Memory, History, and our Invitation Therefrom
This past week we began the fifth and final book of the Torah, titled D’varim in Hebrew, which translates in this context to “words” as in, “These are the words Moses addressed to all Israel,” from the first verse of the book; and Deuteronomy in English, which comes from the Greek for “second law,” i.e, deuteros + nomos. Both of these […]
The Power of Speech, and The Journey Through Exile, Together.
Each week, we rehash and reflect upon our Torah study discussion from this past Shabbat as a means of inviting us all into the conversation; injecting a little Torah, i.e., both ancient and modern Jewish wisdom, into our weeks; and getting ourselves in sync with the rhythms of the enduring Jewish calendar. This past week, […]
“Divine Wrath” And Our Relationship To It
This past week we read Parashat Pinchas—the Torah portion known as Pinchas, so named after a religious zealot who carries out a violent act of vigilante justice on a fellow Israelite and his Midianite partner in order to stave off a plague that had come about as a result of God’s wrath, which in turn had been […]
Reflections on Meaningfulness of Torah Discussions. Oh. And Anger.
As we have done ever since the pandemic started, we’re going to continue to send out snapshots, or synopses, of what we discussed at Torah Study this past Shabbat. We do this for a few reasons: 1) It’s a continuation of millennia of Jewish tradition. If one examines the Talmud, perhaps the foundational document establishing how Judaism […]
A (re)Introduction
Today has been my first day as Rabbi of Society Hill Synagogue. In some ways, I never planned on this path, and in some ways, I have been preparing for it my entire life. I never planned on it in the sense that, in college, I majored in economics; after college I worked on issues […]