Assumptions and Appearances
Nov 28, 2012 By Nancy Abramson | Commentary | Vayishlah
Things are not always as they appear to be. And when assumptions are based on circumstantial or incomplete evidence, we are often surprised or disappointed by what unfolds.
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Forgetting to Remember for Posterity
Dec 5, 2012 By Abigail Treu | Commentary | Vayeshev
Remember the Sabbath day. Remember what Amalek did to you in the wilderness. Remember what God did to Miriam. Remember that you were slaves in Egypt. Memory is integral to our identities as Jews and as individuals. What happens when we lose our memories, or our ability to remember altogether?
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Holy Innovation and the Festival of Hanukkah
Dec 11, 2012 By Daniel Nevins | Commentary | Hanukkah
What is the essential message of Hanukkah, the beloved Festival of Lights? Like many of our holidays, this celebration is protean, shifting shape to accommodate our changing Jewish needs.
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It’s Not What You Say . . .
Dec 19, 2012 By Deborah Miller | Commentary | Vayehi
We have learned that two trees do not make a pattern—it takes three. So we have to look at a series of events in order to learn about Jacob. What can we discern?
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Unanticipated Consequences
Dec 19, 2012 By Marc Wolf | Commentary | Vayiggash
Joseph’s brothers got very lucky. What started as an act of malice inspired by jealousy and spite turned out to secure the future of the Jewish People. Did they imagine the implications of their action? Did Joseph’s brothers know that their initial plot of murder and their eventual sale of Joseph into slavery would ultimately save their own lives? No, they did not.
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Good for the Midwives
Dec 30, 2012 By Walter Herzberg | Commentary | Shemot
What exactly was the good that God did for the midwives? This question has engaged the commentators throughout the generations.
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Not Rhetoric, but Reality
Jan 8, 2013 By Marc Wolf | Commentary | Va'era
One of the more disheartening reports about Israeli society these days is that our brothers and sisters in Israel are simply not as concerned with the struggle for religious pluralism to the degree that we are in North America. Reporting this past week from the JTA, Ben Sales added his voice to the chorus of journalists writing about what many in the Diaspora consider to be of preeminent importance, but what many in the Israeli population are, at best, disinterested in.
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Afraid of the Dark
Jan 16, 2013 By Abigail Treu | Commentary | Bo
I cannot read the stories of the plagues without a knot in my stomach. What kind of God hardens Pharaoh’s heart so that the suffering of both the Egyptians and the enslaved Israelites increases? What kind of God comes up with the death of the firstborn as the “final straw”? What am I supposed to do with these stories as someone who wants to believe in the God of Redemption and Compassion and Justice; who wants to feel that God’s presence in my life?
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