JTS Torah Commentary

A Civic Liturgy for 9/11: Reflections for the Days of Awe

Sep 11, 2026 By Rabbi Ayelet Cohen | Commentary | Rosh Hashanah

This year, when the first night of Rosh Hashanah falls on the 25th anniversary of 9/11, we reflect on the lessons from that day, on its inexorable connection to the season of the Days of Awe, and on the days and years since. The images from that day are imprinted on those of us who can remember where we were that morning. Yet 30 percent of Americans living today were born after 9/11. They never had to readjust to the new skyline. They never lived in a world where such horrific acts of terrorism were unimaginable. We have experienced too much horror, too much revenge, too much loss. We also carry the legacy of those who reached toward each other to offer healing and comfort.

The Choice

Sep 4, 2026 By Rachel Rosenthal | Commentary | Nitzavim | Vayeilekh

Imagine if you could choose your future—not know it, but choose it. What would happen to you? Would you live forever? Would you choose how you were going to die? What would be your legacy? If you could, would you turn fantasy into reality?

From Nothing to Nothing: Finding Your Own Voice in Prayer 

Aug 31, 2026 By Cantor Rabbi Shoshi Levin Goldberg | Public Event video | Video Lecture | Rosh Hashanah | Yom Kippur

The High Holiday liturgy offers a rich tapestry of words handed down through generations, yet it also leaves room for something deeply personal: the prayers of our own hearts. In this session, Cantor Rabbi Shoshi Levin Goldberg, Director of the H. L. Miller Cantorial School, will explore the quiet prayer recited at the conclusion of the Amidah—a passage traditionally associated with the personal supplications of the sages—and consider what it teaches us about bringing our authentic selves into prayer.

After Liberation

Aug 28, 2026 By Job Y. Jindo | Commentary | Ki Tavo

Parashat Ki Tavo opens with two ceremonies: the presentation of the first fruits (Deut. 26:1–11) and a declaration made after distributing the triennial tithe to the Levite, the stranger, the orphan, and the widow (26:12–15). Their location is puzzling

Fear, Trauma, and the High Holidays: Reading Ancient Texts with Compassion

Aug 24, 2026 By Naomi Kalish | Public Event video | Video Lecture | Rosh Hashanah

In this session, Rabbi Naomi Kalish, Director of the Program in Spiritual Care and Counseling, JTS, will explore how the themes of fear and trauma surface throughout the High Holidays, with particular attention to the banishment of Hagar and Ishmael, the binding of Isaac, and the recurring language of the Psalms.

God’s Love is Here to Stay

Aug 21, 2026 By Burton L. Visotzky | Commentary | Ki Tetzei

I’m going to make a bold conjecture: that Ki Tetzei was the Bar Mitzvah portion of George Gershwin, and that his older brother Ira was inspired by the haftarah that young Yankele chanted. The section was from Isaiah 54 and it constituted the seventh of the Haftarahs of Consolation (Shiva Denehemta) following Tishah Be’av.  

Objects of Awe: The Meaning of the High HolidaysThrough Treasures from the JTS Library

Aug 17, 2026 By Marcus Mordecai Schwartz | Public Event video | Video Lecture | Rosh Hashanah | Yom Kippur

What can a medieval prayer book, one of the earliest printed Hebrew mahzorim, and a set of century-old baseball card sized boxing cards teach us about the High Holidays? These three remarkable objects from The JTS Library demonstrate how Jewish communities across the centuries have expressed themes of kingship, tradition, strength, repentance, and renewal.

Who Was “the Levite” in Deut. 18:6?

Aug 14, 2026 By Alan Cooper | Commentary | Shofetim

From the dawn of biblical criticism, the opening verses of Deuteronomy 18 have played a crucial role in efforts to understand the history and development of the Israelite priesthood.  It seems clear that the priestly activity described in these verses (and elsewhere in Deuteronomy) varies from the accounts in the Priestly sources of the Torah in Exodus through Numbers.  One obvious difference is the lack of differentiation among the Levitical clans, in contrast to the primacy given to Aaron’s descendants elsewhere. 

The Power to Choose: A Founding Moment of Jewish Ethics

Aug 7, 2026 By Shira Billet | Commentary | Re'eh

Choice – between right and wrong – is the opening theme of Parashat Re’eh. “See (re’eh), I place before you (lifneikhem) today blessing and curse. Blessing – if you heed God’s commands…; curse – if you do not…” (Deut. 11:26). This verse is a portal to the end of Deuteronomy: “See (re’eh) I have placed […]

Full Stomachs, Forgetful Hearts

Jul 31, 2026 By Benjamin Mann | Commentary | Eikev

It is a good day when I happen upon the elementary school students at the Schechter School of Long Island while they are singing birkat hamazon, the traditional Jewish blessings after a meal. The kids sing the blessings with gusto, and being with them is a sweet perk of my role as Head of School. […]

The Hidden Meaning of the Shema

Jul 24, 2026 By Chancellor Mike Uram | Commentary | Va'et-hannan

There is a story about a rabbi who traveled through Europe after the Holocaust searching for Jewish children hidden in churches during the war. In one Catholic orphanage, the priest assured him there were none. The rabbi did not believe him but had no way to prove it. So he asked to watch the sisters put the children to bed that night, just to see how they were cared for. The priest agreed. As the nuns tucked the children in, the rabbi stood in the doorway and began to sing the Shema. Several of the children immediately began to cry for their parents, revealing that they were, in fact, Jewish. The story may be apocryphal, but it highlights just how foundational the Shema is to Jewish consciousness.

The Whole Journey

Jul 10, 2026 By Abigail Uhrman | Commentary | Masei | Mattot

School has ended, and with it comes a familiar flood of feelings. As my own children close out another year, I feel grateful and a little sad, eager for the summer and already nostalgic for the days that just were. My family lives in Israel, where this year those feelings have been especially layered.Transitions press us up against the fullness of what has been, even as they pull us toward what is coming.

This is exactly where B’nei Yisrael finds themselves at the opening of Matot-Masei. With forty years of wandering behind them and the land of Canaan visible across the Jordan, they stand at a great threshold. And it is at precisely this moment that the Torah pauses, looks backward, and does something unexpected:

Pinehas and the Three Weeks

Jul 3, 2026 By Marcus Mordecai Schwartz | Commentary | Pinehas | Tishah Be'av

Most years, Parashat Pinehas is read near the beginning of the Three Weeks. While the timing before or after the Seventeenth of Tammuz shifts, the proximity is worth noticing. This minor fast day commemorates the breaching of Jerusalem’s walls before the destruction of the Second Temple, marks the beginning of the traditional period of mourning that culminates on Tish‘ah Be-Av. Both the parashah and the season that follow are unusually concerned with numbers. Pinehas features a wide range of narratives including the reward granted to Pinehas, the daughters of Zelophehad, and the appointment of Joshua as Moses’ successor. Yet counting appears again and again. A census records the size of the tribes. The inheritance laws depend upon the distribution of land among those tribes. By the end of the parashah, the Torah has turned almost entirely to the calendar, laying out the offerings for Sabbaths, new moons, and festivals.

Deuteronomy and the Separation of Powers  

Jun 29, 2026 By Benjamin D. Sommer | Public Event video | Video Lecture

Part of the series “America at 250: Jewish Ideas and the American Experiment”   Download Sources With Dr. Benjamin D. Sommer, Professor of Bible and Ancient Semitic Languages, JTS The core of democracy as understood by the framers of the United States Constitution understood it was not just majority rule, but the separation of powers and the rule of law. […]

Who Sees the Truth, and Who Speaks It?

Jun 26, 2026 By Loraine Enlow | Commentary | Balak | Hukkat

Long-time New York subway riders are familiar with the slogan, “See something, say something.” Balaam’s story in this week’s parashah is closer to: “Say something, because you didn’t see something.” After all, “See something, say something” assumes that the hard part is speaking up, but Parashat Balak suggests the hardest part may be noticing at all, especially when Balaam, the professional seer, can’t see the angel in the road that his donkey does. This reversal of who notices (and who misses what’s right in front of them) is what draws me into this passage. As a scholar working primarily on medieval Jewish and Christian biblical commentaries, I’m especially interested in noticing how texts travel, how communities guard them, and how outsiders can sometimes help shed light on a tradition. Biblical interpretation is itself, in a sense, the discipline of noticing ‘angels in the road,’ learning to see what is already present right in front of you in the text.

One Nation Under God? Heschel, Niebuhr, King and the Intersection of Religion and Politics in America

Jun 22, 2026 By Arnold M. Eisen | Public Event video | Video Lecture

Part of the series “America at 250: Jewish Ideas and the American Experiment”   Download Recommended Resources With Dr. Arnold Eisen, Chancellor Emeritus; Professor of Jewish Thought, JTS, and E.J. Dionne, Journalist, Harriman Chair in American Governance, Brookings Institute A frank and wide-ranging conversation between two admirers of these great religious leaders  about the fateful linkage of politics to prophecy in America from the […]

When a Question Threatens

Jun 19, 2026 By Sarah Wolf | Commentary | Korah

In this week’s parashah, Korah organizes a group of two hundred and fifty well-respected people to protest Moses and Aaron’s leadership. “You have gone too far,” Korah and his group announce. “For all the community is holy, all of them, and God is in their midst. Why then do you raise yourself above God’s congregation?” (Num. 16:3). Moses is appalled, God is furious, and in response, the earth opens up and swallows the protesters, their households, and all their possessions. What are we as readers to make of this episode? Do we attempt to creatively rehabilitate Korah, despite his divine punishment, as an example of those who bravely attempt to speak truth to power? Or do we side with Moses and try to figure out why Korah must have truly deserved what he got?

The Changing Landscape of Jewish American Literature

Jun 15, 2026 By Benjamin Resnick | Public Event video | Video Lecture

For decades, Jewish American literature was defined by giants like Roth, Bellow, Malamud, and Ozick, whose novels explored assimilation and the immigrant experience. But what defines Jewish American writing today? Author and JTS alum Rabbi Benjamin Resnick reflects on how the field has changed and asks whether the Jewish American novel still exists in the way readers once understood it. 

Grapes of Canaan

Jun 12, 2026 By Achia Anzi | Commentary | Shelah Lekha

The spies’ illustration epitomizes the power of images but also their hermeneutic limitations. Of the complex story that Parashat Shelach Lekha relates concisely, the grapes are a central motif in the visual tradition that illustrates it. For a biblical story to become an image, the artist must focus not only on the sayable but also the seeable. Hence, throughout history, images have often been presented alongside words. For example, the ancient mosaic from the Huqoq Synagogue depicts the two spies, along with the inscription “במוט בשניים”.[2

Jewish Storytelling and American Law in Post-WWII America 

Jun 8, 2026 By Shira Billet | Public Event video | Video Lecture

In the decades after World War II, Jewish American legal thinkers began drawing on biblical and rabbinic stories to help explore fundamental questions of constitutional interpretation. The work of Robert Cover in the 1980s, first developed in the context of the Vietnam war, is the most famous and influential example. But lesser-known figures such as Edmund Cahn and JTS professor Shalom Spiegel began developing this discourse in the context of the postwar moment in 1950s America, and the civil rights movement that emerged in its wake.