This coming Shabbat, the Shabbat immediately preceding Passover is called SHABBAT HAGADOL, the Great Sabbath. Rabbis traditionally deliver long sermons about the laws of Passover, what is kosher and what is not, how our behaviors change during the Passover festival, how we should conduct our Sedarim (plural of Seder), and...
The Iron Swords War: How We Are All Affected! B’Yachad N’Natzeach/Together We Shall Be Victorious! On Tuesday morning, Ellen and I attended a profoundly moving and truly painful session at Gratz College presented by Esther Marcus and Gal Horev, two survivors of October 7th Massacre. It was overwhelmingly difficult and...
“Acheinu” Resounds Throughout Our Community and the Jewish World! This week’s portion teaches us about G-d’s requirement to bring gifts to the community’s leadership for the community’s maintenance. Moses ascends Mount Sinai for a second time in order to learn what G-d expects of him and the Israelites. G-d gives...
We are in the middle of the most dramatic, most pivotal, most intense, most action filled, and most consequential Torah portions in the Torah! The portion of Bo is the third section in the book of Exodus. We learn about the eighth, ninth, tenth and final plagues that the Almighty...
Parashat MIketz-Joseph, Lighting the Hanukkah Candles for The Eighth Night, and Candles as a Symbol of Shalom Bayit/Family Peace In our Torah reading cycle, we are in the middle of the Joseph stories in the Book of Bereshit/Genesis. Joseph, the son of the Jacob, the third Jewish patriarch, has been...
The connections between this week’s Torah portion and our own lives scream out at us! As I write these words, we are living through a time of grave uncertainty for the State of Israel and the Jewish people all over the world. The events of the past twelve days have...
PARASHAT R’EIH: SEE, THE BLESSING AND THE CURSE! CENTRAL SANCTUARY IN A DIVINELY ORDAINED PLACE! SHIR KI CONTINUES THE 3000 YEAR JEWISH MUSICAL TRADITION- FIRST REHEARSAL: AUGUST 15, AT 7 PM. In this week’s Torah portion, Moses continues his third and final summary of G-d’s commandments by staging a massive...
Parashat D’varim: Beginning the Fifth Book of Torah Summer Jewish Life in the Poconos This past Shabbat morning, I chanted the prayer announcing the new Hebrew month of Av in our summer congregation, the Hemlock Farms Jewish Fellowship. For 32 years, Ellen and I have spent our summer vacation in...
A DOUBLE PORTION DESCRIBING PROFOUND PRESSURE ON MOSES AND HIS ABRUPT REACTION. All over the world, Jews are reading two Sidrot/Portions this coming Shabbat, the double portion of Hukkat/Balak, chapters 19-25 in B’midbar/Numbers. The Israelites are approaching the end of their 40 year march in the desert on the way...
This Shabbat, we begin the reading of the fourth book of the Torah, the Book of Numbers. In Hebrew, the book is called B’Midbar/In The Wilderness. Both the English and Hebrew names of the fourth Torah book teach us about the character and contents of this volume. The English name,...
