God’s Human Partner
Jan 5, 2002 By Ismar Schorsch | Commentary | Shemot
At the end of their gripping biography of Abraham Joshua Heschel (unfortunately chronicling only the European phase of his life), Edward Kaplan and Samuel Dresner report that he arrived in New York on March 21, 1940 aboard the Lancastria. For a moment, after reading that tidbit, I wondered if uncannily the Schorsch family had come on the same ship. I dimly knew that the month of our arrival had been March 1940.
Read MoreThe Spirit and the Letter
Feb 5, 2016 By Yonatan Y. Brafman | Commentary | Mishpatim
After the heights of the revelation at Sinai, Parashat Mishpatim settles down to more mundane topics, including a lengthy discussion of torts. Perhaps motivated by this sudden change of altitude, Nahmanides interprets these details as expansions on the Ten Commandments, such as the prohibitions on coveting and theft: “For if a man does not know the laws of the house and field or other possessions, he might think that they belong to him and thus covet them and take them for himself”.
Read MoreDawkins and a Deeper Level of Faith
Nov 18, 2006 By Marc Wolf | Commentary | Hayyei Sarah
In his introduction, Richard Dawkins articulates his goal in writing The God Delusion: “If this book works as I intend, religious readers who open it will be atheists when they put it down” (5).
Read MoreThe Currencies of Justice
Aug 9, 2008 By David Hoffman | Commentary | Devarim
You shall not be partial in judgment: hear out low (katan) and high (gadol) alike. Fear no man, for judgment is God’s. (Deut. 1:17)
Philo, the great first-century Alexandrian Jewish thinker, was engaged in a project that in many ways was deeply modern. He sought to “translate” Judaism for the Greek-speaking world of his day and demonstrate to a highly educated and urbane population that the Torah was a philosophically serious work. Not only could one be a Jew and be a Greek, but in many ways a pious Jew was the truest of Greeks.
Read MoreJacob’s Struggle Is Our Struggle
Nov 24, 2007 By Marc Wolf | Commentary | Vayishlah
“In olden times when wishing still helped, there lived a king whose daughters were all beautiful, but the youngest was so beautiful that the sun itself, which was seen so much, was astonished whenever it shone in her face.”
Read MoreThe Importance of Constructive Action
Jul 11, 2014 By Matthew Berkowitz | Commentary | Pinehas
Recall the troubling and cryptic episode at the conclusion of last week’s parashah: the Israelites encamp at Shittim; they are seduced by Moabite women and attach themselves to an idolatrous cult of Ba‘al Pe‘or.
Read MoreFinding Direction to Move Forward with God
May 23, 2014 By Matthew Berkowitz | Commentary | Bemidbar
This Shabbat opens the fourth book of Torah known as Sefer Bemidbar, the book of Numbers.
Read MorePride, Power, and Corruption in the Name of God
May 2, 2014 By Matthew Berkowitz | Commentary | Emor
In the wake of religious fundamentalism that plagues our world today, why aren’t religious leaders vocal in their opposition to bloodshed and corruption in the name of God?
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