Pesach is one of our most joyous festivals and, for many of us, a definite favorite. It can feel odd, then, to conclude the holiday with Yizkor, the memorial service. Yet the pairing of celebration and mourning is central to Judaism and seems perhaps...
By Rabbi Roxanne J.S. Shapiro
• Published April 1, 2015
On the eve of our Passover sederim, we will sit and read from our haggadot. We will participate in blessings and retell the story of our exodus from Egypt. We will taste foods and point out their symbolism. We will give thanks.During the course of the...
By Rabbi James Stone Goodman
• Published March 25, 2015
Leviticus was his favorite book. He had several shelves in the category of sifrei drush — books of interpretation — that when we packed up his library he paused to linger among them before assigning them to the inevitable give-away box. A shelf of...
BY RABBI DALE SCHREIBER
• Published March 18, 2015
The Book of Leviticus opens in the aftermath of Divine Revelation and the focused energies of the wandering Israelites for building a portable sanctuary. They are still carrying the weight of a learned history acquired during their long sojourn in Egyptian...
Rabbi Carnie Shalom Rose
• Published March 11, 2015
This coming Shabbat, Jews the world over will be blessed with a uniquely “thick” liturgical experience. In addition to a lengthy Torah reading spanning the two concluding sections of Sefer Shemot (Exodus) — the double portion of VaYakhel and...
“Not-one, not-two, not-three” – those who attend daily services will recognize this as the method employed in counting the number of people in attendance in order to determine if a quorum, or minyan, has been reached. For millennia Judaism has had...
By Rabbi Hyim Shafner
• Published February 18, 2015
This week’s Torah portion, Tetzaveh, almost always falls during the week of the holiday of Purim, which this year will be Wednesday night, March 4, and Thursday, March 5. Purim was the day 2,500 years ago in Persia when Haman tried to annihilate all...
By Rabbi James Stone Goodman
• Published February 11, 2015
I preside several times a month over a small synagogue that opens onto the Royal Dining Room at Covenant Place, where mostly older folks live. I get a kick out of that name. I always think I’m on some kind of cruise ship – which I am.The kaddishim...
By Rabbi Scott Slarskey
• Published February 4, 2015
Do you know the Ten Utterances (sometimes called the Ten Commandments, even though they contain within them more than 10 discrete imperatives)? Do you believe it is worth knowing the Ten Utterances, or are you even aware of the story of the giving of...
Today’s college graduates are moving back home after graduation in far greater numbers than even a decade ago. This trend, scholars suggest, is a sign of a new life phase known as odyssey. Over the past generation, the typical stages of life have gone...
BY RABBI TRACY NATHAN
• Published January 14, 2015
By Rabbi Tracy Nathan Exodus is called the Book of Names in Hebrew (Shemot), and Parashat Vaera continues to remind us of the value of names. At the end of last week’s Torah reading, Pharaoh responds to God’s call to release the Israelites by making...
“These are the names of the Children of Israel …” With these words, the book of Exodus begins. And with the recitation of the names, we encounter a new chapter in the life of our people and our history. We move beyond the family drama of the book...
