Rabbi Akiva’s Adult Bar-Mitzvah
Jun 21, 2003 By Ismar Schorsch | Commentary | Beha'alotekha
One of the most compelling new rituals in the Conservative synagogue is the adult bat–mitzvah. The impulse is egalitarian, the result religious empowerment. The women who participate enjoyed no bat–mitzvah ceremony in their youth. Years later they seek to fill the void. Usually in small groups of up to a dozen, they study with their rabbi and cantor for a period of at least two years. The practice is so widespread today that the Women’s League for Conservative Judaism has produced a carefully articulated curriculum to enhance the meaningfulness of the experience. Learning to read Hebrew is required. Biblically based yet religiously encompassing, the study period culminates in the preparation of a specific parashah and haftarah to be chanted in the synagogue on a Shabbat morning. There is definitely comfort in numbers. Doing the bat–mitzvah as a group lessens the tension of performing in public. Each participant must master only a part of the whole.
Read MoreA Paradox of Greatness and Humility
Jun 5, 2004 By Ismar Schorsch | Commentary | Beha'alotekha
America does not like wimps. We want our leaders to exude certainty and resolve, vigor and self-confidence. We deem a leader wise when decisive. The image, though, hardly comports with that of scripture. In the portrait of Moses offered up by this week’s parashah, we are treated to a leader conscious of his own fallibility. The Torah does not stress, to the exclusion of all other traits, Moses’ special charisma. True, unlike other prophets, he is on such intimate terms with God that God addresses him at any time of day in unmediated fashion. No need for somnolence and dreams. In reprimanding Aaron and Miriam for their presumption of equality, God affirms Moses’ unique stature: “With him I speak mouth to mouth, plainly and not in riddles, and he beholds the likeness of the Lord” (12:8).
Read MoreHow Do We Deal with Frustration?
May 29, 2010 By Abigail Treu | Commentary | Beha'alotekha
As the Israelites begin their journey away from a place they’ve called home for 400 years toward an unknown land and future, their frustrations turn into complaints that ignite God’s wrath and test the limits of Moses’s patience. Two models emerge from this cycle of stories.
Read MoreThe Ways God Leads Us
Jun 14, 2008 By Matthew Berkowitz | Commentary | Beha'alotekha
Abraham Joshua Heschel writes eloquently that the supreme aspiration of religion is to inspire each one of us, in the words of the psalmist, “to lift up your eyes and see.”
Read MoreRadiating God’s Light
Jun 9, 2012 By Charlie Schwartz | Commentary | Text Study | Beha'alotekha
This empowering message suggests that what brings God’s presence into the world is not miracles, or even the exercising of the divine will, but rather the careful crafting of holy objects and holy spaces so that their light is able to reflect outward, transforming the dark cracks and crevasses of the world with soft and sacred light.
Read MoreBalancing God’s Will and Our Own
Jun 6, 2014 By Matthew Berkowitz | Commentary | Beha'alotekha
Parashat Beha’alotekha gives us insight into the Israelite trek through the wilderness.
Read More“Lights, Camera, Action!”
Jun 11, 2011 By Deborah Miller | Commentary | Beha'alotekha
We’ve all heard the adage about the opera not being over until the fat lady sings. But the opera doesn’t begin, at least not at the Metropolitan Opera, until the chandeliers go up. The performance starts even before the curtain opens, as the twinkling crystal chandeliers ascend to the ceiling. The stage has been set for something illuminating, magical, and transcendent. We are invited to enter into an alternate realm that whisks us away from the finite and ordinary world we inhabit.
Read MoreThe Importance of Being Humble
May 24, 2013 By Matthew Berkowitz | Commentary | Beha'alotekha
An unfortunate incident mars the otherwise solid familial bond between Moses and his siblings in Parashat Beha’alotekha.
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