Chayei Sarah – Missing From Your Own Story — By Ben
It doesn’t take a Talmudic genius to notice something is off about the title of this week’s Torah portion Chayei Sarah. Literally translated “The lifetime of Sarah” the portion seems […]
Category Archives: Parsha
Lech Lecha – The One You Can’t Reach — By Ben
Last week’s post had a question. When comparing two tzaddiks, Noah and Avraham, why is one known as the father of the Jewish people while the other is known for […]
Is a Rainbow a Good Thing? — By Ben
A few weeks ago, I was practicing Hebrew with my mom over Facetime (as is our Friday morning ritual). Usually we practice the prayer for healing, or the shema, or […]
Rosh Hashanah – The Work You’ve Already Done
Rosh Hashanah is a difficult holiday to wrap our heads around. At the forefront there is the notion of being inscribed in the Book of Life and God’s judgement. And […]
Ki Seitzei – A Dangerous Double Standard — By Ben
It’s two weeks before Rosh Hashanah (Can you believe it? Ach!). Clearly Rosh Hashanah is the Jewish New Year. Except in Judaism we have two New Years (actually four, but […]
Don’t Change the Torah. So What are Rabbinical Mitzvahs? — By Ben
In this week’s Torah portion Re’eh, we get the paramount instruction from God to, “Be careful to observe everything which I am commanding you, you shall not add to it […]
Eikev – Why Shema Is So Long — By Ben
Shema isn’t a prayer. Colloquially we tend to refer to any words meant for God as prayer. That can mean requests, praise, or gratitude. But None of those sentiments are […]
Why God Told Moses To Stop Praying — By Ben
Va’eschanan is a jam packed Torah Portion. There’s shema, which includes the mitzvahs of loving God, wrapping tefillin, and mezzuzah. There’s the retelling of 10 Commandments and the whole revelation […]
Masei – The Torah’s Fugitive — By Ben
Let’s say Guy A and Guy B are at work, maybe they’re on some construction job. Guy A is on some scaffolding several floors up and Guy B is down […]
Pinchas – Peace From Hatred — By Ben
On the drive back from Mother’s day brunch my brother has accused me of lying about my car’s gas mileage. A discussion about fuel reimbursement started just before getting into […]
Six Degrees Of Kosher Bacon 