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The Bones We Carry
Apr 18, 2025 By Abigail Uhrman | Commentary | Pesah
Consider the scene: after over 200 years of slavery, the Israelites, at long last, are preparing to depart. They are frantically gathering their belongings—gold, silver, all their earthly possessions—and scrambling to prepare food for their journey. In this urgent rush, Moses, rather than attending to the needs of the people and their immediate concerns, embarks on a singular mission: to retrieve the bones of Joseph, fulfilling a centuries-old promise. It begs the question: Why, in the midst of these epic events, does the Torah highlight this seemingly minor detail? What is the significance of Moses’s dedication to this task, his resolute commitment to honoring a promise made generations ago?
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Can We Sanctify Incivility?
Apr 11, 2025 By Gordon Tucker | Commentary | Shabbat Hagadol | Tzav
Parashat Tzav opens with instructions for the olah, the offering (primarily the twice-daily sacrifice) that is entirely burnt on the altar. The ninth chapter of the talmudic tractate Zevahim, notes that the word olah, which means “ascending,” can be understood both as denoting an ascent to heaven from earth, and equally, an ascent up the ramp of the altar to the place from which it is offered. The double meaning gave rise to a principle that is articulated in the opening mishnah of that ninth chapter. But some background is necessary before citing that principle.
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Who is Liable?
Apr 4, 2025 By Alan Cooper | Commentary | Vayikra
The opening parashah of Leviticus comprises regulations for the performance of sacrifices. Of these, the most complicated are the hattat and the asham offerings, discussed in chapters 4 and 5. As James Watts observes in the best English-language commentary to appear since Milgrom’s,[1] these chapters have been “the subject of an especially contentious history of interpretation.” The reason is the ambiguity of the biblical text, with its conjoining of “sin” and “guilt,” and the absence of a clear distinction between actual (objective) guilt and (subjective) guilty feelings.
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The Give and Take of Strength
Mar 28, 2025 By Eliezer B. Diamond | Commentary | Pekudei | Shabbat Hahodesh
Rituals of closure are common in both the secular and religious realms. An example of the first is the sounding of retreat and the lowering of the flag marking the end of the official duty day on military installations. An instance of the second is the siyyum, a liturgical ritual and festive meal that is occasioned by […]
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Sacred Gifts and the Holiness of Diversity
Mar 21, 2025 By Rabbi Ayelet Cohen | Commentary | Shabbat Parah | Vayak-hel
Parashat Vayak-hel demands that we notice the details, recounting with exquisite specificity the ornamentation and beautification of the Miskhan and the sacred vestments. Among all of the parshiyot detailing the construction of the Mishkan, Vayak-hel is particularly notable in lifting up the sacred contributions of women and of the artists and artisans. It also expands […]
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The Day Is Short, but Our Story Is Long
Mar 14, 2025 By Yael Landman | Commentary | Ki Tissa | Purim
Within the book of Exodus, certain details link the golden calf story with the account of revelation at Sinai. Mount Sinai is the site of the Israelites forming a covenant with God, but it is also the site of them violating that covenant. It’s where God tells Moses to go up and receive the stone tablets, and where Moses carries down those tablets before he witnesses the Israelites partying and hurls the tablets to the ground. The word kol (which we might translate “sound,” “noise,” or “thunder”) recurs in the context of God’s revelation, only to recur in the account of the golden calf with respect to the Israelites’ ill-advised festivities. In these ways, the golden calf story is inextricably connected to the initial moment of revelation and lawgiving at Sinai, even as it threatens to destroy that covenantal foundation.
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Anina Dassa – Senior Sermon (’25)
Mar 12, 2025 By JTS Senior Sermon | Commentary | Senior Sermon | Ki Tissa
Ki Tissa
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Remembering Who We Are
Mar 7, 2025 By Gordon Tucker | Commentary | Shabbat Zakhor
The coming Shabbat is designated as Shabbat Zakhor. The word is quite prevalent in Jewish literature and thought, and its basic meaning is generally translated by the words “memory,” “remembrance,” or “memorial.” And as a people we seem always to be remembering, and exhorting others to remember. It’s at the core of what we believe to be essential in Jewish education. As Isaac Bashevis Singer once remarked: “Jews suffer from many diseases, but amnesia is not one of them.
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The Golden Crown of Parenting
Feb 28, 2025 By Lilly Kaufman | Commentary | Shabbat Shekalim | Terumah
These are architectural details of the Ark of the Covenant, the central element of the Holy of Holies, where the tablets of the Ten Commandments will be held and carried. The Ark has a covering of gold, inside and out, and a crown of gold. Four gold rings are attached to it, two to each side wall, and through these rings poles of acacia wood are inserted, which remain in place, even when the Ark is at rest. To what may this Ark be compared? To parents. How so?
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Don’t Be the Terumah
Feb 21, 2025 By Stephanie Ruskay | Commentary | Mishpatim
Last week JTS, The Rabbinical Assembly, United Synagogue Youth, United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism, Camp Ramah, the Jewish Youth Climate Movement Powered by Adamah, and Congregation Adas Israel in Washington, DC, launched Ruchot, the first ever advocacy and lobbying training for Conservative Movement teens. We gathered as an erev rav (mixed multitude) of 36 teens from 11 states (and one Canadian), 7 rabbinical students, 6 rabbis, three youth director staff, and an Israeli shaliah.
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The Confusion of Revelation
Feb 14, 2025 By Barry Holtz | Commentary | Yitro
We have now come to Parashat Yitro in our annual Torah reading cycle, arguably the most significant sedra in the Humash. While Parashat Bereishit has the mythic power of the creation stories and Parashat Beshallah includes the narrative of the Exodus from Egypt and the miraculous crossing of the Sea, it is in Yitro that […]
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Ariel Dunat – Senior Sermon (’25)
Feb 12, 2025 By JTS Senior Sermon | Commentary | Senior Sermon | Yitro
Yitro
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Aggressor and Aggrieved
Feb 7, 2025 By Dr. Phil Keisman | Commentary | Beshallah | Pesah
The Israelites find themselves in a new position in Parashat Beshallah. After generations of suffering as slaves to the pharaohs, and after decades of uncertainty about how and when their suffering might end, the Israelites are now staring backwards as their oppressors die violently.
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The Worst Possible Plague
Jan 31, 2025 By Rebecca Galin | Commentary | Bo | Pesah
Terror. Annoyance. Foreboding. Among the Egyptians, each plague feels so much worse than anticipated. A shared sense of eeriness seeps in as the world becomes apocalyptic. Yet, each time a plague ends, the depth of the horror dissipates, forgotten until the next one arrives—more all-consuming and destructive than before. Locusts, darkness, death, grief. The world is overturned by a foreign God. Egyptian safety depends on the emotional whims of their leadership, plagues ending only when God softens Pharaoh’s heart.
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Alicia Rothamel – Senior Sermon (’25)
Jan 29, 2025 By JTS Senior Sermon | Commentary | Senior Sermon | Bo
Bo All Class of 2025 Senior Sermons
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Moses’s Lessons in Interfaith Dialogue
Jan 24, 2025 By Claire Davidson Bruder & Sherouk Ahmed | Commentary | Va'era
In the first week of 2025, the Washington Theological Consortium hosted a weeklong interfaith dialogue program at the United Lutheran Seminary in Philadelphia. Third-year JTS rabbinical student and Milstein Center for Interreligious Dialogue program manager Claire Davidson Bruder participated in this program, alongside other Jewish, Christian, and Muslim seminary students. The following d’var Torah is […]
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A Turn for the Better
Jan 17, 2025 By Ariella Rosen | Commentary | Shemot
In Parashat Shemot, it appears that Moses took conscious steps to operate as a lone bystander, taking action that seems unlikely had a larger crowd been present. Raised in Pharaoh’s household, now an adult, Moses went out to walk among the Hebrew slaves as they labored. After witnessing an Egyptian beating a Hebrew slave, “He turned this way and that and, seeing no one about, he struck down the Egyptian and hid him in the sand” (Exod. 2:12).
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Angel or Avatar?
Jan 10, 2025 By Benjamin D. Sommer | Commentary | Vayehi
The second of these verses is often sung aloud in a beautiful melody by Abie Rotenberg when children have their aliyah on Simhat Torah and by some parents at bedtime each night. That melody has made these words familiar to many, but their meaning is not clear. Who, exactly, does Jacob call upon to bless the lads?
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A Tale of Two Dreamers
Jan 3, 2025 By Eliezer B. Diamond | Commentary | Vayiggash
Yet while the incongruity of Jacob’s response to Pharaoh’s question is in some sense humorous, Jacob’s words are heart-rending. They grow out of the existential and ideological divide that separates Jacob from his son. One can speak of three differences between their perspectives.
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The World that Isn’t There
Dec 27, 2024 By Joel Seltzer | Commentary | Miketz
Years ago, I read a book by the author Chuck Klosterman titled But What if We’re Wrong? The premise of the book is to attempt to “think about the present as if it were the past,” or in other words, to consider whether despite our current devotion to rationality and the scientific method, there are aspects of our modern world about which we might be profoundly wrong?
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