water but that the Torah also means to tell us that they "dug into" the world to explain it to us in a unique way, to illuminate its spirituality which is often hidden.  This is the legacy our ancestors started and the gift they each gave to us in their own particular way through their "digging".  How do you dig the world to uncover its depth and spiritual meaning?

Toldot: Humility

In this weeks parsha Rebecca feels the children in her womb 'running about'.  The Torah says that she declares, "If this is how it is, why should I exist." and goes to seek ask G-d about it.  From her existential declaration and her trip to seek help from G-d instead of a doctor we realize that she is aware that the movement within her womb is perplexing in a very big way.  Indeed G-d's answer is, "There are 2 nations in your womb...they will struggle over power and in the end the older one will serve the younger one."   Her children, Jacob and Esav it seems, are destined from the womb to be enemies.  

Yet as Jews we believe people have free choice and the door for tishuvah, repentance, is always open.   In fact the Midrash tells us that Jacob and Esav were really supposed to be partners in starting the Jewish people, each being the progenitor of 6 tribes.   Why didn't it work?

The Torah describes Jacob and Esav as opposites, in look-one is hairy and one smooth, in place-one is a person of the field and one of the tent, and in personality-one is a trapper and one a simple man.   In theory they would have made great complementary leaders.   The power of a hunter with the depth of a studious man of the tent.   Why couldn't Esav be Jacob's partner?   Why in the end must Jacob do it alone combining his own voice (the voice of Jacob) with the hands and power of his brother (the hands of Esav)?

The Shem MiShmuel a Chassidic commentary on the Torah says that Esav, like all of us, was not bad in and of himself.  He had great potential.  Very different than Jacob's strengths and potential but none the less his power could have been used in the right way.   The Shem Mishumel says that this is why Isaac wanted to give the blessing to Esav.  Though Esav is dangerous he feels giving him the blessing will impart a certain holiness to Esav and tweak him to use his powers for good.  What Isaac did not realize though says the Shem Mishumel is that Esav was also a baal gavah, a haughty person without humility.  Haughtiness he says is like a black hole.   Some things are so dark that no light, no holiness, can exist in them, in haughtiness and ego all holiness is absorbed and blotted out.   Holiness will not help one who is haughty because the holiness gets used to generate more ego.   The holiness becomes self directed, a source of further self aggrandizement.  This is ultimately Esav's Achilles heal.

This Shabbat let us the humble food of lentil soup as Jacob did and work on our anavah, our humility.

VaYetze: Genesis 28.10-32.3

Is Then G-d in this Place and I did Not Know it?

In this week's Torah portion, Va'yatzey, Jacob is running from his home and from

his brother Esav who wants to kill him.  The Torah tells us regarding the

beginning of his journey: "And he came to the place, and slept there with a

stone under his head.  He dreamed that there was a ladder stretching from

earth to heaven with spiritual messengers going up and down it.  God

appeared to Jacob and said, "I am the God of your fathers, the land you are

laying on I will give to you and your decedents.  Your progeny will  be

like the sand of the ground and will spread out and all the families of the

world will be blessed through you...Jacob woke up and said, is it possible

that this is a Godly place and I did not realize it?  What a place, this

must be the house of God."  The Talmud tells us that this place was Mount

Moriyah the future place of the Holy Temple in Jerusalem.

Have you ever been in a holy place and not realized it or not felt

it?  When have you felt it?  Why are holy places important?  What do you

think Jacob is teaching us?

Vayetzey 2

Spiritual Wells

This week’s Torah portion is Va'yetzey.  In it Jacob runs away from his brother Esav who is out to kill him on account of Jacob's receiving the blessing of the first born instead of Esav, who was the oldest of the two twins.  For the first time in Jacob's life he leaves his land, his family and his parent's tent.  The portion says, "and Jacob left Be'er Shevah and went to Charan."   The question is asked, why did the Torah waste words telling us that he left Be'er Shevah, being that it is information we already know?

Rash"I’s answers that when a righteous person leaves a place there is a certain blessing and holy aura that leaves also, this is what the sentence is noting by calling attention to Jacob's place of departure.  The Sefat Emet offers a more mystical explanation.  Jacob is leaving the Holy Land for the first time.  Jacob wonders how he will be able to take his spiritual life with him even into a place of exile out side of Israel.  The answer given is that we all do this each week.  We have a day called Shabbat in which we are in a spiritual atmosphere, more aware of the Divine.  Our Shabbat gives us the tools to go into the 6 days of the week, the days of the physical world in which God is hidden and yet find God even there.  Jacob too, leaves a place called Be'er Shevah literally "The well of the seven".  Just as shabbat is the spiritual well that feeds the 7 days of the week, so too Jacob achieved a high spiritual level in Be'er Shevah, in the Holy Land, and could then take that with him and use it to sanctify the place of exile to which he journeyed. 

Vayetzey 3

This week’s Torah portion yayetzey begins, "And Jacob went out from Be'er Shevah to go to Charon, and he bumped into the place and laid there because the sun was setting and he took from the stones of the place and placed them under his head and slept in that place." 

What is "The Place" that Jacob came suddenly upon?  According to the commentaries, it was indeed "the place," Mount Morayah in Jerusalem, the place where Yitchak is offered and the place that all the Jews will ultimately gather.   Indeed, after Jacob's dream he says "This must be the house of G-d and the gate of heaven." 

Jacob then dreams of a ladder ascending from the earth to the heavens with angels going down and then up the ladder.  Rash”i is perplexed by why the angels descend and then ascend, when ostensibly angels come from above first.  He explains that as Jacob leaves the land of Israel the angels from Israel must ascend back to the heavens and new angels, those of outside Israel must descend to accompany him on his continued journey. 

Jacob is at a transitional moment in his life, the dweller of tents is leaving his house for the first time and embarking on a journey that will lead him to produce the Jewish people.  When we read the text describing his dream it seems like a very significant holy dream.  The dream itself indeed seems so ripe with metaphor, such dramatic potential: a ladder to Heaven, angles, the gate of Heaven, G-d appearing at its end.  Rashi's explanation seems less than satisfying.  Why does Jacob even need to know that the angles are switching their guard? 

Perhaps precisely at this moment that Jacob leaves Israel to embark on building the Jewish nation and to enter exile, the uniqueness of the Land is a very important message.  Our generation knows well the trials of exile and the dangers of forgetting our true spiritual home, the Land of Israel.  We live at a time in which life in exile is quite good and life in the holy land is rife with some trials.  When leaving the land, it is important that Jacob see its glory and realize its holiness; that the angels from Israel are not able to be outside Israel; that the Land contains the house of G-d and the gate way to heaven.  On his way to exile he must feel the pangs of loss in leaving the place and the land.

On this, the first Shabbat of Kislev the month of rededication to the temple and the holy space, and on the parsha in which Jacob leaves the land for a life in exile, we must ask ourselves (and I also): What is our relationship to the land?  What does it mean to be in exile at a time in which we have a land to go to?  What does it mean to have holy space?  How can it -Jerusalem and Israel and Mount Morayah- help us connect to the infinite and how are we affected by not being in proximity to it.

Vayetzey 4

Finding the Divine in the Dark

This week’s torah portion, Vayetezey, describes the formative experiences of Jacob, the third of the patriarchs.   He runs from his brother Esav and when the sun sets he bumps into, 'the holy place', Mount Moriah.  There he has a dream of a ladder with angles going up and down and he prays, and names the place 'The House of G-d'.   The Talmud tells us that Jacob is the first person to pray at night, it is he we credit with the night time Arvit prayer.   Indeed it is appropriate that all the life changing events in Jacob’s life, the ladder dream, the exchange of his wives with out his knowledge, and his wrestling match with a man/angel, happen in the dark.  

Jacob we are told is the father of exile.  He spends his life on the run, in the dark, but it is he that is truly the father of our people.   His name becomes Israel, meaning to struggle with G-d and people.   Though we as Jews pray for redemption, most of our history has been spent in exile.   It is in exile that Jacob dreams and latter struggles, and then names these places.  He names them, Beit El-'The House of G-d', and Pineel-'The Face of G-d'.   Perhaps it is from Jacob that we learn not to feel that exile in our national life and darkness in our personal lives is a place of losing hope, but a place of finding the Divine house and encountering the Divine face.

VaYishlach: Genesis 32.4-36.43

Wrestling

In this week's Torah portion, "Va'yishlach", Jacob is traveling with his family away from his father-in-law's house where he has worked as a shepherd for 14 years.  He then does a strange thing.  After sending his family ahead Jacob wanders alone.  As he does, the Torah tells us that, "a man wrestles with him until the dawn".  Jacob's leg is hurt and the man (an angel) tells him he will have a new name-"Israel"-because he has "Struggled with man and with God and made it through."  The experience is so spiritually profound for Jacob that he names the place where it happened "Piney El" which means "The Face of God."  What do you think it means that Jacob, the father of our people, finds God in the midst of a struggle in the middle of the night?  Where do you find God, is it also where you might not expect to?  For humans, is struggle a necessary part of being in touch with the Divine?

VaYeshev: Genesis 37.1-40.23

Seeing the Good

This week’s Torah portion, Va'yeshev, begins by describing the relationship between Joseph and his brothers when Joseph was 17 years old.  The Torah tells us that when Joseph was tending sheep with his brothers "...Joseph brought slander about them to his father.  Israel loved Joseph more of all the brothers....and they (his brothers) were unable to speak with Joseph peacefully..."  Certainly everyone, no matter how righteous, sins at times. But why does the Torah specifically tell us this sin of Joseph’s, that he spoke badly of his brothers to his father?  In addition, how could he, Joseph the Tzadik, the righteous one, be guilty of such a crime?

Some commentaries justify Joseph's actions, proposing that perhaps he saw evil in his brothers and meant to tell their father in order that Jacob would discipline them.  Some also judge the brothers favorably explaining that what Joseph saw was not what was actually happening. Still others (the Seforno) blame Jacob for his bad parenting in favoring Joseph over his other children and thereby causing hated among them.

The Sefat Emet does not apologize for Joseph's, his brother's, or his father's actions.  He says that indeed Joseph was guilty of the sin of slander and that this is the reason he must descend to Egypt.  Latter he will become Joseph the Tzazadik, Joseph the Righteous.  The job of the tzadik, the righteous Jewish leader, says the Sefat Emet, is to take the good deeds of the Jewish people and bring them before G-d, ignoring the people's evil deeds.  Joseph needed to learn this in order to create unity among his people.  This is the lesson he learns in Egypt through the trials and travails, the tests and time in prison he is subject to.  Only after the experience of Egypt is he complete and ready to be Joseph the Tzadik.

Miketz: Genesis 41.1-44.17 

VaYigash: Genesis 44.18-47.27

Self Sacrifice

In the end of last week's Torah portion Joseph's princely goblet was placed by Joseph in Benjamin's grain sack.  Then Joseph asked his officers to capture the brothers and look for the cup.  Finding it in Benjamin's sack Joseph says to his brothers (who do not know his true identity) that they must leave Benjamin in Egypt as Joseph's servant.  Knowing this will kill their father Yehudah offers himself in Benjamin's stead.  Then suddenly, after a 2 parsha long charade, Joseph reveals himself to his brothers.  What is it about Yehudah's willingness to sacrifice himself for Benjamin that now lets Joseph stop hiding himself and finally exclaim, "I am Joseph your brother"?

Yehudah, the natural leader of his brothers and future leader of the Jewish nation, indeed the progenitor of King David, changes the most of any person in the story of Joseph and his brothers.  When Joseph is thrown in a pit and left to die by his brothers Yehudah stands up and says, no, lets not kill him, lets sell him instead.  But at that point, Yehudah, though willing to take a stand for what is right, is yet not yet willing to sacrifice himself for Joseph.  He is not fully able to stand up to his brothers and risk personal injury and alienation, by completely protesting the wrong.  Now though, at the end of the story, he is willing to sacrifice himself for Joseph's brother Benjamin.  Only then is Joseph willing to stop pretending. Now his job is done.

It is very interesting to look back over the last two Torah portions and explore the things that happen to Yehudah, with an eye to seeing how they effect change in him, and what we can learn about becoming people of holy action and leadership in our own lives.
 

Vayigash 2

In these last few Torah portions, coming to a climax in this week’s portion of Va'yigash, the Torah tells us of Joseph's brothers coming to Egypt to buy food and Joseph's difficult treatment of them.  Putting Shimon in jail, telling them to bring Benjamin and then hiding his cup in Benjamin's sack and threatening to keep him in Egypt, eventually bringing them to their knees.
 
Why does Joseph do this?  For revenge?  But Joseph is described several times during the episode as being on the verge of emotional tears, not hardened vindication.  To make the dreams of his brothers and parents bowing down to him come true?  But Joseph better than most knows that G-d is in charge ("G-d will interpret Pharaoh's dreams, not I"). Yet, the Torah does say that when Joseph first saw his brothers he remembered the dreams he had dreamt.   What does this remembering of the dreams mean if not to now make them come true?

I would like to suggest that the answer lies in the first verse of our Torah portion.  Joseph has said that Benjamin must stay.  The brothers are dumb struck, all is lost, they have promised their father they would be responsible for Benjamin and bring him back safely since their father Jacob expressed his trauma in letting Benjamin his only other child from Rachel go after Joseph his other child has been lost and is gone.   Now Judah comes forward and stands up for Benjamin.  With self sacrifice he takes responsibly.   Perhaps this is what the Torah means when it says Joseph remembered the dreams.   Not to make them come true and to make his brothers bow down, but the opposite, to make his brothers stand up for Benjamin, what they did not do for him and instead in reaction to his dreams, sold him away.   They must make up now for not standing up against the brothers when they wanted to throw him in the pit.  Indeed Reuven the first born (would be leader) says not to kill Joseph, but he does not stand up fully for him with self sacrifice.  He does not stand out against the crowd.  Now one of the brothers finally does, Judah.  Not the first born, but, and perhaps resulting from this episode, he will become the first.  The Kingship of the Jewish people will come from him.

Veyechi: Genesis 47.28-50.26

Closed/Open

In this week's torah portion, Vayichi, we are told of the death of Jacob. Strangely, instead of starting after the normal open line break in the Torah scroll that is typically found between portions this portion begins closed, with no space between its beginning and the end of the portion before it.   The Midrash tells us that the closed nature of the written text in the beginning of this portion reflects the closing that is happening in the text's narrative.  Jacob is dying and the hearts of the Jewish people begin to close as the enslavement comes. 

In contrast there is a part of the Torah that when written in the scroll, is formed in the exact opposite manor with lines written so open that they are more space than text.  The Shirah, the song that the Jewish people sing after crossing the Red Sea is written all open, with numerous line breaks in each line of scribal writing.

The Torah is thus to be read on many different levels.  Its punctuation itself reflects the nature and feeling within.  Perhaps part of the lesson is that Torah must be not only be read but felt.  One must enter into the Torah as it is read.  It is meant as a book of instruction and transformation rather than one of history.  May we merit this Shabbat to enter into the Torah as it enters into us, to become one with its opposites. To embody and learn from both the closedness of exile and openness of redemption that the Torah depicts.  

Shmot: Exo. 1.1-6.1

In this week's Parsha, Shemot, the Jewish people go down to Egypt and though they are successful and have land there, they are soon enslaved by Pharaoh.  210 years go by and Moses, a Jewish boy adopted by the daughter of Pharaoh emerges from the palace.   He sees an Egyptian beating a Jewish slave, knows instinctively that the Jewish slaves are his brothers and kills the Egyptian task master.   He then sees two Jewish people arguing and trys to break up their fight.  The ask him if he is going to kill them as he did the Egyptian, and Moshe realizes that what he did has become known and runs away to Midyon.  There he meets his wife, sees the burning bush and is asked by G-d to save the Jewish people.  

In general the Torah does not tell us much about people.  It is not a book of history but rather a book of instruction.  The Torah carefully chooses what to tell us.   We know a few hours of Abraham's life and indeed, though Moshe will be such an important figure in Jewish history we know only two stories about him before he becomes the Jewish leader at 80 years old.   Why are these two stories the ones the Torah chooses to tell us?   What insight do they give us about Moshe?  

The answer is obvious i think. The Torah wants to teach us something about Jewish leadership.  Moshe is not someone motivated by honor or position, indeed he is most humble and does not want to be the leader.  What does motivate him?   Justice and empathy.  All we know about Moshe until he is 80 is that when he sees an Egyptian taskmaster beating a slave, even though Moshe is the prince of Egypt he immediately steps in. Not only that but among his own people too, when there is a fight he jumps in to make peace.   The torah wants us to know that these are the qualities of a good leader.
May we merit to learn from Moshe this Shabbat and to surly pursue justice and peace!

Shemot 2

This week we will begin a new book of the Torah, Shemot (Names), the book of Exodus.      Jacob and his children and grandchildren have been living in Egypt for quite a few years when a new Pharaoh becomes king of Egypt.  He fears that the Jewish people, who have become numerous, will join with a potential enemy of Egypt and wage war against Egypt.   The Jews are apparently of Egypt but clearly not “Egyptian” and are suspected of being a potential fifth column.  

But why does the torah need to list the names of the people who go down to Egypt?  We already know all the names of Jacob’s children.  Aviva Zornberg points out that the Torah describes the Jewish people here as being so fruitful and multiplying so much they we were like a “swarm,” “va’yishritzu”.   The upside of a ‘swarm’ she says is that there is a great many; the downside though is a kind of insect like ubiquity, a namelessness.   Things that swarm are many in number but few in individual identities and names.  

The Midrash says that the Jewish people were almost completely assimilated in Egypt.   To be redeemed the Jewish people must find their uniquely Jewish voice.  This happens when they realize they are individuals, not just a swarm of people.   They then cry out to G-d and G-d hears their voice, and thus the process of redemption, the redemption of individuals that will form a nation, the redemption of a collective and potentially holy Jewish voice, begins.  

This Shabbat of the beginning of the redemption of Jewish voice and language may we merit to find our own uniquely Jewish and holy voices. 

Va'era: Exo. 6.2-9.35

This weeks Torah portion, Vayerah, contains the first 7 of the plagues brought upon the Egyptians. In the Torah's introduction to the seventh  plague ,hail, G-d tells Moses, stretch you hand out on top of the heavens and bring hail.  Rash”i is bothered by this strange phrase and quotes the Midrash which says that in order to bring the plague of hail God lifted Moshe up above the heavens.   This Midrash though, while making sense of the words in the verse itself, does not clarify the reasons for Moses' being raised above the heavens or what this really means.   Furthermore why is the Midrash inclined to say this regarding the plague of hail and no other plague, and what does it teach us?

The Shem Mishmuel, the Sochetchover Rebbe points out that the plague of hail is unique.  All of the other plagues were things that were part of the natural world.  Though water does not turn into blood, blood is something that we often see and are familiar with in the physical world.  The torah says that the hail (frozen water) had fire burning within it, a physical contradiction that can not survive in the world we know.  Fire and water usually annihilate each other, and are often seen as symbolic opposites.  This plague, for its existence, had to draw on things higher than the world we know. 

Indeed the miracles of Egypt wrought by Moshe bring up the question of how we as rationale Jews see miracles in general.  Maimonides has an interesting take on miracles and those of Egypt in particular.  in the Guide to the Perplexed, his book on philosophy, he approaches the tension between belief in miracles and believing the laws of science to be immutable as follows, “Although the rod was turned into a serpent and water into blood with out the existence of any natural cause that could effect these changes, the changes were not permanent and did not become a physical property.  Our sages have said strange things in the Midrash regarding miracles, that they are to some extent also natural, that when G-d created the universe with its physical properties, G-d made it part of these properties that they should produce certain miracles at certain times, the Prophets only said when they would take place, but the thing itself was effected according to the fixed laws of nature..."

May we merit much more time to study together such deep questions as these in our tradition.

Bo: Exo. 10.1-13.16

In this weeks Torah portion, Bo, the Jewish people are commanded their first mitzvah as a nation.  In order to leave Egypt in the morning, the previous night all the Jews had to bring a Passover offering.  According to the Medrash the Jews were almost completely assimilated into Egyptian culture, and so God wanted the Jews to slaughter and eat a lamb, one of the main Egyptian gods to show their willingness to separate from Egypt.  It specifically had to be barbecued, so that their oppressors could smell what they were doing, forcing the Jewish people to be public about their rebellion. But, If God is trying to separate the Jews from their Egyptian idol worship, isnt telling them to take the god they have been worshiping for 250 years into their houses for a religious ceremony a dangerous proposition? Why not just take them out quickly instead of giving them one last night eating their favorite god?

Perhaps part of the point of this mitzvah is to teach the Jewish people not to reject their past but to learn how to use it in a holy way.  Had God just taken them out, torn them from their enslavement and culture, the process would have been simpler but we would have missed one of Judaisms main messages, that we reject nothing in this world, but have guidelines on how to utilize such things for holiness. 

Slaves probably never eat in an organized communal fashion; they eat on the go when they have food (much like 21^st century Americans).  Now the Jews had to create pre-set communities in which to eat the lamb.  It had to all be eaten; none saved for a future time in which there might be no food, complete trust in Hashem was required.  They could not break the bones.  This is a meal of transition, eaten in hasty leaving, yet respect for it matters.  To a slave this is a new notion.  This lamb is for free people, not just a food, but conscious respectful communal ritual.

Bo 2

Bo: Lambasting the Egyptian God

In this week’s Torah portion the Jewish people are commanded their first mitzvah as a nation.  In order to leave Egypt in the morning, the previous night all the Jews had to bring a Passover offering.  According to the Medrash the Jews were almost completely assimilated into Egyptian culture, and so God wanted the Jews to slaughter and eat a lamb, one of the main Egyptian gods to show their willingness to separate from Egypt.  It specifically had to be barbequed, so that their oppressors could smell what they were doing, forcing the Jewish people to be public about their rebellion.

Exodus Chapter 12

3. Speak to all the congregation of Israel, saying, In the tenth day of this month they shall take every man a lamb, according to the house of their fathers, a lamb for a house;

4. And if the household is too little for the lamb, let him and his neighbor next to his house take it according to the number of the souls; according to every person’s eating shall you make your count for the lamb.

5. Your lamb shall be without blemish, a male of the first year; you shall take it out from the sheep, or from the goats;

6. And you shall keep it up until the fourteenth day of the same month; and the whole assembly of the congregation of Israel shall kill it in the evening.

7. And they shall take of the blood, and strike it on the two side posts and on the upper door post of the houses, in which they shall eat it.

8. And they shall eat the meat in that night, roast with fire, and unleavened bread; and with bitter herbs they shall eat it.

9. Eat it not raw, nor boil with water, but roast it with fire; its head with its legs, and with its inner parts.

10. And you shall let nothing of it remain until the morning; and that which remains of it until the morning you shall burn with fire.

11. And thus shall you eat it; with your loins girded, your shoes on your feet, and your staff in your hand; and you shall eat it in haste; it is the Lord’s Passover.

Your Torah navigator:

1. If God is trying to separate the Jews from their Egyptian idol worship, isn’t telling them to take the god they have been worshiping for 250 years into their houses for a religious ceremony a dangerous proposition? Why not just take them out quickly instead of giving them one last night eating their favorite god?

2. Why all the rules?  What would be wrong with eating it alone, leaving some over till the next day (mmmm…cold lamb sandwiches), or breaking one of the bones? 

3. If you were choosing a mitzvah to give the Jewish people to would prepare them for their new freedom what would it be?

A word:

Perhaps part of the point of this mitzvah is to teach the Jewish people not to reject their past but to learn how to use it in a holy way.  Had God just taken them out, torn them from their enslavement and culture, the process would have been simpler but we would have missed one of Judaism’s main messages, that we reject nothing in this world, but have guidelines on how to utilize such things for holiness. 

Slaves probably never eat in an organized communal fashion; they eat on the go when they have food (much like 21^st century Americans).  Now the Jews had to create pre-set communities in which to eat the lamb.  It had to all be eaten; none saved for a future time in which there might be no food, complete trust in Hashem was required.  They could not break the bones.  This is a meal of transition, eaten in hasty leaving, yet respect for it matters.  To a slave this is a new notion.  This lamb is for free people, not just a food, but conscious respectful communal ritual.

 Beshalach: Exo. 13.17-17.16 -shirah

This Shabbat has a special name.  Shabbat Shirah, the Shabbat of song.  In this week's Torah portion we read of the first song the Jewish people sing as a nation, the first communal prayer of thanks to G-d.  When the Jews cross the sea to dry land and are saved from the pursuing Egyptians they spontaneously sing out to G-d in thanks. 

Even though the Jewish people have been in slavery for 210 years, almost completely assimilated into Egyptian society and do not know the G-d of their ancestors, they are  in the moment inspired to cry out to Hashem in thanks.  Rashi expresses it this way, "Then Moshe sang: when he saw the miracles it moved his heart to sing..."  Moshe then leads them in song and teaches them how to channel this inspiration for spiritual connection to the Holy One.  Immediately afterward Miriam his sister takes a tambourine in her hands and the women go out after her with instruments, and Miriam sings a similar song. 

Let's anyalize this first formal prayer by our people to gain some insight into the nature of praying.  This first prayer by our people is the most basic most visceral prayer.  It is spontaneous, sang in response to G-d's presence and saving.  It is not structured but an eruption of song.  Singing is perhaps the most basic from of Jewish prayer.  The men and women pray separately.  It seems that instruments are particularly the domain of the women.  Indeed,  after hundreds of years in slavery the Jewish women have musical instruments that they bought on the road along with their matza.  The parsha moves us to ask ourselves what is lacking from our own prayers.  How we can learn from our ancestors and lay claim to moments of inspiration that have the potential to move us close to Hashem, as they did.  

Indeed the Talmud in Berachot paints a picture of prayer that occurs all day long.  When one enters a city that might be dangerous says the Talmud pray that God should protect you, on the way out pray in thanks, if you saw a shooting star, a mountain or an ocean there is a beracha to say.  Beyond the structured prayer services 3 times a day we have many blessings and prayers, available all the time indeed constantly required that help us to channel the moments of inspiration in our lives toward G-d.

Bishalach 2

In this week's Torah portion Be'shalach the Jewish people cross the Red Sea and their captors, the Egyptian army, is drowned in it.  The Jews then pray to G-d as a nation for the first time.    The Midrash tells of 4 groups when the Jewish People reach the sea.  One wanted to go back to Egypt, one wanted to jump in the sea, one wanted to make war with the Egyptians and one began to pray.  According to the Midrash Moses addresses each group with different words in the verse and reassures them that G-d will help them through this.  In the text though G-d says to Moses, "Why are you crying out to me, speak to the children of Israel and tell them to move ahead..."  G-d's message is, don't pray now, don't rely on me to save you, you need to move ahead.  The Talmud tells us that one man, Nachshon the son of Aminadav jumped into the water as the people were arguing about what to do.  Only then did the water split.  He was from the tribe of Judah, and for his act the Midrash says the tribe of Judah became the line of royalty.   Moshe does not become the King, his characteristic is to pray to G-d, to reassure the people, he is the great Shepard.  The King though, the leader par-excellence must act.

Yitro: Exo. 18.1-20.23

In this week's Torah Portion, the Jewish people receive the Torah at Mount

Sinai.  Strangely when they approach the mountain God says to Moses, make a

boundary around the mountain and keep the people behind it.  The Medrash

comments that a boundary was needed because in the people's spiritual

fervor they would just run headlong into the mountain in a quest to see

God.  But then at the end of the experience we are told the people shook

with awe and ran away.  So what is it, are we runing headlong into the

Divine or are we scared by it into running away?  Perhaps this is deep

contradiction is part of the very nature of powerful spiritual

experience.  According to the commentaries we humans are both drawn in

passion to God and yet at the same time fear the annihilation of ourselves,

the loss of our previous identities.  How are you both drawn to God and

also recoil from it?  May we all merit to receive the Torah this week anew.

Yitro 2

In this week's Torah Portion, Yitro, the Jewish people stand at Mount Sinai and receive the Aseret Hadibrot, the 10 commandments.  Though these 10 are no more important than any other mitzvot in the torah they are considered by many to be a kind of headline or categorical  index for all the mitzvot.  It is interesting that exactly 5 are commandments between us and G-d and 5 are mitzvot between people.  There is a great lesson to be learned from this.  Though Mount Siani is a moment of Divine revelation and deep spiritual awakening, the product of it is not a purely religious one but also a civil one.  Judaism is not a religion, not only a system to help us connect to G-d but one that is just as concerned about civil laws and conduct between people.  In fact a quarter of the Shulchan Aruch, the classic code of Jewish law is bushiness law, and includes other wide sections which deal with torts and damages.   Though these are not the usual areas religion deals with , Judaism is completely encompassing; not a typical religion but a system for living a moral, spiritual and joyous life. 

Mishpatim: Exo. 21.1-24.18

This week's Torah portion follows immediately after the giving of the Ten commandments at Mount Sinai.  Now God tells Moses the rest of the Torah's laws the Jews must know.  The first of those related are laws pertaining to servants.  If one has a servant they must be treated well and after 6 years they must be set free.  If the servant refuses to go free their ear is pierced next to the door post of the house (the mizuzah).  The commentaries tell us that the servant's ear is pierced because he did not listed to the message of the Torah which is, "the Jews are to be servants of the Infinite One, and not servants of people."  I never understood why a servant would not want their freedom until I spent a year in India as the Rabbi of Bombay.  There almost everyone has servants.  I knew a Jewish family that had a servant, and the servant and his family had been living with the master's family for generations.  The servant's father had even been a servant in the master's father's house a generation before.  The servant's family was so integrated into masters family that though the servant's family was Hindu and the master's Jewish the servant's kids knew how to sing all the Shabbat songs and prayers.  They were so close that if the master had died or moved away the servant and his family would have been lost.
Why do you think this mitzvah of the necessity of freedom is the first one given after the Ten Commandments?

Mishpatim 2

This week's parsha, Mishpatim, is the first Torah portion after the Jews have stood at Mount Sinai and consists of many laws, almost all of them civil and societal laws.  The first of these are the time limitations on servitude.  If one has a Jewish servant they must be freed after 6 years and if they refuse to go free you must bring them to your door post and pierce their ear.  Rash"i tells us that it is the ear that is pierced because this servant did not listen to that which G-d implied at Mount Sinai, that we are His servants and not servants of human beings, and this person wants to take a human master.  The process is done at the door post because it was the door post that the Jews put blood on when they left Egypt, rebelling against their human captors to enter into Divine service.   The Jewish people are only 50 days from slavery.  The first thing they must know is that to truly serve G-d, though it may be scary, requires an amount of personal freedom, responsibility and independence.  Only then can they begin to build a society based on Torah.  

Trumah: Exo. 25.1-27.19

In this week's torah portion Terumah we are told about the building of the first Temple in the desert.  God tells Moses to tell the Jewish people, "make a sanctuary for me and I with dwell among (in) them.  The commentaries ask, "shouldn't it say, make for me a sanctuary and I will dwell in it?  What does 'I will dwell in them mean'?  The Torah here is trying to teach us a deep concept.  We do not build holy spaces for God to dwell in, God in infinite.  Holy spaces act as an inspirational catalyst for us to allow God to well within each of us, not God forbid, to make believe God is confined in a certain place.  What holy spaces help you to facilitate God's dwelling within you?  How can you make more of them?

Trumah 2

 This week's Torah portion, Trumah, contains the first words told to us after the narrative describes Moses' ascension to Mount Sinai. Most of the portion is a long description of the building of the tabernacle, a traveling temple that the Jews had in the desert.

The portion begins as follows: "And God said to Moshe saying, 'tell the children of Israel; take gifts to me from each person according to their desire...and this you will take: gold, silver, bronze, purple wool...and oil for the menorah...And you will make a sanctuary for me and I will dwell among them. All I have shown you of the look of the mishkan (tabernacle) and its vessels shall you make...'" (Exodus 25:1-9)

The rest of this week's portion and all of next week's go on to describe in detail how to construct the tabernacle.

Read the following questions and discuss them. Then, read the texts below and discuss the questions again:

1. Why do you think the laws of the tabernacle are given to Moses first?

2. If we believe God is everywhere, infinite, and non-physical, why does the Torah ask us to build a physical space for God's dwelling?

3. If God just brought the Jews out of Egypt and split the Red Sea, then why does God need the Jewish people to provide the materials and labor to build the mishkan (tabernacle)? Why wouldn't God do it Himself?

Some Texts:

Rabbi Tarfon said, "How great is work, for even God (who is everywhere) will not bring the divine presence to rest on the Jewish people until they have done work. As the Torah says, '[They must] make for me a tabernacle and [then] I will dwell among them.'" -Avot D'rabbi Nason

"Change was very difficult for the Jewish people. Therefore, God gave them animal sacrifices because that is the type of service they were used to, not because it was the best type. God wanted to turn their sacrificial service of idols to the service of the One God." -Maimonides--Rabbi Moshe ben Maimon of Fez (formerly of Cordoba), 11th century (Guide to the Perplexed 3:32)

The Talmud says that for us today prayer has replaced the sacrifices. Doing the work of approaching God, exercising the ability of the human to reach beyond and encounter face to face the brute existence of the Most High, is what both sacrifice and prayer are really all about. This is service for no ulterior purpose than encountering the Divine one on One, and standing in relationship with God.

If we experience Being through relationship, as Martin Buber said we do, then the primacy of the experience of approaching, standing before, and interacting with the Divine, may be one of the most powerful and necessary things we can do as humans and Jews.

A famous Chassidic Rabbi once asked, "why does the Torah say, 'Build a sanctuary for me and I will dwell in them (plural)?' Wouldn't it be more correct to say, 'build a sanctuary and I will dwell in it (singular)'?

The answer teaches us that God really desires a sanctuary in each one of us.

In the beginning of this week’s Torah Portion, Terumah, Moses has just ascended Mount Sinai after the saying of the aseret hadibrot, Ten Commandments, and G-d now commands Moses to tell the Jewish People to collect funds for the building of the Mishkan, (Tabernacle), a moving Temple the Jewish people traveled with in the desert.  This Torah portion and several subsequent to it then continue to describe the details of the Mishkan’s construction.  Why do the commandments for building a tabernacle follow so soon on the heels of the revelation at Mount Sinai?  Indeed, why do the Jewish people, a nation that our Rabbis say saw G-d face to face at the Red Sea and at Mount Sinai, require a Tabernacle at all for relating to the Divine?  Furthermore isn’t it a dangerous proposition for a people so soon redeemed from a land of idolaters, to have a concrete place and gold vessels for worshiping an infinite G-d?

Rash”i, the great medieval French Torah commentator was perplexed by the same questions.  He answers that the Torah here is in the wrong chronological order.  In reality, says Rash”i, the Tabernacle was only given to the Jews after they had worshipped the golden calf and G-d realized their need for a more concrete form of worship.  Maimonides in his book, The Guide to the Perplexed, says a similar thing, that prayer and personal interaction are a higher form of connection with G-d than Temple sacrifices and communal service, but that the Jews, a nation 50 days from slavery, could not relate to things so abstract.

The Midrash though, sees the Mishkan in a more positive light.  The Midrash says that Moses was quite perplexed when G-d gave the commandments for the building of the Tabernacle and said, “Will You who even the whole universe can not contain, constrict Yourself in the Mishkan?”

The Midrash, Yalkut Shimoni, offers the following parable as G-d’s answer to Moses.  There was a king who had a young daughter.  When she was a little girl she would run to the king in the market place and he would pick her up, he was always available to play with her and talk to her.   When she grew up the king said, “It is not fitting for us to talk in the market place; I will make a special personal room for us to talk in.”  

So it is with Israel, says G-d.  When she was young I interacted with her everywhere face to face; at the Sea, in the Exodus and at Mount Sinai.  But now that she has grown up, received the Torah and become a complete nation, it is not polite (or profound enough) for me to talk to her in public like a child, rather let her make for me a Sanctuary and I will dwell among them.  

Do we have a Mishkan due to our lack of ability to interact intimately and maturely with G-d or because we have an even greater ability to do so?  Though growing up often changes the parent-child relationship into one that at first may seem less intimate, the potential exists, if we can mature enough, to have a relationship that is ever so much more deep and complex.  This Shabbat may we each personally become spiritually mature enough to have an even more intimate, deep and complex relationship with our G-d.

Tetzaveh: Exo. 27.20-30.10

In the beginning of this weeks Torah portion God tells Moses to command the Jewish People to take pure olive oil for the menorah which was to be lit each day in the Temple.  This is the first of the Temple services described.  The following Medrash (Tanchumah 5) gives some explanation for the menorahs so central and precedent place in the daily Temple service.

How beautiful are you my beloved, your eyes are like doves (Song of Songs1:15).  Why are the Jewish People compared to a dove in this verse?  When Noah sent the raven out of the Ark to check if the waters had receded the raven flew away on its own, but afterward when he sent the dove it came back with an olive twig in its mouth showing that the world was habitable again.  Just as the dove brought light to the world, so you, the Jewish People who are compared to a dove, shall bring pure oil and light a lamp before God, as it says, command the people and tell them to bring oilto bring up a constant flame.

How did the dove bring light to the world?
Is lighting the menorah similar to the doves light?
What kind of light should the menorah remind us to bring to the world?
As a Jew how can you bring more of this light in your life and world?

For the Jews in the desert after they dedicate the Temple the lighting of the menorah is the first service done (see Numbers) and for the Macabies latter in history when they rededicate the Temple the menorah is first.  Somehow the lighting of the menorah sets the stage for all other Temple services.  The Talmud points out in fact that the windows in the Temple were smaller on the inside and larger on the outside as if the spiritual light of the Temple was meant to radiate to the outside world.  The dove comes from the Ark (a special place) and returns to it and in the process brings light to the outside world, so to should we come from a holy place and return back to holiness, but in the interim bring light to a world that so needs that light.  This is what the menorah in the Temple (and in our houses on Chanukah) should remind us of.  We are like doves leaving the ark, bringing light to the world. 

Titzaveh 2

In this week's Torah portion, Tetzaveh, Moses is told to command the Jewish

people to take pure olive oil to light the menorah in the Temple.  The

menorah was lit each day as one of the first services in the temple in

Jerusalem.  The description of the actual fashioning of the gold menorah was

already described in last week's Torah portion among descriptions of so many

of the Temple's vessels such as the Ark and Table.  Following those

descriptions we have this week's command to light the menorah every day

followed by a lengthy description of the vestments of the kohen (high

priest).

Why does the Torah spend a portion relating the Temple's furniture and

vessels and another Torah portion describing what the kohen wore but between

them a few lines about the lighting of the menorah connecting the two

portions?  Indeed, the other many Temple services are not described here,

only the lighting of the menorah.  How to sacrifice animals and bring

incense is saved for latter books of the Torah, so why the stress here,

between the section of the Temple's vessels and the kohen's vestments, on

how to light the menorah? Furthermore, why use the menorah's lighting as a

transition between the Temple's vessels and the clothes of the High Priest?

Why not just put them together?

Perhaps the Torah does not want only to describe the Temple's vessels and

the clothes worn to perform its services without touching on the humanness

that must inhabit those vestments and use those vessels.  So we are told

about the menorah's lighting, something which can not be done without the

person of the kohen.  Fire can exist on its own, oil can exist on its own,

but bringing the two together takes a kohen. 

Why then use the menorah's lighting and not another temple service as a

description of the kohen's presence and necessity?  I would like to suggest

that the lighting of the menorah is THE Temple service par-excellence.

Indeed, in Numbers 8:1, after the Temple is built and dedicated the first

thing done is the lighting of the menorah before any daily sacrifices.  We

know also that the  Macabees, after rededicating the temple, look first for

pure oil for the menorah's lighting.

Why is the menorah so central?  Why is the essential role of the kohen

expressed in terms of the menorah's lighting?  Perhaps the answer lies in

the following medrash.  "The song of songs (which according to the Talmud

describes the relationship of God to His people) says: "behold how

beautiful, your eyes are like doves."  Why are the Jewish people compared to

a dove?  Just as when Noah sent the Raven it ran away but the dove returned

to the Ark with an olive branch in its mouth to bring light to the world, so

too says God my people shall bring light to the world when they light the

Menorah before Me with olive oil.

According to this Medrash the Menorah is the symbolic expression of the

Jewish mandate to bring light to the world.  The goal of our spiritual

service is not to, God forbid, satiate God with the death of animals, but to

bring light through our many services to a dark world where the Almighty is

hidden.  And so it is precisely the Menorah which sets the tone for our

Temple service and our lives as Jews.

Tizaveh 3

In the beginning of this weeks Torah portion God tells Moses to command the Jewish People to take pure olive oil for the menorah which was to be lit each day in the Temple.  This is the first of the Temple services described.  The following Medrash (Tanchumah 5) gives some explanation for the menorahs so central and precedent place in the daily Temple service.    How beautiful are you my beloved, your eyes are like doves (Song of Songs1:15).  Why are the Jewish People compared to a dove in this verse?  When Noah sent the raven out of the Ark to check if the waters had receded the raven flew away on its own, but afterward when he sent the dove it came back with an olive twig in its mouth showing that the world was habitable again.  Just as the dove brought light to the world, so you, the Jewish People who are compared to a dove, shall bring pure oil and light a lamp before God, as it says, command the people and tell them to bring oilto bring up a constant flame.  What kind of light should the menorah remind us to bring to the world. 

Ki Tisah: Exo. 30.11-34.35

In this week's Torah portion Moses is late descending Mount Sinai and the Jewish people, anxious without their new leader, make a golden calf to take his place.  Its funny really, they are so attached to Moses that they can't live with out him for even a few hours. Yet they find it so easy to replace him.  Perhaps the experience of the golden calf is not just about worshiping an idol but about where the people are at, and who they are right then.  Maimonides says that God did not really want animal sacrifices in the Temple to be the way for the Jews to serve him, but after they made the golden calf and announced "this is your G-d oh Israel who brought you out of Egypt," He realized that they were still like children, who could not encounter God on the mature level of prayer. They were still a people with deeply ingrained slave mentalities.  Who, like infants, could not go alone for more than a moment without their leader.  Ultimately, it takes 40 years for the Jewish people to mature into their personal spiritual relationship with God. 
How are you spiritually immature? How would you like to grow over the next 40 years?

Ki Tisah 2

In this week’s Torah portion, just 40 days after receiving the Divine Revelation at Mount Sinai, the Jewish people become anxious that Moses their leader will not return from on top of the mountain and they make for themselves a golden calf.   In the midst of their sensual, noisy, Dionysian worship of the calf they exclaim, “This is your God of Israel who took you out of the Land of Egypt.”  How could a people who had experienced the splitting of the sea and the giving of the Ten Commandments by God at Mount Sinai commit such a grave act of treason against their benevolent redemptive God? 

According to Rabbi Shlomo Isaac (Rash”i) the Jewish people are not so much rebelling against God as reacting primarily to Moses’ absence, like children with out guidance feeling forsaken by their parent.   According to Rabbi Moses ben Nachman (Ramb”n) they were indeed rebelling against God, not because they did not believe God had wroth miracles for them but because spiritually all they could relate to at this point was a concrete God to guide them on their journey, not an infinite One.

I would like to suggest an additional approach.  Though some commentaries argue that these Torah portions are not in proper chronological order, in the Torah as it is written the story of the golden calf proceeds directly after the laws of the Tabernacle and the Shabbat.   Both the tabernacle and Shabbat are places of kidusha, of holiness, in space and in time respectively, and both the holiness of the tabernacle and the holiness of the Sabbath are achieved through limitation and boundary. 

This Jewish people, only 90 days redeemed out of 200 years of slavery, do not know how to see the depth, and indeed the freedom, in limitation.   The Jewish people at this point are without focus and can not understand, as the existentialists often write, that only in limitation can their be true freedom.   Even their worship is unbounded, they want a God they can put their hands on and worship with abandon.

The midrash tells us that the tikun, the fixing of the sin of the golden calf, is that the Jews give gold of their own free will and from their hearts to build the Tabernacle and they give more than enough.  God does not limit their giving as before to only a half coin, but lets them give with abandon.   Their passion is curbed from selfishness into holiness, from their unbridled desire emerging an unbridled giving, to an other, to the community.  

According to the Zohar (I:61a), strangely one thing that emerges out of the sin of the golden calf is the ability to procreate.  Just as in the case of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden, had they not sinned they would not have had children, so too had the Jews not sinned with the golden calf they would not have had any children.   God now gives them the opportunity for true expansion, holy God-like creativity through their passion and thus helps the Jews where they are at to take what was sinful and transform it into holiness.

This Shabbat may we learn how to take our own idols and desires and transform them into building a tabernacle for God.

Vayakhel: Exo. 35.1-38.20

Jewish tradition believes that in the bible no word is extra and no pattern or juxtaposition designed with out reason.  So we must ask ourselves, why does the Torah relate in this portion, one after another, these three seemingly unrelated themes: the coming together of all the Jewish people, the Shabbat, and the building of the tabernacle (the traveling temple the Jews used in the desert on their way from Egypt to Israel).

Rabbi Mordachi Yosef of Ezbietz, suggests the following answer.  In the building of the tabernacle all the Jewish people became joined together in their hearts, without any one feeling greater than their neighbor.[  feelings of haughtiness toward each other.  ]   Though at first each person who came forward with a skill, did their part as an artisan and said, wow, this is really a wonderful piece of artisanship; afterward, when they stepped back and saw how each person’s work and art fit together with every other one to form one structure fitting together so well, as if one person had made the whole tabernacle, and that they were all so interdependent on each other, each realized that it was not their own skill alone but the guidance of the Divine One, that had brought together the Tabernacle.  They saw in the way that it all fit together that its greatness was not in each individual part they had made of their own skill but in the harmony of the whole as if made by one person, they understood that their creativity did not come from themselves but from the Divine through the hand of each of them.  How could they feel that their individual work was so great?  How could they feel that familiar ego of the artist when they had all taped into the same overarching and unifying Divine consciousness.

There for the Torah tell us of the Shabbat just before the artistry of the tabernacle (mishkan in Hebrew which means dwelling, for it was the place of the dwelling of the Divine), because the binding together, the joining of consciousness, comes from the concept of the Shabbat.  For all mitzvot that are done, not for one’s own ego, but for their own sake, have at their core the concept of the Sabbath.  The Godliness was only able to dwell in the tabernacle if all the pieces and all the individuals came together as one to form it, and because they realized how necessary each person was within this Divine plan none felt greater than their neighbor.  So Moses calls all the people together as one person with one heart, to be on the level of Shabbat, with out personal ego, and to come together as one and form the tabernacle, a place in the physical world of Divine awareness.

Rabbi Mordichi Yosef is saying that only when we act for the sake of a greater good, for God and for the sake of good itself, can there be a coming together in oneness, for if we act out of any other reason, then we are motivated by our own ego.  As Jews we are called to realize that our creativity and strength come not from ourselves but as a gift from God.  The farmer does not make the rain to fall or the seed to grow, nor does the potter imbue herself with the coordination and talent to shape the vessel.  When we realize this there comes a great unity of people, one in which none is greater than their neighbor, but all are cogs in a greater Divine plan then we find little room for judgment of others and slander of our neighbors.  Rather through all the cogs fitting together do we draw down the Divine presence through our cumulative creativity and action.  This is the message of the Juxtaposition of all three things.

God picks a man named Bitzalel to be the Tabernacle’s architect.  Bitzalel means “in the shadow of God”.  The lesson is that our creative ability, that greatest expression of our human capacity, our ability to ‘be like God,’ is only a Divine gift, our image of God, the human dwelling place in the shadow of the divine, not something we invented or a talent we should feel proud or hauty of.

The daat zikanim points out that the same words used by God to describe Bitzalael are the words used to describe God’s creation of the world.  Indeed what makes us like god is our ability to create, yet this ability itself is what comes from god.   

The human is a strange being, we are on one level animals, and at the same time like God.  We have self consciousness and can feel we have made ourselves at times and yet are all too much guided by our animal side

The types of work  forbidden by Jewish law on the Sabbath are learned from the types of work done to build the tabernacle.  The work done in the tabernacle was the opitome, the archetype of ‘creative’ work.  We on earth know God in his role as ‘creator’.  On the Sabbath we step back and realize that it is not I who have given myself the talent and creativity that is the most Godly aspect of my humanity, without which I am only an animal.  This realization provides the foundation for my attachment and relationships to other human beings.  My self, my aggrandizement, is gone and there is room and commonality with an other. 

 Pekudei: Exo. 38.21-40.38

In this weeks Torah portion, Pikudeh, we read about the Mishkan, the Holy Tabernacle that the Jews traveled with in the desert.  This was the place in which the Jewish people were able to most interact with G-d.  But what is it about the Mishkan that made it so conducive a space for sensing Hashem (G-d)?  The Midrash says,  "The only vessel that can truly be a source and retainer of  Beracha (blessing) is Shalom (peace).    Based on this Midrash the Sefat Emet (19c.) suggests that the tabernacle is such a place of blessing because its thrust is one of peace and unity.   Indeed unity, wholeness and peace are very interconnected and in fact share the same Hebrew root word.  The unity which is required for peace is not only a unity of people but a unity of the 'this worldly and the Godly'.  Now that the Mishkan is gone though what are we to do?  Says the Sefat Emet, we have Shabbat.  Shabbat is a kind of Mishkan, a sanctuary in time that also unifys.  Indeed, he writes, so many things on the Shabbat come in twos brought together, for examble, two loves of bread brought together and 'Remember the Shabbat' and 'Guard the Shabbat' are said by G-d together in the same unified breath.  May we merit a Shabbat of great unity and peace. 

Vayikra: Leviticus 1.1-5.26.

This week's Torah portion begins the third book of the Torah, Va'yikrah.  The book of Vayikrah is about many things but mostly mitzvot that apply to the Mishkan, the tabernacle.  The portion of Vayikrah this week speaks about several different kinds of sacrifices that were brought in the tabernacle, the Mishkan.  The word for sacrifice in Hebrew is Korban, or closeness.   Sometimes we find the idea of animal sacrifice strange, and perhaps, not very Jewish (though we seem to have no problem with brisket....).  Often the prayer book speaks of asking G-d to return the temple and its sacrifices to their place.  Indeed it seems there are deep spiritual reasons for sacrifices, weather we an grasp them or not.

Maimonides, the 10th century doctor and Torah sage, wrote two main books.  His book of law, the Mishnah Torah, the Second Torah, and his book of Jewish philosophy, the Moreh Nivuchim, the Guide for the Perplexed.  In the Mishnah Torah he has several sections describing all the details of all the temple sacrifices as described in the Mishnah.  In the Moreh Nivuchim (3:32) though, he writes the following: "The custom which was generally observed in those ancient days where the Israelites were brought up consisted in sacrificing animals in temples to certain idols...It was in accordance with the wisdom and plan of G-d that He did not command us to give up all these manners of service, for man naturally cleaves to that which he is used to...For this reason G-d allowed those types of service to continue, but transferred to His service those methods of service (sacrifices) that had formally been used to worship to idols....Sacrificial service is not the primary object of the commandments about sacrifices, but supplication and prayer are nearer to the primary object."

Do you think the concept of sacrificing in our relationship with G-d, giving things up in G-d's service, is important?  Why or why not?  Have you ever had a relationship that did not require sacrifices of some sort?

Tzav: Levit. 6.1-8.36

Shemini: Levit. 9.1-11.47

In this weeks torah portion, Shemini, the Mishkan, the traveling Temple the Jews had in the desert is completed and dedicated for use.  At the end of an 8 day dedication process the Mishkan and its Kohanim are prepared.   Aaron the high priest then blesses the people and suddenly a fire comes from before God and consumes the sacrifices on the alter and the people praise God.   Immediately after this, in the next verse the Torah tells us: "And the sons of Aaron, Nadav and Aviho, took their incense pans and put fire in them and incense and brought before God a foreign fire  which they were not commanded to bring.  And a fire went out from before God and consumed them and they died before God.  And Moses said to Aaron this is what God said, 'among those that are close to me I will be sanctified and before all the people I will be honored, and Aaron was silent'".

What do Aaron's sons do wrong?  Why do they do it immediately upon seeing the fire from God consume the sacrifices?  Why are they killed in the same way the sacrifices are taken a minute before, with 'a fire from before God'?  Why does this sanctify God?

There are many opinions in the Midrash as to what their actual sin was, from serving in the temple drunk to not having respect for their teacher.   I think it is curious that they do this immediately following the revelation of God in which God consumes the sacrifice with fire; and they themselves, instead of their incense, become the sacrifices and that it is called a foreign/strange fire.   

Though some say that the Jewish people were trying to connect with God when they worshiped the golden calf it was still a sin.   Many say that the Mishkan was given to the Jews to atone for the sin of the golden calf.  God essentially taking the desire of the Jews to serve a God in the wrong way and curbing it for better use.   But how is the Mishkan service different than the service of the golden calf?   If in both instances what the Jews really want to do is connect with Hashem, what is the difference if your sacrifice is a calf of gold or a calf of flesh?   I think the lesson God is teaching the Jews is that serving Him requires discipline now. they no longer are a childish nation of slaves, now they must grow up and serve Hashem in a defined way.   In a certain space, with certain laws and practices, no matter how inspired they are they can not bring a 'strange' fire when ever they want.  Aaron's sons are deeply inspired, but alas, the lesson of the Mikdash is one of discipline.  they were indeed holy, and so God teaches the people through them.  but the time has come for a new stage in the development of the people.   May we merit both, a burning fire to serve the Creator and the discipline to do so carefully.

Tazria: Levit. 12.1-13.59- Metzora: Levit. 14.1-15.33

This week we read 2 Torah Portions, Tazriah and Mitzorah.  A large part of this double portion outlines the laws of a biblical skin disease called Tzaraat.   Miriam, the brother of Aaron and Moses is struck with the disease soon after she speaks critically, and perhaps disparagingly, of her brother Moses.  From that episode our Rabbis conclude that one of the causes for Tzaraat is speaking lashon hara, evil speech and slander.   Why is Tzaraat a good punishment for speaking badly about others?  On one level, we know that a person afflicted with Tzaraat must leave the camp for 7 or 14 days, perhaps a fitting punishment and opportunity for solitary reflection on how to get along with and respect others.  

On a deeper level the Talmud says that a person afflicted with Tzarrat is as one who is dead. As Moses says about Miriam when she is afflicted with Tzaraat, "why should she be as one who has died?"  Perhaps it is fitting that the power of speech, the thing that makes us unique human beings, our ability to relate with language on an intimate level that makes us higher than the animals; when this is compromised though abuse of the gift of speaking, we sacrifice part of our humanness, resulting in something like death. 

This Shabbat may we all merit to truly feel love and respect for others and have no need for lashon hara, or its corollary, Tzaraat.

Tazriah 2

In this weeks Torah portion, Tazriah, focuses on a biblical disease called Tzara'at .  Tzara'at was seen as a physical disease that came from spiritual causes.  If a person had spoken slander, or done another similar sin, they would get Tzara'at.  The Rabbis tell us that Tzara'a only affected those on a very high spiritual level (such as when Miriam has the disease in the Torah after speaking bad about Moshe) since it was essentially a communication from the Divine, prompting one toward introspection.  The person with Tzra'at must leave the camp for seven days and the Kohen Gagdol, the high priest goes to them outside the camp to check the disease and declare whether it is better and the person can return or not.   The Sefat Emet sees this process not as a punishment but as a way of coming closer to God, "some achieve spiritual wholeness through coming close (to G-d) and some through distance."  We often think that if a person is distant from Hashem they should just come close, but says the Sefat Emet there is an avodah, a holy service to be performed through distance also.  Perhaps a new spiritual thirst to be discovered; a new space to be reflected upon.

Indeed the Talmud (Sanhedrine 97a) learns from a law in this week's Torah portion that distance from God will proceed the ultimate redemption and union with Hahsem, In the parsha the Torah writes that if the Tzara'at is not healed and spreads over a person's entire body they are, paradoxically, considered healed and purified. 

"It has been taught: Rabbi Nehorai said: in the generation when Messiah comes, young men will insult the old, and old men will stand before the young [to give them honor; daughters will rise up against their mothers, and daughters-in-law against their mothers-in-law. The people shall be dog-faced, and a son will not be abashed in his father's presence.  It has been taught, Rabbi Nehemiah said: in the generation of Messiah's coming impudence will increase, esteem be perverted, the vine yield its fruit, yet shall wine be dear, and the Kingdom will be converted to heresy with none to rebuke them. This supports Rabbi Isaac, who said: The son of David (the Messiah) will not come until the whole world is converted to the belief of the heretics. Raba said: What verse [proves this]?  It is all turned white: he is clean."

May we merit to find Hashem not only when we are close but in our distance and darkness also.

Mitzorah

In this week's Torah portion, Mitzorah, the Torah continues with the topic of Tzara'at, the biblical skin disease understood as a physical manifestation of spiritual difficulties; a kind of gift from God, a subtle wake up call to stir us into reflection.  Part of the cure process in fact was to be alone in exile outside the camp, probably the greatest place for spiritual understanding.  Indeed, Rabbi Nachman of Breslov tells us that if want to be close to G-d we must go each day to a place where people do not tread such as a forest, and there speak to the Divine.

The Torah in this week's parsha describes the disease of Tzara'at afflicting a house.  "When you come into the land of Cannan which I have given you as an inheritance, and I will send lesions of Tzara'at on your houses..."  , Rashi is bothered by why the Torah is so sure that Tzara'at will effect our houses, such that it seems written as something that will certainly happen, sent by Hashem to the houses of the Jewish people in Israel.  Though  the Talmud says that despite the Torah's description of it,  Tzara'at never effected a house and never will, Rashi explains that Tazra'at on a house come to the Jewish people in Israel because it can also be a good thing.  Even though it will necessitate the destruction of the house, through this destruction treasure may be found hidden in its walls.  (Though Rashi means this literally, perhaps Rashi is touching on a deeper metaphor here also, that destruction and pain can be the foundation upon which greater spiritual and self insight is also built),

The Chasidic master Rabbi Yehudah Leib Alter of Ger, like Rashi, is bothered by the Torah's surety that when the Jewish people enter the land God will put tzara'at on their houses.  He does not agree with Rashi"s reasoning though:  "Why is the Torah so sure that tzara'at will effect our houses?  Rashi explains that the Jewish people will, though knocking down houses, find the gold hidden in their walls.  But would the Creator of the Universe need to go through this charade?  Rather the concept of tzara'at on a house  is  that the Jewish people's mission on earth is to bring holiness and purity even in the physical dwellings themselves....this is part of serving G-d with all of your posetions, that  to the extent we are able we must bring the Spirit even into the physical things we own, even into plants and rocks.   This is the reason the Jewish people come into Israel, to make a place for the Divine Presence to rest in the physical world. Impurity will be in the houses themselves and we must create a tikun for this, a fixing of the physical dwelling back in to a spiritual state.  This is the true 'hidden treasure' (that Rashi refers to).  For what ever is most corporeal, precisely there are hidden the greatest sparks of holiness."

May we merit this Shabbat to sanctify and bring out the spiritual in ourselves and our dwelling places here in the physical. 

Achrei Mot: Levit. 16.1-18.30

Kedoshim: Levit. 19.1-20.27

in this week's torah portion, Kidoshim, the torah tells us. "You shall be holy because I am holy, I the Loard your G-d.  A person must fear their mother and father and guard my Sabbaths; I am your G-d."  Nachmonides asks why after the torah has given us many commandments that seem to make us holy in last week’s and this week’s torah portion, laws that govern food, sex and holy worship, does the torah reiterate the command to be holy?  Nachmanides’ famous answer is that one could technically keep the laws of the torah and still not be a mentch, still be a disgusting person.  Thus the torah demands of us that we go beyond the letter of the law in both our relationship with G-d and with people. 

What is the connection to the torah's next verse, to the commandment of fearing one’s parents.  Rashi points out that here we are told to fear our mother and father, whereas when the torah tells us to honor them our father is mentioned first.  Rashi’s explanation to the reversal of order is this: "It is often our nature to fear our father more than our mother and to want to honor our mother more than our father since she nurtures us."  Thus the torah instructs us to go against our natural inclination and honor our father in addition to our mother and fear our mother in addition to fearing our father.  

Perhaps the two verses are connected because the first verse tells us to go beyond the letter of the law and perfect our inclinations, the second verse tells us how, by compensating toward the opposite direction of our natural tendency.   That, as Maimonides says in his book of Jewish law, human nature is such that sometimes we need to go to the opposite extreme to end up in the balanced middle and the balanced middle of character development is where we aim to be.

Emor: Levit. 21.1-24.23

This week's torah portion is Emor.  The central part of the portion is about the various holidays, but before this the parsha discusses the Kohen and the Kohen Gadol, the high priest, and the restrictions that the Torah gives him on not being in contact with human dead bodies.  The Kohanim were not allowed to be in contact with any dead bodies except for those relatives closest to them.  The Kohen Gadol, the high priest, was not allowed to be at the funeral of or touch the body of even his closest relatives.   The Torah then tells us two other things about the Kohen, he could not marry a woman who had been divorced but could marry a widow, and the Kohen Gadol could not marry a woman who was divorced or a widow.   In addition we are told that the Kohen's body had to be physically perfect and whole to do sacrificial service in the Temple.  

These laws are very strange and seem to fly in the face of many Jewish ideals.  In Judaism preparing a body for burial or being at a funeral is a mitzvah more important than many others.  The Talmud tells us that if we are studying torah and a funeral procession comes by we must join it to show honor for the dead.   The group of people in each city that prepare bodies for Jewish burial is called the Chevarah Kadishah, the holy society.  In addition we know that the widow is to be taken care of and honored, and there is no stigma in Torah about divorce.  With regard to having a physical blemish, we know that there was great opposition between the Jews and the Greeks over such ideas.  The classical Greeks felt that the body beautiful was to be honored and worshiped, the Jews felt just the opposite, the body is only a vessel for the Divine soul.  And of course one of the first things the Torah tells us about Moses our greatest leader, the one the Torah says came closer to G-d than any other person, is that he had an injury to his mouth that made it difficult for him to talk. 

What then is it about the Kohen that he must not be in contact with death, not marry someone with a previous relational history, and be physically perfect?   Indeed when we think about what the Kohen does in the Temple after staying far from death the matter is even more perplexing -he sacrifices animals.  

While the fact of death is the thing that makes our lives meaningful, that motivates us to do something in the short time we have in this world; according to the existentialists death itself is also the mother of anxiety.  We are alive, Godly humans.  truly unique and seemingly meant to be, yet we are always only half here, death is the primordial chink in the armor of our selfhood.  As soon as we think of ourselves as eternal, as Godly (which we are) death comes along and reminds is that we are mortal, that we have a truly animal side, for we go to the dirt as they do. 

Perhaps for the Kohen to do his work, the work of the eternal spot in our physical, a work that is perhaps not part of this world, a work where death is controlled and used for a much different end and purpose than usual, for an eternal end.  Not in dust but in the divine service, the Kohen must for a time be not human but only divine.  Psychologically there is no room for the death anxiety we humans constantly carry, in his Temple work.  The Kohen must be free of things which are outside of him.  He is opposite of the leader or Rabbi who takes on the people's troubles, the Kohen is free from all things, all histories, to just be there.  He is not higher, just serves a different role and purpose.

May we merit this Shabbat the level of the Kohen, subsumed in the trans-mortal if only for 26 hours.

Bichukoti

This weeks torah portion, B'chukoti, speaks primarily of the blessings that will be given to the Jewish people as a community in the land if they keep the Torah and the curses that will befall the nation if they do not keep it.  The parsha also speaks of the mitzvah of ma'aser, giving a tenth of ones produce.  The Torah commands that a Jewish farmer who raises domestic animals (or grain) put aside one tenth of the animals to be holy.  The holy animals must be taken to Jerusalem and eaten there by the farmer.  The same was true of a grain farmer in the land of Israel, who several years out of out of the seven year cycle must bring a tenth of their crop to Jerusalem when they go with the rest of the nation to Jerusalem for the 3 festivals, passover, shavuot and sukkot, and eat it there.

The question is why.  The farmer is already obligated to give part of his produce to the needy and to the kohen and levi.  We can understand the need to require that the whole nation gather together in Jerusalem for each festival, thus facilitating a holy and unified community, but why must the Jewish farmer bring so much of his or her produce to be eaten by him in Jerusalem?  If the animal is holy just give it to the Temple, what is the difference where the farmer eats it?

The sefer hachinuch explains that the purpose of this mitzvah was not just to require that the tenth animal of a farmer be eaten in a specific holy city (Jerusalem), but to create a thrice yearly sabbatical for every Jew.  When they went to Jerusalem, the city not of farming but of study and spirituality, they would bring a tenth of their animals and grain thus having more than enough on which to subsist.  The farmer would then live out his "paid" sabbatical that he had saved a tenth of his produce for and spend time in Jerusalem just soaking up knowledge, torah and spirit.   Thus every Jew, farmer and scholar alike was forced to have depth in torah and take it home with them to their farming communities far from the holy city.  

The torah wants us to live lives in this world, but informed, deepened and suffused with study of our holy Torah.  This is an important message for all of us in this Shabbat of the week of Lag Ba'omer which will be this Thursday night and Friday, a day when we celebrate the life of one of our greatest scholars in Jewish history, Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai.
Shabbat and Lag Ba'omer shalom.

Bamidbar: Numbers 1.1-4.20

This week we begin the book of Bamidbar.  Though the Torah portion is about the counting of the Jewish people the word Bamidbar literally means, 'in the desert', and this book includes much of the Jew's travel in the desert.  The haftorah from Hosea speaks of the Jews leaving G-d for Baal, an idol.  The profit compares the Jews to someone leaving their spouse (G-d) for a prostitute (idol worship).  Toward the end of the haftorah though, Hosea says G-d will take the Jews back to Him.  Hosea says that G-d will seduce the Jewish people back to God, and speak to their heart, like a lover.  This will happen in the desert, says the haftorah, thus the haftorah is connected to the Torah portion.  The desert is for the Jews the place of courting G-d.  A place alone with their Divine love, a place with no distractions, and where the Jews must rely completely on, and interact only with G-d.  Their 40 year trip through the desert is not a punishment but a gift, a place to cultivate the Jewish peoples' spiritual relationship with G-d.
May we merit closeness with the Divine and with our people on this Shabbat,

Naso: Num. 4.21-7.89

In this week’s Torah portion, Naso, each of the heads of the 12 tribes bring an offering to the Mishkan, the Tabernacle.  The Torah repeats the same paragraph, over and over describing their offerings 12 times.   If the torah is so careful about extra words then why not just list the offerings once and tell us that all the tribes all brought the same thing?   At the end of this several page long process the torah tells us a seemingly unrelated thing: "When Moses arrived at the tent of meeting (Mishkan) to speak with Hashem, he heard the Voice from on top of the covering of the ark, from between the two cherubim".

Rabbi Menachem Leibtag explains that perhaps the Torah is telling us that G-d only dwells among the Jewish people, only speaks to us, when we are both unified and individualized.   Each tribal leader brings the same thing, but their motivations are not the same, their inner selves are not identical, they are individuals, they each must have their unique spotlight.   Each of us, as individuals within the community is what G-d wants.

Behaalotcha: Num. 8.1-12.16

Meat and Whine
 In this weeks portion, Baahaloticha, the Torah relates:
Those traveling with the Jewish people (in the desert) had a desire, and the Jewish people also cried out and said, Who will feed us meat?  We remember the fish we ate in Egypt for freeand now our souls are dry because all we have is this mannaGod became angry and this was also bad in Moses eyes.  And Moses said to God why have you done evil to your servant (me) to put the burden of this whole people upon me.  Did I give birth to this nation, that you say to me carry them in your bosom like the one who is nursing carries her child?  I am not able to carry them aloneif this is how it will be please kill me now (Numbers chap. 11)
 
Compare the preceding paragraph with Moses response to God after God has told Moses that He is going to destroy the Jewish people for worshiping the golden calf in Exodus:
Moses responded to God, this people has done a great sin and made for themselves a god of gold, tolerate their sin, for if you will not (forgive them), then erase me from your book which have written. (Exodus 32:31-32) 
 
-Why does Moses so defend the Jewish people after they worship the golden calf and now, when they are whining for meat, instead of asking God for forgiveness for the people or chastising them directly Moses is willing to just give up on the whole program?
 
-Is there any theological difference between making a golden calf and crying for meat?
 
This is a people that experienced Gods direct influence in their lives at the Red Sea and at Mount Sinai.  In fact the Rabbis tell us that every Jew had such a powerful prophetic revelation at the splitting of the Red Sea, it was more than any Jewish profit.  So why do they worship the golden calf?  I think their desire for the golden calf emerged precisely from their spiritual self.  They were a young people, an immature slave nation who needed a concrete relationship to God.  The only way they knew to do this was through an image.  But their essential desire when they made the calf was for the Spirit.  In contrast the word used here in our parsha is hitavu taavah, they desired a desire, or they desired desire.  This was not about a people desiring the spiritual and not knowing how to relate to an infinite God.  This is about a people so sunk into their own selves that the only thing they can relate is their own lust.  They lust for lust itselffor their selfish selves.  When the Jews worshiped the golden calf it showed they had deep spiritual potential (though it may have been misdirected), now though perhaps Moses is not so sure this is even the right people to be Gods nation.  Perhaps, thinks Moses, they dont really have the inner spiritual spark.  For us too, sometimes it is not that we have no spiritual desire though it may feel that way, its just that we like the Jews who worship the golden calf, need to find the outlet that will inspire us.

Shlach: Num. 13.1-15.41

In this week's parsha, Shelach, the Torah tells us that G-d told Moses to send spies to spy out the land of Cannan in preparation for the Jews entering the land.   The 12 spies come back and 10 have a bad report, that we can not take the land, there are giants there they say, and we were 'like grasshoppers in their eyes'.  Calev and Joshua say, on the contrary, the land is very good and we can take it.   How is it possible that similar people, leaders of tribes, upstanding people, all see exactly the same land and yet have completely different views of it.   According to Rashi the 10 spies were good people, they meant well and wanted to go into the promised land, why were unable to see it in a good light?

Conversely Calev and Joshua are also heads of tribes, were also slaves born and raised in Egypt only one year before this.  Are they so different?  Indeed the sin of the spies is so great they will not enter the land but Yehoshuah and Calev will.  What is the difference between the 10 spies bearing a bad report and the 2 spies with a good report?

he Torah tells us that the sin of the spies was essentially one of Lashon Hara, of slander.   Lashon harah is not always the product of premeditated desire to damage another's reputation.  Often we are not malishious but we are lacking in how our eyes view the world.   How we see others is really the sourse of how we speak about them.   We must train our selves to be 'dan l'caf zechut' to judge people meritoriously.   We must be humble enough to do as the orchot tzadikim suggests, "If i saw a person less wise than myslef i would sy to myself, when i sin it is volitional, but twhen he sins it is out of lack of knowledge...." 

Maimonides says that one who speaks lashon hara all the time, who sees the world in a way that breeds slander, they lose their share in the world to come.   This si not true of one who eats unkosher all the time or violates other sins but lashon hara is apparently different.   Why is this so?  All things are tainted by one world view, even their ability to relate to G-d. 

Korach: Num. 16.1-18.32.

In the beginning of this week's Torah portion we are told about Moses and Aaron's cousin, Korach, who challenges Moses and Aaron's leadership saying, 'all the Jewish people are holy, why do you make yourselves (Moses and Aaron) above us'?   Moses speaks to G-d and relates to Korach that they should all bring fire pans and incense and see who G-d chooses.  In the end of the episode Hashem delivers a miracle and the ground opens and swallows Korach and his band of rebels.  

Clearly Korach was in the wrong in G-d's eyes, but could Korach perhaps have a good claim?  Indeed maybe there should be room for more diverse leadership?  In fact, when Moshe was told by his father-in-law Yitro that he should appoint a government of leaders and not just lead the Jewish people alone, G-d agrees and Moses establishes a cadre of 70 elders to help lead and judge the people.   So what is wrong with Korach's suggestion?

From a close reading of the Torah's text its clear that where Korach went wrong was not in his suggestion itself that Moses and Aaron not be the sole leaders, but in Korach's motivation.   The verses belay that Korach is only out for his own personal aggrandizement, motivated by ego and a desire to cause conflict.   Indeed, Rashi points out that the verb used to describe what Korach does is 'vayikach', and he took.  The Torah does not tell us what he took.  He took just to take, separation and fractionalizing as its own end, in service of Korach's ego.  This was his sin.  As Maimonides says, we must tread the golden mean with regard to all human characteristics, but when it comes to humility we must practice the extreme.

Balak: Num. 22.2-25.9

This week's Torah portion is Balak.  In it Balak the King of Moav has heard about the Jewish people's successful battles against other tribes and decides that to defeat the Jewish people will take more than might.  Balak askes Bilam, a powerful non-Jewish prophet, to curse the Jewish people.  In the end, though he tries to curse the Jews G-d will not enable him to he ends up blessing them.  Indeed part of Bilam's blessing has a place in our everyday morning liturgy.  The Talmud even tells us that Bilam's blessing was so powerful the Rabbis wanted to include it in the Shemah prayer.  (The Talmud says that because it would have made the Shemah too long, and thereby strained the people with unduly long prayers, they decided not to).
 
The Talmud spends some time finding hidden meanings in Bilams name.  One of the three interpretations/puns the Talmud makes on his name is that the name Bilam is a reference to bilow am or without a nation.   It is not entirely clear what this adds to the Talmuds understanding of the man bilam himself.  The Sefat Emet suggests a deep idea. He writes that a prophet needs the people more than the people need him.  Its not that the people need the prophet to connect them to the Divine but that the prophet is rather the voice of the peoples collective spiritual unconscious.  The prophet is but their mouthpiece, just as in an individual the mouth really just gives expression to the persons inner thoughts.  The Prophet takes the people latent spiritual strengths and brings them out into the world of reality.
 
And so, though the Midrash says that Bilam was as strong a prophet as Moses, he was lacking the people from whom to draw his spiritual strength, and so he had no power to guide his own people. 

Pinchas: Num. 25.10-30.1

At the end of last week's Torah portion the women of Moav seduce the Jewish people into idol worship.  Moses and the Jews don't know what to do, so they cry.  The Jewish people have been stricken by a plague due to G-d's wrath.  Just then Zimri the prince of the tribe of Shimon comes forward with a Moabite princess, Cozbi, and takes her right there in front of the eyes of all.   Moshe and the people continue to cry.  Suddenly a man named Pinchus from the tribe of Levi grabs a spear and thrusts it through both the Zimri the prince of Shimon and Cozbi the Moabite princess as they are copulating.   The plague stops and at then at the start of our Torah portion G-d gives Pinchus his 'brit shalom', a covenant of peace and an honorary Cohen appointment.  

Is what Pinchus did good or bad.  If good why do we require a special peace covenant from G-d for Pinchus.  If bad why does Pinchus receive the Lord's approbation?

The Talmud comments that one is not allowed to take the law into one's own hands.  if Pinchus had asked Moses what the law was Moses could not have told him to kill the Zimri, if Zimri had killed Pinchus first in self defence it would have been justified, if Pinchus had killed Zimri after his act with the Moabite princess was finished Pinchus would have been liable for murder.   Yet it appears that Pinchus did something good. 

Perhaps there are times when one must act, out of jdesire for what is right, sometimes outside the strict course of judicial due process.  In Judaism in order for the court to punish someone we require 2 witnesses and a pre-warning to the would be perpetrator of the penalty carried by the act he is about to perform. The Talmud, just before its discussion of Pinchus, says though that if there were reliable witnesses to a murder, but the murderer was not warned, then technically the murderer can not be given punishment and must go free.   Yet, in such cases at times the perpetrator, though he got off on a technicality, was killed in a roundabout way.  

Though we are a people wedded to strict legalism, and though Moshe does not act in such a manner in our portion perhaps we learn from Pinchus that, at least in theory, there are times when one can act with passion out side the course of strict due process for the greater good of the people.  

In this week's torah portion of Matot, the Jewish people approach the land of Israel after their 40 year trek in the desert.  Just before they pass over the Jordan River the tribes of Reuven and Gad notice that the land on the east of the Jordan river is very good for cattle and they say, 'we have a lot of cattle, let this land be our inheritance, and we will not pass over the Jordan.'  Moses responds, 'Will your brothers go to war and you will stay here?  Haven't you learned anything from the story of the spies, by not entering the land you will cause destruction for the entire people.'    Then the tribes of Reuven and Gad acquiesce and say, "Pens for our flocks and livestock we shall build here and cities for our children...We shall not return to our homes until the whole children of Israel have inherited theirs."   Moses responds, "If you arm yourselves before G-d in battle...and every man among you will cross the Jordan before G-d....then you may build cities for your children and pens for you cattle."

The biblical commentator Nechamah Leibowitz points out a fascinating difference between the words of the tribes of Reuven and Gad and Moses' response to them.   The do not mention G-d, just fighting, and Moses makes clear that they will fight but G-d will create victory, they fight before G-d.   In addition, the tribes put their cattle first and afterward mention their children, whereas Moses says 'Build cities for your children and then pens for your cattle'.

The tribes of Reuven and Gad are motivated here by anxiety about their wealth and livelihood.  Moses is motivated by concern for the whole Jewish people and for G-d's command.  It is interesting that these tribes' over-zealousness for their businesses not only make them want to skirt their communal responsibility and relationship to G-d but their own children seem to come second in their words. 

Perhaps the Torah is telling us that if our relationship with G-d is in order and our concern for the Jewish people, then our families will also come first.  But if we are taken by our business, our wealth, and ourselves then not only does our relationship with G-d and our community suffer but our relationship with our own also.

Though we work hard, may we merit to see our work as something that serves people and G-d and then our relationships with our children will be in order and they will learn from us.

Mattot: Num. 30.2-32.42- Masei: Num. 33.1-36.13

In this week's Torah portion, Matos-Maasey, the Torah speaks of a war the Jewish people fought with Midyan.  The torah command the people that any vessels captured in the war, if they were used in fire must by passed through fire (kashered) and then all vessels even ones only used cold (or new) must be dipped in the waters of a mikvah.   Though Rashi comments that this is to remove a certain level of ritual impurity and the Talmud says that this portion refers only to metal (and by relatedness to glass) vessels to be used with food.   Why is it that vessels to be eaten from require special purity treatment beyond concerns of kashrut and that this purification process only applies to vessels taken or purchased from a Non-Jew?  Why only to metal vessels?   Why does it matter who owned the vessels, and not just if they came in contact with ritual impurity and became impure?

Rabbi Aryeh Kaplan points out that just as all impurity is somehow connected to death, metal vessels are things that have the potential to be made into weapons of war and are not.  But then why not all metal vessels?  why only one's to be eaten off of?  Tosafot (a medieval commentary on the Talmud) points out that the rules surrounding the purification (tovaling) of vessels do not fit the general rules of impurity.  If a metal vessel owned by a Jew touches a dead body the vessel becomes impure, but today we would not purify it, indeed we can not purify it entirely with out the ashes of the red heifer.   these laws are unique and do not really fit into the general rules of purity and impurity.   these laws are specifically about taking the vessels of midyan in war, and by extension any vessels acquired from any non-Jew.   We can not make sense of it.

Never the less perhaps there is something to be garnered from the idea of our eating having an especially holy surrounding.   Vessels made or remade with the right kavvanah, holy intentions.  Eating is something we do often, a regular part of life, yet it is very powerful and often overlooked.   We tell people to "eat to live, not live to eat".  But perhaps the Torah's message is that eating should be neither of these.  Rather a holy act itself.  "Don't eat to live, eat with true life!"

Devarim: Deut. 1.1-3.22

After 40 years the Jewish people are finally standing at the entrance to Israel and Moshe launches into a book long soliloquies. Why?

The book of Divarim is composed of reminiscence and rebuke.  Moses, the Medrash says, has changed through receiving the torah.  'The tree of life brings healing to the tongue'.  Moshe goes from 'I am not a man of words' to 'these are the words which Moshe spoke'. 

But in truth Moshe speaks a lot in the desert prior to the book of Divarim.  Why is this book 'the words' which Moshe spoke?

Now, at the end of 40 years, Moshe and the Jewish people are at a different place.  There is a new quality to these words.  The medrash says.  'These are the words which Moshe spoke'...this is like the parable of a teacher and student who were walking together.  The student sees a precious gem glowing and picks it up only to discover it is really a burning coal.  Much latter they are walking again and they see another glowing ember.  The student does not want to go near it, but the teacher says, this time it is a gem not an ember.

So too Moshe.  His earlier rebuke of the people at the rock is 'listen here you rebellious ones', and he hits the rock.    But his sin is not just hitting the rock when G-d said to speak to it, but as the torah says, because you did not sanctify me in the eyes of the people.”

It was about Moshe, where he was at, his anger and perhaps some ego even.  This rebuke in the book of divarim is much different. It is not a direct rebuke but a review of the past 40 years.  Good and bad.  But indeed it includes, loud and clear, the failings of the people.  This is a different quality of rebuke.  Rebuke through going over the past.  Seeing what one has been and done can be rebuke enough. 

The Talmud says that if one does tishuvah (repentance) through fear their sins are forgiven, if one returns out of love their sins are transformed into mitzvot.  Very strange, how is this so?
The answer is that, all they were, if their tishuvah is in love, they are not leaving behind who they are, all that they were and have been through becomes part of who they are at this moment.  they have not left themselves behind.  If now they stand in a holy place all they have been was part of leading up to it; of creating the holiness, even the evil in their lives.  Not so one who returns to G-d out of fear, then there is a cutting off of their past,  they are terrified of it.

'Listen here you rebellious ones' is a rebuke out of fear, a cutting off of the past.  A rejection of who the Jewish people are.  In its view they are bad.  They are rebellious ones.  Not so the rebuke Moshe gives them in Devarim.  This is out of love and so there is a direct tie to their past.  It becomes part of the tishuvah, the return, and consequently the negative can be transformed into mitzvah, not cut off.  The Jews have perhaps changed, and certainly Moshe has.  He may be afraid now, as the medrah says, to give rebuke, but hashem tells him, no, now this will not burn you, where you are at now this will be a gem.   This is a tikun of the past not a separation from it, a tishuvah out of love, a rebuke born of reminiscence, and looking back at the self.

As we enter the 9 days, a time of tishuvah, let us keep in mind this lesson of tishuvah out of love and take who we are into the process of becoming transformed, not cut off.

Divarim 2

The whole book of Divarim, that we are now in the midst of reading is spoken by Moses to the Jewish people while they stand on the eastern banks of the Jordan river poised to enter the land of their ancestors.  When they enter Moses knows that some of the nations will not make peace with them but that the Jews will have to wage war for the land.   This week's Torah portion of Ki Tetzei  opens with an interesting law:

"When you go forth to war against your enemies, and the Lord your God has delivered them into your hands, and you have taken captives,  and see among the captives a beautiful woman, and desire her, that you would have her as your wife;  Then you shall bring her home to your house; and she shall shave her head, and pare her nails; and she shall take off the garment of her captivity from upon her, and shall remain in your house, and bewail her father and her mother a full month; and after that you may go in to her, and be her husband, and she may be to you for a wife;  and it shall be, if you do not want her, then you shall let her go to herself; but you shall not sell her at all for money, you shall not treat her as a slave just because you have humbled her."

The commentaries are perplexed as to why the Torah, which demands that even in war the Jewish people stay in a holy state would allow a solder to take a non-Jewish captive woman for himself.  The Talmud says, that the torah here speaks to the evil inclination.  In war there is a great danger that solders will rape enemy women, the Torah thus allows her in some way, but the solder must first bring her to his home even before having any sexual relationship at all with her.  She must take off her captive clothes and cry for her mother and father.  She must remove the hair that gives her beauty.  The solder must see her true self, not the captive woman he desired in a state of waring.  Why does the torah insist she remove her captive clothes as part of this process?  

According to the psychological studies of war, rape is very common in war not because solders have found someone they are attracted to and act out a sexual relationship through violence, but that they are still making war, they are acting out only violence, only its though a mode of sexuality instead of a gun.  Thus the Torah commands that she be a real person, not a captive woman.  The Torah does not allow us to have a relationship of power and powerlessness, of dominance and submission.   Only of respect and love.  As the Talmud says, "a perwon must alway be careful about the honor due to his wife (Baba Metzia 59a)."

May we merit this Shabbat of the portion of the protected captive women, that, as the torah teaches us, all our relationships be equal, honorfull, inspiring and holy.

Divarim 3

This Shabbat we celebrate a beginning and an end.  This is Shabbat Chazon that marks the week of the destruction of the Temple and is also the beginning of the last book of the Torah, Divarim.   The book of Divarim beings, "These are the words which Moshe spoke..." and continues for many chapters, consisting of Moses rebuking the people, reviewing the Torah and their past travels through the desert and giving them words of strength for when they enter the land in a few days.   The Midrash compares Moshe’s rebuke of the people in Divarim to a teacher and student who were walking together.  The student (Moses) sees a precious gem (rebuke) glowing and picks it up only to discover it is really a burning coal and burns himself (the episode at the hitting of the rock).  Latter they are walking again and the student sees another glowing ember.  The student does not want to go near it, but the teacher (God) tells him that this time it is a gem (the rebuke of the book of Divarim) and not a burning ember.

In the Midrash the ember is rebuke.  Moshe's earlier rebuke of the people at the rock when he hits it begins, "Listen here you rebellious ones..."  The result for him is disastrous.  He is now hesitant says the Midrash to venture words of rebuke.   But, this rebuke in the book of Divarim is qualitatively different.  Though it includes loud and clear the failings of the people, it is not a direct rebuke as the rebuke of the people at the rock was.  This time it is more of a mater-of-fact review, both good and bad, of the last 40 years, and thus does not lead to the negative results of the rebuke at the rock.  

Reviewing our life is indeed often a type of rebuke, but one that is not the product of anger and ego, one that is more organic and often more productive.  This Shabbat, a begging and end, is one that is very ripe for Tishuvah, review and repentance.   A Shabbat to review our year and see where we have failed in the realm of loving other Jews in order to bring, speedily in our days, a great and peaceful redemption to the world and the rebuilding of the Land of Israel.

Ekev: Deut. 7.12-11.25

This week's torah portion, Ekev, begins with the verse.  "And it will be ("ekev"), when  you listen to these laws and guard them and God will guard the covenant and the kindness which He swore to your ancestors."  The commentaries are bothered by this second word in the verse,  "ekev". I ts meaning does not seem to be clear.  The word indeed seems extra in the verse.  Our Rabbis tell us that the word "ekev" here is actually hinting at another closely related word, "akev", meaning heel (as in foot).  Thus rereading the verse as, "and it will be when you listen to the laws, especially those laws that people tend to trample on with their heel..."  Even the seemingly less significant mitzvot, those often treaded upon, may be more important than those that loom large.

The Talmud tells us that only twice does the Torah reveal the reward for a mitzvah.  When we are commanded to shoo away the mother bird before taking eggs from her nest, and when the Torah commands us to honor our mother and father.  Interestingly both these commandments carry the same reward.  Long days on the good land with God has given the Jewish people. The Talmud says that this is no coincidence, the Torah is telling us that a mitzvah which seems so important and difficult as honoring one's father and mother has the exact same reward as a mitzvah which is so easy as shooing away the mother bird, done with a mere flick of the wrist.  The lesson is an important one.  Hashem wants us to do all the mitzvot equally, not judge, through a cost/benefit analysis, which are better.

Hashem wants us to do them without an eye to their reward alone, as the Midrash puts it, God wants us to treat the mitzvot like a garden.  A gardener who only tends the big plants does not have a complete or beautiful garden.  So too we must nurture and pay attention to even the mitzvot which people tend to trample underfoot.  May we merit to keep even the small parts of Torah not out of a desire for reward but out of our love for it.

Ekev 2

This week's Torah portion, Ekev, contains the mitzvah of Birkat Hamazon, grace after meals.   the Torah says, "And you shall eat and be satisfied and bless Hashem your G-d, on the good land which G-d has given you".   Bircat Hamazon is so important that it is the only blessing which is commanded in the Torah itself.   The Talmud, in trying to find a source for blessings before food, says the following.  "We know that a blessing after a meal is required from a verse in the Torah, but how do we know to make one before eating?  It is a kal v'chomer, an a fortiori, we can learn a weightier, more obvious thing, from a lighter one.  That is, if one must bless Hashem in fullness, certainly one must bless Hashem when hungry."

A blessing before a meal it seems is more logical.  In hunger we are inclined to bless G-d more, but when full we want to move on, not to take the moments to bless G-d.  The Torah though tells us that the main time for blessing G-d though is not when hungry (though it may be more logical to do so) but when satiated.  Fullness, though it usually leads us away from G-d and to ourselves, is precisely the time to bless G-d.   It is a powerful time.  To bless Hashem out of fullness, out of bounty is very holy.  After we eat and are full is a time that it may be more difficult to bless G-d but its a moment of greater power and potential.

Ekev 3

This week's Torah portion, Ekev, begins with the verse.  "And it will be when (ekev) you listen to these laws and guard them and God will guard the covenant and the kindness which He swore to your ancestors."  The commentaries are bothered by this word "ekev". Its meaning does not seem to be clear and the word seems extra in the verse. 

Our Rabbis tell us that the word ekev here is actually hinting at another closely related word, "akev", meaning heel (as in foot).  Rereading the verse as, "And it will be when you listen to the laws, even especially those that people tend to trample on with their heel..."  The seemingly less significant mitzvot, may be more important than those that loom large. The Talmud tells us that only twice does the Torah reveal the reward for a mitzvah.  When we are commanded to shoo away the mother bird before taking eggs from her nest, and when the Torah commands us to honor our mother and father.  Interestingly both these commandments carry the same reward, long days on the good land with God has given you. The Talmud says, this is no coincidence, the Torah is telling us that a mitzvah which seems so important and difficult as honoring one's father and mother has the exact same reward as a mitzvah which is as easy as shooing away the mother bird, done with a mere flick of the wrist. 

The lesson is an important one.  Hashem wants us to do all the mitzvot equally, not judge through a cost/benefit analysis, which are better. Hashem wants us to do them without an eye to their reward.   As the Midrash puts it: A good gardener will tend the entire field of mitzvot to enable all of the commandments to blossom, one who only tends the big plants does not have a complete or beautiful garden.  So too we must nurture and pay attention to even the small mitzvot that people tend to trample underfoot.
May we merit to keep the holy torah not out of a desire for reward but out of our love for it.

Re'eh: Deut. 11.26-16.17

This week's torah portion, Re'eh, begins with the verse, "See, I place before you today blessing and curse."  The commentaries are bothered by several things in this verse.  Among them the switch in the verse from the word "see" which is in the singular verb form to the word "you" which is in the plural  In addition the word "today" is perplexing since the blessings and curses are not described in this Torah portion.

The Sefat Emet, Rabbi Yehudah Leib Alter of Ger (1847-1905) ,understands the verse to actually be referring to every individual at every moment:  "Every moment there are two paths before every person.  As the Midrash says, in the future there will come a time when God will slaughter the evil inclination before humanity, the righteous and the wicked will both cry.  The righteous will cry and say, how were we able to overcome this evil inclination  that looks as large as a mountain.  The evil doers will cry and say how is it that we were unable to over come the evil inclination which seems like only the breath of a hair.  Why does it seems so large to the righteous and so small to the wicked?  In truth, it is like a hair's breadth, but the righteous stand at a challenge and a cross roads every moment and choose good over evil .  As they deal with one difficult challenge after another the tests accumulate forming a mountain.  Conversely, the wicked never pass even one test never make one difficult choice and so they always stand still, never progressing, always poised behind a challenge the only the width of a hair.  As the righteous face new tests over and over the hair's breadths add up to form a mountain."

This is a deep idea.  Choosing good over evil often seems like a mountain, but in truth say our teachers, it is like a hair's breadth.  The trick is to see each test, each crossroads of choosing good or evil as a unique one.  Just this hair's breadth, not a lifetime of righteousness which can seem like a mountain.  Just this moment is what i must focus on to chose good over evil.   "I place before you today blessing and curse".  The secret is to see it only in the here and now, this moment is all I must conquer.   Eventually the moments will add up to a mountain climbed.  An important message as we approach the month of Elul, the month of internal inquiry and testing.

Re’eh 2

In the beginning of this week's torah portion, Re'ey, Moshe tells the Jewish People "See that today I put before you blessing and curse.'"  This Hebrew sentence, though, is grammatically incorrect.  The word 'see'  is in the singular and the word you is in the plural.  The Klay Yakar explains that the Torah is here referring to the idea that the Jewish People are all responsible (literally co-signers) for one another.  Kol yisrael avavim zeh bazeh.  Just as a cosigner must sit in the place of the borrower if he or she defaults so too the Jewish People are rewarded and punished before G-d as one family.  What I do affects you.   So Moses speaks to each individual, 'see you as an individual bring blessing and its opposite to all the nation and vice versa'. 

The Medarsh tells us that at Mount Sinai, in order to receive the Torah, the Jews had to be like one person with one heart.  Unity is so important to us as a nation that without it we can not have the Torah.   But why?  Abraham was a Jew alone, why do we need a unified Jewish people to be the Jews now?  To keep the torah now?  Why can't i just insulate my own community in St. Louis, Jerusalem or Brooklyn and be good Jews?

Perhaps the difference lies in the role that Abraham played as a Jew and the role we must play.  Abraham's Jewishness was about his finding G-d and the Divine harmony of the universe.  As the Medrash says that Abraham searched the physical world for 40 years to find that the world must have a higher sovereign.  But the Jewish nation in Egypt did not find G-d, G-d found us.  G-d wanted us for a mission, to be a light in the world.   Avraham did not need the Torah, but we can only do our job with the guidance of the Torah and only as a unified whole.  Our mission now is not to live as Jewish individuals having a spiritually fulfilling  life and a relationship with G-d.  Our mission is to change the whole world.   To bring light, guidance and blessing.  To gather in the wholeness and be an example of morality and nobility to other nations.

May we merit this Shabbat to be a light to all those who see us. Amen.

Shoftim: Deut. 16.18-21.9

In this week's Torah portion, Shoftim, are written two commandments about trees.  (1)Do not cut down a fruit tree even in war, and (2) Do not plant trees on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem near the altar.  The Talmud tells us that this commandment of respect for trees applies to all things.  The Torah is teaching us to have respect for all of God's world.  This second tree commandment, according to one early Chasidic commentary, is to be seen not just as a limitation on planting trees on the Temple mount but as a more wide ranging metaphoric lesson.  The altar represents prayer, how we connect with God.  Planting trees near it represents having something between us and God.  For Jews we relate directly to God and require no person or thing to help us make that connection.  Only ourselves and our own efforts and concentration. While respect and honor for God's world, even the trees in it, is such an important Mitzvah, it has limitations, we can not make God's creations more important than God or the people made in God's image.  We can not see the trees we respect as intermediaries, we must see God as directly accessible to each of us if we only focus and reach out to It.

Shoftim 2

This weeks Torah portion is Shoftim.  It begins with Moshe instructing the Jewish People with regard to creating a society once they enter into the Land of Israel.  The portion begins, "Police officers and judges you shall appoint in all of your cities...and they shall judge the people with righteous judgement."  The Torah portion of Shoftim is always read at the beginning of the month of Elul, the month which is spent in reflection and Tishuvah (return) in preparation for the Days of Awe.  Seemingly the portion of Shoftim has little to do with the month of Elul with which it coincides.  The Sefat Emet and others though, do find a hint at the beginning of the portion to this month of repentance. 

Officers and Judges apply to, and must be maintained at, not only at the gates of a city to keep peace but at the gates of one's self also.  How can we return during this month of Elul to the Divine from which we have become distant?   Begin with officers and judges, posted at the gates of our selves.  Create boundaries against sin, ego and the all encompassing physical desires we are all prone to naturally.  Make yourself a logical judge over your emotions.  Let the intellect guide us, not our ego, passions and desires alone.  If we can cultivate officers and judges within our selves the road to the spirit then may readily open.  May this first Shabbat of Elul be one of Tishuvah (return) and inspiration.  Shabbat Shalom.

Ki Tetze: Deut. 21.10-25.19

This week's Torah portion, Ki Taytzey, contains a mitvah [commandment] that we rarely have the opportunity to do anymore.  The Torah writes that if you find a bird's nest and you want to take the eggs from it to eat (a long time ago, before TV even, I am told that eggs came not from styrofoam but from birds...) you must first shew away the mother bird before taking the eggs.  Only in 2 places does the Torah list the reward for mitzvot.  In this case of sending away the mother bird before taking the eggs and in regard to the mitzvah of honoring one's parents.  In both the reward listed is the same, long life on the land which God has given us. The Talmud says that the reward for these two commandments is told to us since they are the hardest and easiest commandments.  Sending away the mother bird is as easy as the shake of a hand but honoring one's parents can be a lifelong undertaking.  Yet both have the same reward, in order to teach us that we do not do Mitzvot for their reward but because they are holy acts that God has given us.  May we all merit doing the mitzvot not for what reward they might bestow but for their pure sake alone.

Ki Tetze 2

In this week's Torah portion, Ki Tetzey, a new mitzvah is presented.  The Torah tells us that when the Jewish people go to war, if a solder sees a woman that has been taken captive and desires her, he must do the following before marrying her or having intimate relations with her.  "You shall bring her home to your house; and she shall shave her head, and pare her nails;  And she shall take off the garment of her captivity, and shall remain in your house, and bewail her father and her mother a full month; and after that you may go to her, and have sexual relations with her, and she shall be your wife.  And it shall be, if you do not desire her, then you shall let her go on her own; but you shall not sell her at all for money, you shall not treat her as a slave..."

The commentaries are quite bothered by how the Torah, which has such high moral standards for the Jewish people and expects us to keep our inclinations in check, could here allow a solder to take a marry a non-Jewish woman, indeed one who has been captured against her will.  According to Rashi (11C. French commentator on Talmud and Chumash)  the Torah realizes that in times of war the evil inclination is very powerful and is speaking to this special situation.  Solders are known for their abasement, often sexually, of captives.  Had the Torah not given guidelines for this situation, the solders would act immorally anyway.  Indeed the Torah's instruction here is very telling.  This solder's inclination is not full forbidden but not permitted in the heat of passion either.  He must take her into his own home first,  She removes her hair and her 'captive' clothes.  She crys for her parents.  Only then is she permitted to him. 

What do these rules speak to?  She no longer has her hair, is no longer is she dressed as a captive, and she bemoans for her own personal loss.  If he is attracted to her now says the Torah, it must be true love.  No longer is this the heat of passion.  Nor is this a dominance fetish for her as a captive, since she no longer wears those clothes.  Now for 30 days he has seen her cry, her feelings worn on her sleeve.  She does not focus on him but on herself and her innermost feelings of loss.  

Often, we are sexually attracted to people at first glance.  This, says the Torah, is not real and not respectful.  A deeper love emerges after becoming knowledgeable of a persons's self, after knowing their feelings.  Indeed, often the attraction that comes from the willingness to be open emotionally is more powerful than all the surface beauty in the world.  May we, as the year comes to a close, judge others and be attracted to others, not based on how they look, but on their depths.

Ki Tetze 3

The whole book of Divarim, that we are now in the midst of reading is spoken by Moses to the Jewish people while they stand on the eastern banks of the Jordan river poised to enter the land of their ancestors.  When they enter Moses knows that some of the nations will not make peace with them but that the Jews will have to wage war for the land.   This week's Torah portion of Ki Tetzei  opens with an interesting law:

"When you go forth to war against your enemies, and the Lord your God has delivered them into your hands, and you have taken captives,  and see among the captives a beautiful woman, and desire her, that you would have her as your wife;  Then you shall bring her home to your house; and she shall shave her head, and pare her nails; and she shall take off the garment of her captivity from upon her, and shall remain in your house, and bewail her father and her mother a full month; and after that you may go in to her, and be her husband, and she may be to you for a wife;  and it shall be, if you do not want her, then you shall let her go to herself; but you shall not sell her at all for money, you shall not treat her as a slave just because you have humbled her."

The commentaries are perplexed as to why the Torah, which demands that even in war the Jewish people stay in a holy state would allow a solder to take a non-Jewish captive woman for himself.  The Talmud says, that the torah here speaks to the evil inclination.  In war there is a great danger that solders will rape enemy women, the Torah thus allows her in some way, but the solder must first bring her to his home even before having any sexual relationship at all with her.  She must take off her captive clothes and cry for her mother and father.  She must remove the hair that gives her beauty.  The solder must see her true self, not the captive woman he desired in a state of waring.  Why does the torah insist she remove her captive clothes as part of this process?  

According to the psychological studies of war, rape is very common in war not because solders have found someone they are attracted to and act out a sexual relationship through violence, but that they are still making war, they are acting out only violence, only its though a mode of sexuality instead of a gun.  Thus the Torah commands that she be a real person, not a captive woman.  The Torah does not allow us to have a relationship of power and powerlessness, of dominance and submission.   Only of respect and love.  As the Talmud says, "a perwon must alway be careful about the honor due to his wife (Baba Metzia 59a)."

May we merit this Shabbat of the portion of the protected captive women, that, as the torah teaches us, all our relationships be equal, honorfull, inspiring and holy.

Ki Teytze 4

In this week's Torah portion, Ki Tzetzi, the Torah tells us the mitzvah of having just and correct weights for buying and selling: "You shall not have in your bag larger and smaller (inaccurate) weighing stones.  You shall not have in your house a standard measure and one that is bigger (non-standard).  A true and righteous weight shall you have, a true and righteous measure you shall have in order that your days will be lengthened on the land which G-d has given you.  Because anyone who does any of these things, these sins, is an abomination to G-d (Deut. 25:13-16). 

Some questions and thoughts: The Torah says that one who does business must do it honestly.  Our weights and measures must be correct and righteous.
1.But shouldn't we just be required to do business correctly, with honesty?  What does it mean to also do it righteously?  
2.Why should this mitzvah be one that lengthens our days upon the promised land?
3.Why does the Torah use such strong language in regard to dishonest business dealings, that the person who does it is referred to as a toavah, an abomination? 

MISHNAH (Bava Batrah 88b)
A SHOPKEEPER MUST ALLOW THE PROVISION SCALE TO SINK A HANDBREADTH LOWER THAN THE SCALE OF THE WEIGHTS. (Thus giving the buyer extra product.)
GEMARA. How do we know from the Torah that a seller must err on the side of over giving the buyer?   Resh Lakish said: the Torah states: A perfect and just measure [shall you have]. [This means], make [your weights] just by giving extra of your own to the buyer...Rabbi Levi said: The punishment for [false] measures is more rigorous than that for sexual immorality; for in the latter case the Torah uses the Hebrew word El ('these' abominations, the word 'these-' or 'el' being written without the letter heh) but in the case of false weights the Torah uses the word 'Eleh' for 'these' (written with a heh)...Why are [the punishments for giving false measures] greater [than those for marrying forbidden relatives]? In the case of sexual immorality repentance is possible, but here, in the case of dishonesty in business, repentance is impossible.

How you understand this piece of Talmud?   Why is it so hard to do tishuvah for dishonesty in business?  Tell me in shul.....

Ki Tavo

In the beginning of this week's torah portion Moshe tells the Jewish People that when they enter the land of Israel and farm the land, they must bring the first of their fruits to the temple in Jerusalem.  There the farmer would give his basket of fruit to the Kohen who would place it next to alter "in front of G-d".  The farmer would then recite a 5 sentence history of the Jewish People leading up to that moment, and say "and now behold i bring the first of my fruits which G-d has given me..."

The Midrash tells us that Moses saw in a prophetic vision that one day the temple would be destroyed and the ceremony of the firsts fruits would be lost.  he there for created the notion of prayer 3 times a day to take its place. 

A few questions:
1. A lot of services were lost with the destruction, what is so special about the first fruits that its abolition gave birth to the idea of prayer?
2. why must the farmer recite the history of the Jewish people with bringing the first fruits, such a declaration is not made for any other sacrifice, act or temple service.
3. Why is the first so important? 
4. what does it mean that there lines the farmer would recite became the template tfor the main part of the passover hagadagh?

Nitzavim: Deut. 29.9-30.20 - Vayelech: Deut. 31.1-30

This week's Torah portion, Nitzavim-Vayelech, begins by describing the Jewish people all standing together on the banks of the Jordan river just before entering Israel, and making a covenant with God.  Every one stands together, men, women, children and strangers, even says Moses, those not yet born.  The covenant the Jews make with God is  that they will be God's people and He their God for ever. A covenant always works two ways.  Some compare the covenant the Jews make to be a Godly nation with a marriage.  After the covenant of marriage two people may not act any differently than they did before.  The same caring and giving may be present.  The difference is that now they are duty bound to each other.  This sense of duty that the Jewish people as a covenantal community has to each other, is not incidental but precisely the point.  Duty and obligation are what make the Jews a unique community.  We are bound to each other and to God as a 3 way partnership for ever.  Its a covenant that can not be broken even by God...even when we ignore it.

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