Jewish News

Three thousand, three hundred, and twenty-nine years ago, Moshe (Moses) announced to the Jewish people that He would be ascending Mount Sinai to receive the Torah for the Jewish people. The Midrash tells us that the Jewish people protested. They said, “We want to see our G-d; we want to receive the Torah directly from [...]

At this sacred season of re-consecration to recollection, we are poised between Yom Hashoah’s monumental burden of sorrow and Yom Ha’ Atzmaout’s transforming joy. We pause at this great twilight oscillating between the helplessness of Yeoush’s despair and Hatikvah’s hopefulness of Yeshua’s salvation. We turn to the Torah’s Book of Life that we may face [...]

Passover in the time of Deuteronomy: What a spectacle! We all got up and made pilgrimage to Jerusalem, pitching our tents on the surrounding hills. The priest helped us accomplish our lamb sacrifice, which we enjoyed in the evening cool of Nisan. It was a peak experience, away from home and its leveling routines. Alas, [...]

Purim’s extraordinary fun masks and matches the extraordinary seriousness of the life and death issues behind it, while allowing for the healthy release of pent-up tension and emotion. After all, a threat of genocide hanging over a vulnerable people such as the Jews with a plot in place to terminate its existence in the vast [...]

NEW YORK (JTA)—For centuries, studying a page of the Talmud has come with a bevy of barriers to entry. Written mostly in Aramaic, the Talmud in its most commonly printed form also lacks punctuation or vowels, let alone translation. Its premier explanatory commentary, composed by the medieval sage Rashi, is usually printed in an obscure [...]

It’s interesting to reflect on the Torah portion, Parshat Bo, while reading Alan Morinis’s book, Everyday Holiness, in preparation for Tidewater Together. This year, the series of programs focuses on the theory and practice of mussar, a 200-year-old system of Jewish teachings. Morinis, who will speak at each Tidewater Together event, posits that people can [...]

The great and most colorful Joseph saga extends over four Torah portions and 13 chapters. Just like Joseph, the dreamer and interpreter of incredible dreams (he should have kept some of them to himself!), the Jewish people have believed that noble, as well as disturbing dreams have the potential and power to transform reality. In [...]

Pharaoh dreamed two dreams. In the first, he was standing on the river Nile. He watched as seven skinny cows consumed seven stout ones. It was a dream, but it was Pharaoh’s type of dream. It was about him and he was the focal character. Pharaoh liked that. He turned over and went back to [...]

Hanukkah’s origins in the drama of a small, yet determined people with a large vision standing up to the might of the Hellenistic empire of antiquity, is a poignant demonstration and a timeless reminder of Israel’s unique and timely legacy. The heroic Maccabees’ successful revolt of the few against the many in 167 B.C.E. following [...]

“Abraham was old, advanced in years. The LORD had blessed Abraham in all [things].—The Numerological equivalent of the word “all” is 52, [meaning] “son”. Inasmuch as Abraham had a son [Isaac], it was necessary to arrange for him to marry.”—Rashi, commentary to Genesis 24:1 “The [Rabbinic] schools of Hillel and Shammai debated each other for [...]