Two Cows
Mar 2, 2002 By Lauren Eichler Berkun | Commentary | Ki Tissa | Shabbat Parah
There is a certain irony when parashat Ki Tissa falls on Shabbat Parah. In our weekly Torah portion, we read about the sin of the golden calf. In the maftir for this special Shabbat preceding Passover, we read about the ritual of the red heifer. Two cows on one Shabbat! One cow represents our complete abandonment of God a mere forty days after the revelation at Mt. Sinai. The other cow represents our ability to purify ourselves in the face of death and defilement.
Read More
What Did We Receive at Sinai?
Mar 14, 1998 By Ismar Schorsch | Commentary | Ki Tissa
At the end of the Torah reading in the synagogue, the scroll is spread and lifted so that everyone might see its hand-written script. Simultaneously, the congregation affirms out loud: “This is the Torah that Moses set before the people Israel; the Torah given by God, through Moses” (a composite of two verses, Deuteronomy 4:44 and a phrase repeated several times in the book of Numbers, 4:37,45; 9:23; 10:13). Having just finished a liturgical reenactment of the original national experience at Mount Sinai, we declare the text of this scroll to be the repository of that revelation.
Read More
Shabbat: A Temple in Time
Feb 26, 2000 By Ismar Schorsch | Commentary | Ki Tissa
If “seeing is believing,” the converse of that adage is surely “out of sight out of mind.” There is something fragile about a faith predicated on sight. Remove its visible attendants and it soon collapses. What did Shakespeare say of another human state? “Love is not love which alters when it alteration finds, or bends with the remover to remove.” Constancy in love or faith soars above the transient.
Read More
How Close Is God?
Feb 17, 2001 By Ismar Schorsch | Commentary | Ki Tissa
From his first encounter with God at the burning bush, Moses displayed a penchant for deep knowledge. He needed to comprehend God before he was ready to face Israel and Pharaoh. He demanded to know God’s name, the key to God’s being. This week again, after the debacle of the Golden Calf, Moses returns for more illumination. To be chosen requires understanding the chooser.
Read More
The Spirituality of Kafka’s Doll
Feb 22, 2003 By Ismar Schorsch | Commentary | Ki Tissa
The story is told about Franz Kafka that the last time he visited Berlin, he chanced upon a little girl in a park awash in tears. When he inquired as to the reason for her distress, she sobbed that she had lost her doll. Compassionately, Kafka countered that not to be the case. The doll had merely gone on a trip and, in fact, Kafka met her as she was about to leave. He promised that if the little girl would return to the park the next day, he would bring her a letter from her doll. And so Kafka did for several weeks, arriving each morning at the park with a letter for his new friend.
Read More
The Key to Salvation
Feb 26, 2005 By Ismar Schorsch | Commentary | Ki Tissa
The jarring truth about the episode of the golden calf is that it occurred at Mount Sinai.
Read More
The Polarities of Judaism
Apr 13, 2004 By Ismar Schorsch | Commentary | Ki Tissa | Shabbat Parah
The instructions of God to Moses concerning the building of the Tabernacle culminate with the command to observe the Sabbath. Holiness in time follows holiness in space. As the Tabernacle constitutes a sacred space in which the nearness of God is a felt experience, so the Sabbath is a portion of the week set apart to admit God into our lives. Whereas the holiness of the Sanctuary is sharply delimited and restricted in access, that of Shabbat is universally accessible. The Tabernacle is a public space, the community’s link between heaven and earth, administered by a priestly hierarchy and subject to laws of purity.
Read More
Moments of Intimacy with God
Mar 14, 2009 By Marc Wolf | Commentary | Ki Tissa | Purim
The unknown can be frightening. This week in particular, beyond the unknowns of the economic crisis that grips the world, we encounter insecurity in the Purim story, with God’s hand seemingly absent from directing the narrative. There is an uncertainty that the unknown breeds; we feel it deep within ourselves and struggle to overcome ambiguity through a search for assurance. What is and remains true is that the lesson of the day is consistent with the lesson of history—none of us is immune from the insecurity of the unknown. Even Moshe.
Read More
