…They are fascinated by the vastness of the universe and our place in it. They have the same sense of wonder that we find in some of the greatest of the psalms. They love stories, songs and rituals. They like the shape and structure they give to time, and relationships, and the moral life. To be sure, sceptics and atheists…
…feed them.” (Hosea 11:1-4). The same image is continued in rabbinic Judaism. In one of the most famous phrases of prayer, Rabbi Akiva used the words Avinu Malkeinu, “Our Father, our King”. That is a precise and deliberate expression. God is indeed our sovereign, our lawgiver and our judge, but before He is any of these things He is our parent…
…word to him, for they saw that his pain was very great.” (Job 2:13). But not all silence is sad. Psalms tells us that “to You, silence is praise” (Ps. 65:2). If we are truly in awe at the greatness of God, the vastness of the universe and the almost infinite extent of time, our deepest emotions will indeed lie…
…that sense of guilt can still stay with you. What’s changed? I did what I did and I’ve been forgiven, but I still feel bad about it. And therefore in biblical times there was a remarkable ceremony which Maimonides says was really a psychological or psychotherapeutic ceremony, which is that the sins were placed by the High Priest on the si’era…
…enormous emphasis on the value of the individual, Judaism also insists on the value of the systems that preserve and protect our identities as members of groups that make them up. We have rights as individuals but identities only as members of tribes. Honouring both is delicate, difficult, and necessary. Bamidbar ends by showing us how. Which group identities do…
…chiloni, not secular but secularist. It is impermeable to the values of kedushah. This must force us to reconsider the relationship between Judaism and Western culture. They are no longer readily compatible. The world outside home, school and shul does not confirm, instead it directly challenges, the constitutive values of Judaism. Jewish education must go deeper and the experiential dimensions…
…impulse is as thin as a spider’s gossamer, but in the end it is as thick as a cart-rope. (Succah 52a) Rava said: At first the evil impulse is call a “wayfarer”, then a “guest”, then finally a “master”. (Succah 52b) Evil has two faces. The first – turned to the outside world – is what it does to its…
…by day, who decrees the moon and stars to shine by night, who stirs up the sea so that its waves roar – the Lord Almighty is His name – ‘Only if these decrees vanish from My sight,’ declares the Lord, ‘will the descendants of Israel ever cease to be a nation before Me’” ( Jeremiah 31:35–36). “‘As surely as…
…it says “vayigdal Moshe” (Exodus 2:11), Moses grew up. ”Vayeitzei el echav”. And he went out to his brothers, “Vayar b’sivlotam”, and he saw their suffering.” And for me, those half a dozen words, describe in the end what moves any Jew, man or woman, to undertake the awe-inspiring responsibilities of leadership. Moshe Rabbeinu could have lived a life of wealth…
…life of the nation, beginning with Ezekiel and culminating in the vast educational programme brought back to Israel by Ezra and Nehemiah. From the destruction of the Second Temple came the immense literature of rabbinic Judaism, until then preserved mostly in the form of an oral tradition: Mishnah, Midrash and Gemara. From the Crusades came the Hassidei Ashkenaz, the North…