I like to be in control. There’s safety and security in feeling as if you have authority in your own life. I like to plan my days, I like my suggestions to be implemented, and I like to solve my own problems. I realize the irony in this claim after...

Over the past several years, we have called on professionals to remodel different parts of our home.  Every time we met with one of them, he or she would dazzle us with swatches and squares and plans and colors and fabrics and dimensions until my eyes...

After 61 chapters, 14 parashiyot, of dramatic, thought-provoking narrative, Exodus 12 transitions into law. At that point, the Israelite calendar, a mark of distinctiveness, is instituted and permanently inserted into the nascent nation’s rhythm.  ...

Reading the Torah portions every week has become an extremely humbling experience. When I originally pitched this “Matzah Ball Soup For the Soul” idea, I was sure I could find a way to take all my private-Jewish-day-school education and teach something...

We live in an age and a society which is skeptical of heavenly visions.  The prophet Isaiah, however, felt no such reticence.  In the Haftorah connected with this week’s parsha, he painted a vivid picture of God’s throne surrounded by angels, and...

Academia and religion have been feuding for centuries, and still I find them difficult to reconcile. Obviously, the conflict has lessened. We don’t punish people for studying science, for discovering realities that diverge from religious beliefs, but...

The Exodus story is the biblical account of the birth of the people Israel. Our Torah Portion this week, B’shalach, Exodus 13:17-17:16, relates the latter part of the Exodus saga. Chapter 15 of the Book of Exodus is the heart of this week’s parashah....

Bad things happen. They come in different levels of severity and affect everyone in different ways, but they happen nonetheless. We lose loved ones, we make mistakes, we fall ill and we say the wrong things. I mean this in the most matter-of-fact way....

It’s strange the sort of emphasis that’s put on New Years. We have 12 new months, 52 new weeks, and even 365 new days, yet so many people see January 1st as a day of redemption — when past mistakes and grievances disintegrate and we can start fresh....

In this week’s Torah portion, Vaera, God asks Moses for the fourth time to, “Go tell Pharaoh to let my people go,” to which Moses again  refuses God’s command.  Moses seems to be so reluctant to do God’s bidding as to be recalcitrant and rebellious. ...

My grandma is sick. I say this with overwhelming blatancy because when someone close to you falls ill, your emotions can’t beat around the bush or be comforted by euphemisms. Four months ago, she dressed herself in high heels and sequined tops to meet...

Our Torah portion, and thus this book of our Torah, is titled “Shemot” or “Names”.  As we know, the title is often taken from the first few words of the portion.   Yet another name that was used for this portion was “sefer yetsi’at Mitzrayim”...