The Tower of Babel
Oct 12, 2002 By Ismar Schorsch | Commentary | Noah
The last mythological fragment we have in the Torah before we come to the figure of Abraham is the Tower of Babel. With this episode the Torah turns its attention from the universal to the particular, from the history of humanity to the descendants of Shem, No·ah’s firstborn son. As preserved, the story is but nine verses — brief, insignificant and unedifying, not much more than a dismissive satire on Babylon. At best, we try to connect this fragment to the mystery of human language. If we are all progeny of No·ah, how did we come to speak so many different languages?
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Sight and Knowledge
Oct 5, 2002 By Matthew Berkowitz | Commentary | Bereishit
As a teacher for JTS Kollot: Voices of Learning, I hear many voices of Torah that open my eyes to creative ways of reading the texts of our sacred tradition.
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On New Beginnings
Oct 5, 2002 By Matthew Berkowitz | Commentary | Bereishit
As a teacher for JTS Kollot: Voices of Learning, I hear many voices of Torah that open my eyes to creative ways of reading the texts of our sacred tradition.
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The Conversion Controversy
Oct 5, 2002 By Ismar Schorsch | Commentary | Bereishit
Conversion is back in the news. During the High-Holy-Day period just ended, a Conservative rabbinic court in Eastern Europe completed the conversion process of eighteen Czech and nineteen Polish converts to Judaism. Some 80 per cent had Jewish roots. All studied formally for at least a full year (many more) and were obliged to be active in their respective Jewish communities. Prior to conversion, the men underwent either a full or symbolic ritual circumcision (if already circumcised), while both men and women went through ritual immersion. Another half-dozen in Prague are on their way to completing the conversion process.
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Remembering Moses
Sep 27, 2002 By Ismar Schorsch | Commentary | Vezot Haberakhah | Shemini Atzeret | Simhat Torah
My father died twenty years ago. The day of his yahrzeit has never been hard for me to remember. It follows by one day the day affixed by the Talmud for the death of Moses (BT Kiddushin 38a). Moses died on the seventh of Adar, the last month of the Jewish calendar, and my father on the eighth. Thus the Hebrew date of my father’s passing is forever anchored in my memory by its proximity to the traditional date for the demise of Moses. Reciprocally, that convergence has heightened for me the yahrzeit of Moses, which is barely noted in most Jewish calendars.
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Ritual in Our Lives
Sep 20, 2002 By Ismar Schorsch | Commentary | Sukkot
When I was a youngster growing up in small-town America in the 1940s, the only sukkah in town stood behind the synagogue. It did service for the entire congregation. Even my father, the rabbi of our Conservative synagogue and devoutly observant, never seemed to entertain the idea of putting up a sukkah in our backyard. In those days, people had less time for domestic rituals and shied away from any public display of their Jewishness. The synagogue in Pottstown, a large, handsome, basilican structure on the main street, had become the last arena of individual and collective Jewish expression.
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9/11 in Perspective
Sep 16, 2002 By Ismar Schorsch | Commentary | Yom Kippur
Last year’s assault on America struck less than a week before Rosh Hashanah. With the embers still burning and the air laden with smoke and the taste of ashes in our mouths, we could hardly bring ourselves to wish each other a sweet new year. Suddenly, the shehecheyanu thanksgiving with which we greet each holiday rang with a frightening literalness. Our state of shock was too acute for comforting, like that of a mourner before the funeral.
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On Radical Amazement
Sep 6, 2002 By Ismar Schorsch | Commentary | Rosh Hashanah | Yom Kippur
Great theology is the reflective end result of religious experience. If we can identify the underlying experience, it will be easier for us to fathom the abstraction. This has been for me, at least, the key to penetrating a well-known Talmudic statement that has captivated me all summer. Familiarity often obscures meaning. I share the comment of R. Yohanan with you in the hope that it will enrich your High Holy Day season.
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How To Choose Life
Aug 31, 2002 By Melissa Crespy | Commentary | Nitzavim | Vayeilekh | Rosh Hashanah
We stand at an exciting and important time in the Jewish year. We stand less than two weeks before Rosh Hashanah, when so many of us will spend hours in synagogue praying for a good, healthy and fulfilling new year. We stand in a moment of transition, filled with potential. There is so much we can do, so much we can learn, so much we can become.
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“Into the Woods” and into Elul
Aug 24, 2002 By Marc Wolf | Commentary | Ki Tavo
“Once upon a time in a far-off kingdom, lived a young maiden, a sad young lad, and a childless bakery” thus opens the story that develops into Stephen Sondheim’s current revival on Broadway, Into the Woods. Cleverly weaving our classic fairy tales from the Brothers Grimm, Sondheim composes a fable with classic, yet new significance. He begins with the foundation of the moral lessons of the children’s fairy tales like Cinderella, Little Red Riding Hood and Jack and the Beanstalk, and builds upon them by watching as their characters interact with one another.
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“The World Belongs to God”
Aug 24, 2002 By Lewis Warshauer | Commentary | Ki Tavo | Pesah | Rosh Hashanah
The month of Elul is a time for preparation for the High Holy Days. Some industrious hosts and hostesses are already making tzimmes and putting it in the freezer. Other kinds of preparations are being made, too– studying, thinking about and discussing the themes and meanings of Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur so that these holidays are not just repetitions of prior years. Even our weekly Torah readings, seemingly disconnected from anything to do with the High Holy Days, can be read through Elul eyeglasses.
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The Trouble with the Rebellious Child
Aug 17, 2002 By Joshua Heller | Commentary | Ki Tetzei
There are those who think that the world and human nature, are ordered and deterministic, that people can be profiled and categorized, their behavior predicted by psychological or statistical models. Having a child has made me newly appreciative of the role that disorder and unpredictability play in the world. On the day–to–day level, all plans and schedules have taken on a new level of tentativity, and getting through an airport security checkpoint suddenly requires a whole new level of coordination.
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God’s Presence in the Mundane
Aug 17, 2002 By Lauren Eichler Berkun | Commentary | Shofetim
One of the great contributions of the Rabbinic period to Jewish theology is the celebration of God’s presence in the mundane. How can we experience God in the world without God’s sacred abode in the Temple? The rabbis taught us to find holiness in the everyday through the beautiful system of blessings.
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Moving Society, and Ourselves, Forward
Aug 10, 2002 By Matthew Berkowitz | Commentary | Shofetim
Parashat Shofetim is central to the entire Torah — “justice, justice you shall pursue” (Deut. 16:20). With these words, our parashah concerns itself with the appointment of magistrates and officials, the establishment of a court system free from impartiality and impropriety, the founding of cities of refuge, the delineation of laws concerning warfare, and communal responsibility in the case of an unsolved murder. Indeed, Shofetim seeks to move society forward — away from the slavery that defined Israelite existence in the land of Egypt. For with freedom comes responsibility.
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Caring for Yourself and Others
Aug 3, 2002 By Lauren Eichler Berkun | Commentary | Re'eh
“ATTENTION PLEASE: In the event of a change in cabin pressure, first place the oxygen mask on your own face and then assist the child sitting next to you.” This airline announcement has always troubled me. It is difficult to imagine that in the midst of a crisis, a parent would allow a child to suffer while attending to his or her own needs. However, the practical wisdom of these instructions teaches us that there are times when we must take care of ourselves first, despite our best instincts.
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The Place that God Chose
Aug 3, 2002 By Melissa Crespy | Commentary | Re'eh
In past and present discussions about how the State of Israel is to make peace with the Palestinians, the question of Jerusalem and the Temple Mount always arises. Obviously the city and site are holy to both Jews and Moslems (and to many Christians as well). But to those who know and love the Jewish tradition, and have a strong sense of Jewish history, it is often enraging to hear voices in the Palestinian community claiming that Jews have no history in Jerusalem or claim to the Temple Mount.
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A Minature Torah
Jul 27, 2002 By Lewis Warshauer | Commentary | Eikev
Jews who do not call themselves religious nonetheless do a number of things that are religious commandments. This is what we are told by various surveys and it is confirmed by anecdotal evidence. These include lighting Hanukkah candles, attending some form of Passover service, fasting on Yom Kippur and going to synagogue for some portion of the High Holy Days.
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Teaching Our Children
Jul 20, 2002 By Joshua Heller | Commentary | Va'et-hannan
The words of the first paragraph of the sh’ma, taken from this week’s parashah va–ethannan, are among the most important in all of Jewish liturgy and learning — the closest thing we have to a catechism. The words of Deuteronomy 6:4–9 proclaim the unity of God and declare the deepest commitment of faith. They mark the doorposts of the Jewish home, they are recited morning and evening and they were the last words of martyrs in many generations.
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Two Paths of Teshuvah
Jul 20, 2002 By Lauren Eichler Berkun | Commentary | Va'et-hannan | Tishah Be'av
This week marks the commemoration of great national calamities in Jewish history. The Torah reading for the morning of Tisha B’Av is a selection from this week’s Torah portion (Deuteronomy 4:25–40). This reading highlights an important aspect of our spiritual response to tragedy.
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The Moral Lessons of Tish’ah Be’Av
Jul 13, 2002 By Ismar Schorsch | Commentary | Devarim | Eikev | Tishah Be'av
The Shabbat before Tishah b’Av bears the special name of “Shabbat Hazon,” which I would translate as “the Sabbath of Vision.” The name derives from the first word of the haftarah for the day, “the prophecies (hazon) of Isaiah son of Amoz.” However, in the context of the calamities to be recalled on the Ninth of Av, the force of the word is not technical or restricted, but spiritual and expansive.
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