It’s been a while since I posted D’var Torah hear, but today I read a short beautiful d’var from a long-distant Rabbi, Ben-Tzion Spitz. Here it is for your pre-Shabbat pleasure: God is shadowing us (Pekudei) Everybody, soon or late, sits down to a banquet of consequences.-Robert Louis Stevenson The main architect,…
Tag: Moses
וְזֹאת הַבְּרָכָה – And this is the Blessing
We are approaching the end of the Autumn Holy Days, the last two parashot in the Torah before starting anew with “In the Beginning”. This week is the final blessing Moshe gives to the nation, the “stiff-necked people” he had to deal with for over 40 years. He has the strength and the desire to…
חֻקַּת – Laws
Reading this Parshah, everyone always speaks about the red heifer – פָּרָה אֲדֻמָּה I want to talk about the people leading the nation, and their tragedies. This is a Parshah, where both Miriam and Aaron die and Moses makes that tragic mistake that costs him his entrance to Eretz Yisrael. א וַיָּבֹאוּ בְנֵי-יִשְׂרָאֵל כָּל-הָעֵדָה מִדְבַּר-צִן, בַּחֹדֶשׁ הָרִאשׁוֹן, וַיֵּשֶׁב…
Beha’alotecha
A few takes on this week’s Parshah come from some of the sources I like: “The Lord spoke to Moses, saying: ‘Take the Levites from among the Israelites and purify them.’” (Numbers 8:5) Parashat B’ha-alot’cha describes the final preparations for leaving Sinai: the purification of the Levites, the order of the tribes, and the trumpet calls to signal the…
Bamidbar
“Do not on any account enrol the tribe of Levi or take a census of them with the Israelites.” (Numbers 1:49) Below are the words of Dr. David Ackerman: Parashat Bamidbar opens the fourth book of the Torah, also called Bamidbar, in the wilderness of… In Bamidbar, God orders Moses to prepare the Israelites for their wilderness trek by conducting a conduct a census…
Ki Tisa & Purim
Today, for the Parshat Ki Tisa, I am bringing you an interesting D’var from Dr. David Ackerman: “He said, ‘Not a sound shouting strength nor a sound shouting weakness; a sound of distress do I hear!” (Exodus 32:18) Parashat Ki Tisa is an epic disaster. The Israelites, who should be on a spiritual high after the revelation…
Yitro. Love. Fear. Awe.
This week, I am bringing you a Torah commentary on the Parshat Yitro, that of another teacher of mine, Alex Israel. You can read it here. I like his d’var because he always brings topics for discussion that you can ponder yourself over or argue about with your Shabbat guests. After all, that’s what we do,…
BeShalach
This is THE Parshah that one can simply not ignore. Since I have shared my own reflections before, I am going to bring you the next best thing 🙂 Enjoy and Shabbat Shalom!
Parshat ha Shavuah Verses Nitzavim-Vayelech / נִצָּבִים-וַיֵּלֶךְ
I am starting this post with tribulation. The reason is that I am not at all sure that the minor event that happened yesterday would be as distressing to my readers as it was to me. I am really curious to see by reactions to this post if I am living in a dreamland, or…
Parshat ha Shavuah Verses – Matot-Masei / מטות־מסעי
This Shabbat we read the two last Torah portions of the book “Bamidbar / Numbers”. And here’s how they start: ב וַיְדַבֵּר מֹשֶׁה אֶל-רָאשֵׁי הַמַּטּוֹת, לִבְנֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל לֵאמֹר: זֶה הַדָּבָר, אֲשֶׁר צִוָּה יְהוָה. 2 And Moses spoke unto the heads of the tribes of the children of Israel, saying: This is the thing which the…
Noshing Across the Nation 