To Listen and to Discern

Jul 3, 2013 By Matthew Berkowitz | Commentary | Masei | Mattot

Parashat Mattot,the first of the two parashiyot this week, opens and closes with the idea of meaningful and thoughtful communication.

Life’s Journeys

Jul 25, 2014 By Shuly Rubin Schwartz | Commentary | Masei

In a few weeks, thousands of US high school students will leave home to begin college or a gap year of study and/or service before entering college.

Boundary of the Wilderness

Jul 10, 2010 By Alan Mintz (<em>z”l</em>) | Commentary | Masei | Mattot

The Torah is replete with lists of every kind: the generations before and after Noah, the enumeration of the tribes and their chieftains in the desert, the catalogs of forbidden foods, the inventories of priestly garments.

The Source of Hope

Jul 21, 2012 By Mychal Springer | Commentary | Masei | Mattot | Tishah Be'av

In a dramatic reversal of the ordinary mourning process, ‎which begins in its starkest intensity and lifts over time as the mourners are comforted, ‎these are weeks of increasing mourning that move, inevitably, to the destruction of ‎God’s house and the banishment of the People into exile. The prophetic readings drive ‎home that we have brought this horrible tragedy on ourselves.

“They Said”/“They Said”

Jul 2, 2013 By Walter Herzberg | Commentary | Masei | Mattot

In this week’s parashah, we are told that the children of Reuben and Gad “had a very great multitude of cattle” (verse 1) and the land of Gilead on the eastern side of the Jordan was an excellent “place for cattle.” They, therefore, hoped that Moses would permit them to stay on the eastern side of the Jordan and not cross over to Canaan/Israel proper when the time would arrive to enter the Land.

³ If a man makes a vow to the Lord or takes an oath imposing an obligation on himself, he shall not break his pledge; he must carry out all that has crossed his lips.

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