New Generation, Old Leaders
Jun 13, 2025 By Ute Steyer | Commentary | Beha'alotekha
To paraphrase Moses’s meltdown in Numbers 11:11–15, “Lord! I’m so done with them! I can’t take it anymore. These people are nothing but a bunch of whingeing losers.” Yet the People are doing what they have been doing since day one of the Exodus: complaining. About the lack of water, the lack of food, and now the lack of meat. So why is Moses losing his temper so completely this time?
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The Problem with Priests
Jun 6, 2025 By Daniel Nevins | Commentary | Naso
Modern Judaism has a problem with the priesthood. The notion of hereditary holiness—that one segment of the Jewish people is set apart from others, given ceremonial privileges, and invited to bless the people—conflicts with our egalitarian ethos.
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Counting as a Spiritual Practice: Bemidbar and the Road to Shavuot
May 30, 2025 By Marcus Mordecai Schwartz | Commentary | Bemidbar | Shavuot
Every year, without fail, we read Parashat Bemidbar just before the festival of Shavuot. This liturgical pairing is more than a scheduling convenience; it offers a profound insight into the spiritual architecture of Jewish time. Bemidbar begins with a count: “Take a census of the whole Israelite community by their clans, by ancestral houses, listing the names, every male, head by head” (Num. 1:2; בְּמִסְפַּר שֵׁמוֹת לְגֻלְגְּלֹתָם). This act of counting seems administrative on the surface, but like so much in the Torah, its spiritual depth lies beneath.
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Grappling with Slavery in Parashat Behar
May 23, 2025 By Marjorie Lehman | Commentary | Behar | Behukkotai
Parashat Behar is filled with powerful messages about building a just and compassionate society, emphasizing commandments to care for the land, support the poor, and treat hired workers with fairness and dignity. However, I find that Parashat Behar stirs up more discomfort than ethical inspiration. I am always struck by the difficult distinction it makes between Israelites and non-Israelites with regard to slavery. With the themes of Passover and the Israelites’ freedom from Egyptian bondage in my mind, I find it hard to reconcile that Leviticus 25 permits the enslavement of non-Israelites while protecting Israelites from such a fate.
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Who Belongs?
May 16, 2025 By Rachel Rosenthal | Commentary | Emor
Who is the Other? This question, which is asked more and more often in our world, is not often easy to answer. Can one choose to be part of a community? Are people who were once outsiders ever fully welcomed as insiders? In Judaism, these questions are especially important. While Judaism has categories to define and even praise non-Jews, opting into the Jewish community is not simple. However, the Talmud tells us that once someone converts to Judaism, we are supposed to treat them as any other Jew. Unfortunately, this is a mission in which many communities fail. This failure can have significant consequences, as we see in this week’s parashah, Emor.
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Love Beyond Grudges: Living the Mitzvah of Love Your Neighbor
May 9, 2025 By Jonah Guthartz | Aharei Mot | Kedoshim
Parashat Kedoshim begins by laying out dozens of mitzvot, including the prohibition against idolatry and the mitzvot of charity, Shabbat, honesty in business, honoring one’s parents, and the sanctity of life. Perhaps the best- known mitzvah is לֹֽא־תִקֹּ֤ם וְלֹֽא־תִטֹּר֙ אֶת־בְּנֵ֣י עַמֶּ֔ךָ וְאָֽהַבְתָּ֥ לְרֵעֲךָ֖ כָּמ֑וֹךָ אֲנִ֖י יְ-הֹוָֽה׃ (Lev. 19:19) “You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against members of your people. Love your fellow [Israelite] as yourself: I am the Lord” Rabbi Akiva famously names this as a fundamental value of the Torah (Sifra, Kedoshim 4:12).
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The Torah’s Prescription for Healing
May 2, 2025 By Alan Cooper | Commentary | Metzora | Tazria
Given the discomfort, discomfiture, and uncertainty that even mild skin eruptions can cause us nowadays, it should come as no surprise that they were a source of anxiety in ancient times. In this week’s parashah, that anxiety finds expression amidst an array of concerns about the human body and its functions. The purity laws in Leviticus 11 through 15, which digress from the narrative flow of the book,[i] are concerned with diet (chapter 11), reproduction (chapter 12), and bodily integrity (chapters 13 to 15, including property as an extension of the person).
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Six Takes on a Leader’s Attributes
Apr 25, 2025 By Walter Herzberg | Commentary | Shemini
Identifying the textual problem: commentators have noticed that the phrase “draw near unto the altar” seems superfluous. If Aaron is being commanded to “perform the service of the sin offering,” is it not obvious that he will need to approach the altar? This textual issue will serve as the basis for our consideration of the attributes of a leader based on our examination of the comments of the traditional Jewish commentaries.
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