
Warning: Use of undefined constant ttp_number - assumed 'ttp_number' (this will throw an Error in a future version of PHP) in /home/customer/www/cardozoacademy.org/public_html/wp-content/themes/aspire-pro/ttp_by_number_21april21.php on line 28
Humor, Fairy Tales & the Secrecy of the Shofar
September 13, 2023The following essay was published this weekend in the Jerusalem Post and in digital form on their site. Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur are serious days when we are asked to place God at the center of our lives, repent, and ask for forgiveness. However, no matter how much we try, most of us know […]

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The Future of a Marriage – The Good News File
August 23, 2023Experiencing low points in life is par for the course. Contending with these and the accompanying negative emotions and moods can be challenging and difficult. The correct perspective of what we have, our reality, and the true power we hold to alter and improve the direction of our lives is a sure tool in facing life.

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The Future of a Marriage: The Problem of the Black Dot
August 9, 2023The Future of a Marriage – Part 3: The Problem of the Black Dot Words spoken at the festive meal (“Sheva Berachot”) on the occasion of the marriage of our grandson and his bride, Lakewood, USA, 24th of June. Here is a piece of advice that may help you in your future lives. It […]

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Tisha B’Av and Victimhood
July 25, 2023Tisha B’Av, the ninth day of the Hebrew month of Av, is often misunderstood—for Tisha B’Av is frequently perceived as a day of victimization, the date both Temples were destroyed and the Jewish People was transformed into a nation of eternal victims. If this was true, there would be no purpose to Tisha B’Av. If […]

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The Future of a Marriage – The Blessing of Marital Dialogue
July 19, 2023The Future of a Marriage – Part 2: The Blessing of Marital Dialogue * In memory of my dear friend Rabbi Dr. Sholom Gold z”l of Yerushalayim Words spoken at the festive meal (“Sheva Berachot”) on the occasion of the marriage of our grandson and his bride, Lakewood, USA, 24th of June. As I wrote […]

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The Future of a Marriage – The Art of Speaking
July 5, 2023Words spoken at the festive meal (“Sheva Berachot”) on the occasion of the marriage of our grandson and his bride, Lakewood, USA, 24th of June. My dear grandchildren, Chatan (groom) and Kalla (bride), Yaacov Shlomo and Chava, Mazal tov! Oma and I were 20 and 21 years old when we married. This was only […]

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The Meaning of Life, Depression and The Red Heifer
June 18, 2023Parashat Chukat Depression is one of the worst conditions a human being may suffer. There are several reasons for the occurrence of depression. One that is very common results from feeling that life is meaningless. Combined with the fact that nobody can escape death, some people experience life as very painful. They do not suffer […]

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The Holiness of Words
June 7, 2023Man alone was endowed with the gift of words and the ability to connect thereby with his Creator. Language can comprise grandeur, while it can also be emptied of its value and essence. How we choose to live our lives affects how we express ourselves and the language we use. The debasing of language today stems from and represents unfortunate moral and ethical decay.

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Hallelujah: Do You Live The Divine Song?
May 24, 2023Shavuot 5783/2023 Hallelujah: Do You Live The Divine Song? (Inspired by Leonard Cohen) Now I have heard of a secret chord That Moshe learned and it pleased the Lord, And he brought it down in human words, But its essence stayed up in the Heavenly Court. Above it is fire, Below it are letters, The […]

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Contemplating Childbirth and Divine Revelation
May 10, 2023Contemplating Childbirth and Divine Revelation: Have you ever thought about these? When a child is born, the first question that should come to mind is: When he or she grows up, what should we tell them about the importance of their birth and the purpose of their life? After all, what right do we have […]

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Yom HaAtzma’ut: The Blessing and the Danger – Lest We forget
April 24, 2023There is no logic to the State of Israel and it is no foundation for commonplace, Nor is it habit, or routine. Israel is a marvel and unique - we must never forget its Jewish and religious basis.

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Israel Plagued, Its Destiny and the Call of Our Prophets
March 22, 2023Throughout the centuries, historians, philosophers and anthropologists have struggled with the concept called “Israel.” While attempting to place Israel within the confines of conventional history, they experienced constant academic and philosophical frustration. Any suggested definitions eventually broke down due to serious inconsistencies. Was Israel a nation, a religion, or perhaps a mysterious entity that would […]

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Megillat Esther: Attaining the Level of Non-Acquaintance
March 5, 2023Attaining the Level of Non-Acquaintance—Pseudo-Dionysius, the Areopagite The most discussed topic in philosophy of the Middle Ages is, without doubt, God’s existence. Many great philosophers such as Rambam (Maimonides, 1138-1204) and the Christian thinker Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274) invest a lot of time in clarifying the concepts of “omnipotence,” “divine excellence” and other such terminologies.[1] […]

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Panic: The Visible and Invisible
February 22, 2023Genuine religiosity is demanding - it requires a sensitivity to the physical human condition as well as the hidden, divine dimension. Living in a manner that combines the visible and the invisible, and more so, harmonizing the two as equal components of our lives, is a tremendous challenge. It is too easy to make a selection - as many individuals and even religions do - between the visible and invisible, preferring one over the other. However, living the one with an imbalance regarding the other is not what Judaism teaches.

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God, Me and the Struggle to Teach Real Torah
February 8, 2023Despite my many years of experience (and successes), I have felt that something crucial has been missing - which I identified recently: Am I merely conveying knowledge, or do I stand before my students as someone who is entirely imbued with the significance, import and sanctity of the words I utter? God requires of His prophets and those who speak His words to be true and just, and to live His words with every fiber of their beings!

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The Art of Smiling – Fearing my Kippah (2)
January 25, 2023A kippah - and every other aspect of dress required by the Halakhah - pose a tremendous challenge! I am constantly aware of how I am to strive to achieve and implement the values that my kippah requires of me - both when I stand before God, and also in the way I face the world. Facing my fellow, my conduct, and even the countenance I assume are spheres that my kippah relates to!

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Birth and Death – The Ultimate Paradox
December 28, 2022Giving birth to a child creates a paradox. On the one hand, it is the greatest joy we can imagine. The first commandment given to humankind is to be fruitful and multiply (Bereshit 1:28). Procreation is an expression of the highest form of creativity; just as God is the Creator of the Universe, so the […]

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Chanukah: The Art of Balancing
December 14, 2022The menorah of Chanukah, sometimes called the chanukiah, has its roots in the menorah of the Temple. While there are many halakhot (laws) regarding the appearance and structure of the biblical menorah, Rashi, the great French commentator, points to a most remarkable halachic feature. Regarding the instruction to arrange the lamps so that they will […]

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It is time to stop eating “Kosher”
December 7, 2022"Kosher" is a term that has gained rather wide prevalence, primarily in the context of "kosher food" - food that has been prepared in accordance with Jewish dietary law ("kashrut"). Are these dietary laws sufficient to deem food kosher and fit for consumption? There may be other concerns significances of what "kosher" means that will influence our thoughts and behavior. "Kosher" is, in fact, a matter of holiness - which requires us to advance, progress and improve ourselves. "Kosher" is a term that has gained fame in the context of "kosher food" prepared in accordance with Jewish dietary law. ("kashrut"). Yet "kosher" is a matter of holiness - which requires us to advance, progress and improve ourselves.

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Goethe, Herman Wouk and Walter Kaufmann and the Art of Reading the Torah Correctly
November 23, 2022As mentioned in our last essay (here) the Torah is not a text to be read as a book—rather, it is to be seen as a divine “notebook” containing succinct summaries of a greater lecture or series of lectures. Moshe first heard the lecture in its “sum total” when God delivered a series of lectures […]

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An Answer to an Unasked Question is Irrelevant
November 9, 2022The text of the Torah can be quite misleading when read in a vacuum. The casual reader may encounter what he deems to be errors, stylistic inconsistencies, grammar and linguistic anomalies, and more. However, prior knowledge - and primarily a basic understanding of what the Torah text truly is and what the goals of its divine author are - are the keys to properly understanding any and every word of the sacred text.

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The Art of Making Winter into a Sukkah
October 26, 2022Winter - bleak, dreary and cold - often has a negative effect on our moods and even outlooks. The message of Sukkot, The Festival of Tabernacles, must be continued into this period of darkness and, indeed, into our lives. The Sukkah is a structure that is quite plain and feeble by definition and requirement, and yet it interior and significance are tremendously beautiful and solid. Our lives can be greatly enriched and understood and even assigned deep purpose when we understand the Sukkah.

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Sukkot, the Desert and the Eternity of the Torah
October 6, 2022Traveling through a desert is journeying through a lonely place, completely forsaken. There is neither food nor water, nor any other form of sustaining substance. There is only the unbearable sun and its heat. There is no grass and there are no trees. The only signs of life are deadly snakes and scorpions. In a […]

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Rosh Hashana & Yom Kippur: A Eulogy for a Christian Who Helped my Religiosity
September 21, 2022I was asked to eulogize an acquaintance from my childhood and youth in Holland—the mother of friends of mine. As I prepared the eulogy, I realized how much she and her family, and other devout Christians I knew, had influenced me. Despite the clear and definite differences between our religious outlooks, their sincerity and intent inspire me.

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Entering Israel’s Army is like Immersing in a Mikve
September 7, 2022Serving in the Israel Defense Forces is an act like no other. It is an act that serves the State of Israel and all its citizens, the Jewish People, and all of mankind. Moreover, the soldiers serving in Israel's army are entirely enveloped by the army - their entire bodies and beings are involved in this sacred task.

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The Spiritual Uniqueness of the Israeli Army
August 24, 2022Words on my Grandsons Enlisting in the Israeli Defense Forces - the tremendous significance of the Israel Defense Forces surpasses the mere defense of Israel's citizens. The joy and honor of joining Israel's army relate to 4,000 years of Jewish history, morals, and ethics, and the universal good.

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Struggles – Illumination of My Personal Challenges
August 10, 2022A private response to the many who asked for illumination concerning my personal religious struggles Coming from a totally secular background, like I did, has many challenges and drawbacks, and yet, also some great advantages. When I became interested in Judaism, at 14-15 years old, it was not an easy time—neither for my parents, my […]

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Abraham and the US President and their Irritation with God
July 27, 2022A God Who is good, yet the existence of evil, is an age-old dilemma. Authentic faith leads to questions and even indignation at perceived injustices. It is the true believer who reacts to realities that seem unjust and that result in suffering - remaining complacent is unacceptable! Simultaneously, one must remember the very little he can fathom about our world.

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The Brilliance of Judaism When You Do Not Believe
July 13, 2022When I met my Dutch atheistic friend, who I discussed previously (The Blessing of the Religious Atheist in Haarlem), in the city of Haarlem several times after I had met him in the synagogue, he became very outspoken. It was clear that his observations were expressed with great sincerity and with an ongoing respect for […]

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The Blessing of the Religious Atheist in Haarlem
June 29, 2022At the age of 15 when I first experienced observant Judaism, I encountered the anomaly of the observant non-believer. After approaching this person to discuss his views, his perspective enlightened me and accompanies me to this day. Non-belief does not dictate complete severance from everything that is Jewish and religious - in fact the non-believer has much to gain from Judaism, even as a non-believer!

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Theism and Atheism: the Twofold of Real Faith Which is One
June 15, 2022Approaching the question of the "existence" of God is almost impossible. Western thought and science has successfully analyzed and understood a myriad of aspects of our universe. However, applying these disciplines and proof by empirical evidence when attempting to "prove" anything about the divine proves futile. Were God to be a "thing," this would not be the case; God is not a "thing."

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Shavuot: Sinai, the Mystery and Myself
June 1, 2022Religious experiences can be few and far between. It is essential to translate religious experiences into a significant and lasting realities. All religions are born out of the intense feelings, often panic-filled astonishment, that follow such an experience. Jewish Law is a successful "recipe" for maintaining and incorporating religious experiences into our lives.

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God for Atheists (2) – Belief in God and the Human Brain
May 18, 2022Belief in the divine and religiosity most certainly have biological bases, however this does not mean that the biology of the human mind cause belief. The root of religiosity lies outside science and biology, while biology enables us to "tune in" and experience faith.

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Yom HaAtzma’ut is Thousands of Years Old!
May 4, 2022The bond, a marriage, between the People of Israel and its land stretches far back prior to the Declaration of the State of Israel in 1948. This marriage weathered wars, conquest, and exile - and now more than ever it is our duty to maintain and fortify the relationship of every Jew to the Land of Israel and the Jewish State.

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Pesach: It All Started With Karpas
April 12, 2022The seder on Pesach night opens with a mysterious practice - dipping a vegetable, "karpas," in salt water and then eating it. This is done immediately following Kiddush, and just as the recital of the Haggada begins. Why was this practice instituted and what does it teach us about the Exodus? Understanding karpas holds the key to understanding Judaism's approach to Pesach and the universal significance of the Exodus.

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God for Atheists
March 30, 2022Atheists and agnostics often feel a certain void in their lives, a certain lack of meaning or awareness of something higher, or a different dimension. This is awareness is part of the human condition and is something that offers an opening into the search for meaning. On beginning the investigation of the "God" concept, one must accept that God cannot be fully grasped: doubt is not merely a "hazard" but an integral and fundamental part of basic belief!

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Purim, or How to Win a Chess Game
March 15, 2022Purim is a festival of tremendous grandeur, splendor... and stupidity! The story of Purim as told in Megillat Esther reveals the arbitrary acts that at once were dangerous and fraught with large risk, and yet concluded as a move of courage and wisdom. Using this unusual strategy can be quite successful in chess...

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The Eternity of Purim
March 2, 2022The Purim story, as depicted in Megillat Esther, is miracle-less. Certainly as the events were unfolding the hand of God is absent, and it is only the keen reader who will identify the divine intervention as the drama that threatened the very existence of the Jewish People unraveled. God's covert involvement in the world is extremely difficult to ascertain, and yet it surrounds us every moment of every day, and like the Festival of Purim, will be celebrated for all eternity.

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Adar Sheni and God Awareness
February 16, 2022The Jewish Calendar is an intricate, complex and complicated system that requires the input of the greatest sages, astronomers and mathematicians in order to have a calendar based on the lunar year yet coincide with the solar calendar and seasons. Seemingly, it would be far simpler to follow either the lunar or solar calendar. The secret of the Jewish calendar is the creation of a constant awareness of God's presence.

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Do Not Wait Until COVID-19 is Over
January 19, 2022COVID-19 has hit all of us - the entire world - quite hard, and is a certain cause for dismay. We are all waiting for the pandemic and everything it has brought with it to end so that we can return to our routines, get on with our lives and be happy once again. However, happiness is not necessarily what or where we perceive it to be. In fact, we can already choose to be happy from today - and on every day and in every situation we find ourselves!

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The Hopelessness of Judaism and its Rescue
January 5, 2022The tension between the Law and the near hopelessness of man to live by it, to survive it and simultaneously to obey it with great fervor, is at the very core of Judaism’s complexity. The divine Word is deadly and causes paralysis. The Word, once descended to man, is unmanageable and causes havoc - it must be tamed and conditioned to allow the human to internalize it and live by it.

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How to Conduct a Dialogue, Discussion or Debate
December 29, 2021Dialogue and debate are essential parts of the sea of ideas that can enrich each and everyone of us. Unfortunately, serious debate on highly significant topics all too often moves from the topic at hand to unruly behavior (whether in an informal discussion between two parties, or in a public, formal setting). Guidelines for maintaining dignity are essential - both so that we are able to conduct the debate properly and so that we maintain our and our opponent's dignity. If we are truly dedicated to the true and free exchange of ideas, then even when we vehemently disagree with our opponent we will remain civil and learn something about his arguments and even ours.

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Shemita: Do Not Become a Chimpanzee
December 15, 2021What defines us? Is it what we do, or rather, who we are? If a human being is nothing more than the tasks he performs on a daily basis, then a mere chimpanzee can take his place and possible perform these tasks as well and even better. However, if we understand that the tasks themselves do not define us, but rather can act as a means to an end, as the means that allows us to realize our dreams, then only we can perform the tasks successfully over time. The Sabbatical year, Shemita, that we mark during the current year teaches us this important lesson; all that is left for us to do is to open ourselves to the Torah's teachings in this sphere.

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The Latest Controversy Around Spinoza
December 8, 2021Two weeks ago, a highly unfortunate incident happened at the Portuguese Spanish Synagogue in Amsterdam - based on the ban on the famous philosopher Baruch Spinoza, pronounced by the leadership of the synagogue in 1656, the synagogue’s Rabbi refused Professor Yitzchak Melamed, an Orthodox Jew, entrance to the synagogue complex, deeming Professor Melamed a “persona non grata." By public demand I am republishing the text of a lecture I delivered in Amsterdam in December 2015, a lecture wherein I called for the lifting of the ban on Spinoza.

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Chanukah: To Pretend to Be Religious?
December 2, 2021One of the great problems any religious person should struggle with is whether it is actually possible to be religious. In fact, what is the essence of genuine religiosity? The concept at the root of all religions is the awareness that it is extremely difficult to live up to the awe of the moment. The famous dispute regarding the order of lighting the Chanukah lights illuminates a practical approach to this issue.

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Living Like a Jew: Playing Music and Saying “to Me”
November 17, 2021Only something placed in relation to the sum-total of the human being bears significance - for such an act indicates complete commitment: “Till death do us part.” This may be the most crucial message for Jews today. Despite the pursuits and activities that occupy them, as long as Jews are not inspired to feel a total, personal commitment to authentic Jewishness, the right conditions for continuity and renewal will never be created.

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What Rabbi Shlomo Carlebach Said to the Women of the Wall
November 10, 2021Our Torah is wide enough and deep enough to cater for everyone. The Torah can speak to each and every person; however, sometimes one aspect will speak to a specific individual while not another. In this impromptu dialogue, Rabbi Shlomo Carlebach expresses a number of very significant, critical thoughts about Judaism, God, the Torah, and our own relations with our fellow.

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The Wisdom of the Bus Driver: Love Your Fellow As Yourself!
November 3, 2021Loving one's fellow as oneself is a central tenet and practical commandment of our religion. And yet, as simple as it sounds, its application is extremely difficult. Even those well-versed in the intricacies of the significance and laws governing this precept have difficulty incorporating it into their inner selves and actions. On occasion, it takes the insight and words of a bus driver to properly inculcate this love for one's fellow.

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The Rabbi’s Gift and the Mashiach
October 27, 2021When my oldest granddaughter became Bat Mitzva I wrote a book for her with advice and stories. Here is one such story.

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The Mystery of the Missing Verse and the Problem of Evil
October 13, 2021There is a pasuk (verse), missing from the Torah, a verse that is the most important of all—without which the Torah is not complete! This missing verse should have been written before the first verse in the Torah: “In the beginning God created heaven and earth.” This verse should have told us why God “decided” to create heaven and earth, the millions of stars, black holes, animals, vegetation, and above all, human beings. The absence of this verse is deliberate—for there is no way to write it; it could only have been “written” in God’s personal “language” that is beyond the capability of humankind to understand. The implications of this missing verse have profound meaning for human existence.

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Children’s Toys and Trivializing Torah
October 20, 2021Human beings are uniquely blessed with the faculty of imagination, and they possess nearly unlimited potential for constructive fantasy. Imagination is essential for advancement and progress throughout the world, which is also the case for Torah study. And yet, the sophistication invested in the production of toys for our children limits their processes of pretense, and thus the possibility for innovation and new insights in Torah learning.

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A Short Introduction to God
October 6, 2021While in pantheistic and other non-monotheistic philosophies, the Divine has no moral input, nothing could be further from the Jewish concept of God. For Judaism, God is the source par excellence of all moral criteria. And yet, on occasion He Himself seems to violate these very moral criteria — such as in the case when He causes a devastating flood in the days of Noah. God is a conscious Being Who created the world with a purpose. And this world is real and by no means a mirage. The human being’s deeds are of great value, far from an illusion; they are the very goal of creation. Judaism objects to the pantheistic view of the human being since it depersonalizes him, ultimately leading to his demoralization.

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Parashat Bereshit: The First Divine Commandment is to Enjoy the World
September 30, 2021It is often thought that God’s first commandment to Adam was the prohibition regarding the Tree of Knowledge. This would mean that man’s first encounter with the will of God was a negative experience: a restriction. However, this isn't actually true: This was not the first commandment! Careful analysis of the text shows that the first commandment to Adam and Chava was to eat from all the other trees and enjoy them.

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Rosh Hashana, Yom Kippur, and the Curse of Indifference
September 1, 2021In the last century during which our people narrowly escaped total extinction, the most remarkable thing in all of history happened. As in a dream, we, Jews, were privileged to return to our ancient homeland after nearly 2,000 years of exile. We now have our own army to defend us, and many of us live in great comfort and joy, with opportunities that we, as Jews, could never have envisioned. This is nothing less than an astounding blessing that God has granted us; an open miracle. But here too lies our greatest challenge: living under these miraculous conditions, we are in great danger of falling prey to the curse of indifference - indifference to the miserable and impossible situation of our fellow humans who are threatened by suffering and death.

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Humor, Rosh HaShana, and the Impossible Shofar
August 25, 2021It is Divine humor that tells us to live with absurdity, and supreme holy witticism that asks us to live with laughter. We are asked to enjoy the journey and realize that there is no arrival.

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The Map Problem and the Fly
July 21, 2021Some have said that only what can be proven is of value. True, if we limit ourselves to that which can be proven, we run less risk of error, and yet, by limiting ourselves so, we also run the risk of missing out on that which is most important. After all, the things that bring us the greatest meaning are those very things that cannot be proven.

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Tractatus Dialogico Philosophico De Faceta – A Modern Humorous Dialogue
July 28, 2021A humorous look at the problem of human communication. Enjoy!

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Parashat Vayikra – The Challenge Of Tisha B’av And The Temple Sacrifices
July 14, 2021Regardless of the many traditional approach to offering sacrifices in our day, there is no question that the Temple and its rituals once played an enormous role in Judaism, and that offering sacrifices was at the very center of its holy service. So, what was it that made sacrifices such an essential part of Judaism in bygone times? Was it merely primitivism? Or was it something that we are no longer connected to today and are missing out on? What holiness could there have been in the offering of sacrifices? And were we to discover this holiness, would that mean we should reintroduce the sacrificial rites in our own contemporary times?

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God as an Idol: The tragedy of being religious
May 27, 2021It’s high time that we who consider ourselves religious have an honest look in the mirror and ask ourselves what brought us to this lifestyle. Was it a genuine longing for religion and mitzvah observance, or was it an insurance policy?

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The War between Israel and Hamas
May 20, 2021When a nation looses its sense of mission it turns against those who remind them of it. All too often, it is the Jewish nation that earns their hatred with their moral demands and teachings. As a result, these countries call for the destruction of this annoying nation. Its voice, reflecting the One Above, has to be silenced so that the uncertainty of these countries’ conscience and the reality of their guilt can be obliterated.

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Achieving Joy: Be a Simpleton
April 22, 2021Joy is not a “peak experience” which climaxes and ends suddenly, but rather a plateau. It is not the ecstatic fire of the moment but the glow of growing from within.

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Afterthoughts on the Pandemic: the Black Spot or the White Page?
April 8, 2021The purpose of genuine religious life is to protest against this optical illusion and to teach us to refocus our spiritual spectacles. It is not that religion shows us something new. Rather, it shows us what we have seen all our lives but have never noticed, that there is dazzling goodness in this world. There is order instead of chaos; there is diversity, not just monotonous existence; and above all, there is the infinite grace of the human deed.

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Conversion is not about Halachah but about Jewishness
March 18, 2021Judaism and the Jewish people are intertwined and interact in ways which nobody can fully grasp. Are we a religion, or a nation? If we are a religion, how can it be that somebody who does not believe in God or refuses to observe even one commandment still remains Jewish as long as he or she is born to a Jewish mother? And if we are a nation, how does religion come in, telling us who belongs to the nation and who does not? Any attempt to find a solution to this problem will always fail. This is one of the greatest mysteries of Jewish identity.

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Pesach and the Exodus from COVID-19
March 23, 2021After a year in which we’ve personally felt a little bit of the Shi’abud Mitzraim—the bondage of Egypt—by way of the Pandemic—Pesach this year has an added meaning, bringing the Exodus a little closer to our own experience.
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The Chareidi Christian Tragedy and the Idol Worship of Talmud Torah
March 4, 2021Due to the long exile of the Jewish people, many Christian ideas have infiltrated Judaism through the back door. One such idea is the notion that saving the soul is more important than saving the body, and that the body is an obstacle to the soul. This idea is completely against the central tents of Judaism, and yet it has been adopted by certain parts of the Chareidi community.

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Halachic Jews and Soul Jews
March 11, 2021There are probably billions of people who are full-fledged “soul Jews” but don’t know it, and very likely never will. Perhaps it is these Jews whom God had in mind when He blessed Avraham and told him that he would be the father of all nations and that his descendants would be as numerous as the stars in the sky and the grains of sand on the seashore.

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The Challenge of Purim and the Coming of the Mashiach
February 22, 2021Redemption does not happen overnight; it develops over a long period of intermediate hester panim, until the last stage in the drama of history is fulfilled. The story of Purim reminds us that such periods when God "hides" from us are temporary. It gives us a framework in which to understand our lives and remain optimistic, even in the midst of darkness.

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The Upcoming Post Corona Crisis Part 7 – not what we want, but what we should want.
February 3, 2021When Jews and non-Jews rediscover that to really live is an art which few people have conquered, but which is essential to our happiness, only then will the world be able to slowly heal itself.

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Parashat Terumah: On the Tabernacle, Silence, and Prayer
February 18, 2021Some of our greatest commentators have wrestled with the connection between the command to build the Mishkan (the Tent of Meeting or Tabernacle) and the sin of the Golden Calf. It can be argued that the Mishkan was a concession to human weakness, and the same is true of the institution of spoken prayer!

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A Plea to the Secular and Chareidi Communities
February 11, 2021Most of the people in both the secular and the Chareidi communities are deeply committed to their fellow Jews and to the welfare of the State of Israel. And so I ask both communities, why can’t you get on with each other?

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The Upcoming Post Corona Crisis – Part 6: Talmudic Rainbows
January 20, 2021What is the Talmud all about? The first thing that must be emphasized is that the Talmud displays deliberate chaos. It roams from one topic to another without any real inner logic, other than that one word gives rise to a whole new idea without warning us that it is coming. The outsider may have trouble making heads or tails of it all. And then suddenly one gets the hang of it and realizes that all this chaos flows together into an unbelievable picture, with hundreds of colors harmoniously coming together. That moment of comprehension is a great joy for the intellect and the human soul.

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The Upcoming Post Corona Crisis – Part 5
January 7, 2021In returning the prophetic spirit to Judaism, the world of Aggadah is of crucial importance. Aggadah is the prophetic voice within Judaism, where prophecy not only speaks, but allows the reader to answer. It is the part of Judaism that deals with the sum total of human life. It prevents mechanical observance by freeing our inner spirit. Whereas Halacha is the consummation, Aggadah is its aspiration.

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The Upcoming Post Corona Crisis – Part 4
December 30, 2020The prophets had a universal message, far beyond the Jewish people. Their calls to aid the poor, widows and orphans, and the promise of the coming of the Messianic age were meant for the whole world. The State of Israel is itself the greatest proof that prophecy is slowly coming alive again. Judaism has been handed an opportunity to restore its full capacity, including its redemptive message, to heal the world and end the amputation of the best part of itself.
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Parashat VaYigash – Yosef’s Remarkable Revenge
December 24, 2020In this week's parashah, Yosef set's up the ultimate test for his brothers. Will they let their little brother down and not sell him to the enemy or will they fight for him? The answer will show whether they have truly repented of their betrayal of him.

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The Upcoming Post Corona Crisis – Part 3
December 16, 2020Halacha was meant to rely heavily rely on the prophetic voice to give it its spirit and motivation. Because of the absence of prophecy, this spiritual component is missing or overlooked in our day-to-day experience. It is the absence of this prophetic dimension that underlies the spiritual malaise in which we currently find ourselves.

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Chanukah: History is written by Choice, not by Truth
December 9, 2020Judaism suggests that at certain times God sends emanations to this world in order to awaken human beings to act. We see this in the story of Chanukah. God created a notion of revolt within the minds of the Maccabees, whose greatness was manifest in their correct reaction to this heavenly directive.

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The Unforgettable “Sinterklaas”: A tongue-in-cheek look at a remarkable tradition
December 1, 2020This week, the festival of Sinterklaas will take place in my birthplace of Holland. This festival made an indelible impression on my childhood, and there is much we can learn from the dilemmas it raised (and still raise) for Jewish educators.
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The Absurdity of Yom Kippur – The Confrontation with Our Undeserved Lives
September 24, 2020Yom Kippur leads us to realize life itself is a gift and that gifts confer obligations. The more we receive, the more we become obligated to respond adequately.
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Rosh Hashana: Daring to Blow New Life into Judaism
September 16, 2020The blowing of the shofar proves that we can surpass ourselves. On our own, using only our vocal cords, we are unable to produce this sound—a terrifying, awesome, penetrating resonance. This is a sound that can cause us to break down, pick ourselves up again, and transform ourselves into new individuals.
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Bach, Mozart, and Beethoven: How to be a Genuine Halachic Expert
June 18, 2020To be an arbiter of Jewish law is to be the conductor of an orchestra. It is not coercion but persuasion that makes it possible for the other to hear the beauty of the music and to accept a halachic decision, just as one would willingly listen to the interpretation of a conductor—because one is deeply inspired.
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Who can be Mashiach? He who knows how to sing!
June 11, 2020Music raises the spoken word to a level that touches on prophecy. It gives it a taste of that which is beyond, and transforms it into something untouchable. Just as there is no way to demonstrate the beauty of music to a person who is completely deaf, so is there no way to explain the difference between a spoken word and one which is sung, unless one sings. It lifts a person out of the mundane and gives him a feeling of the imponderable, which is the entrance to joy. It sets the soul in operation and brings us near to the Infinite.
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Some Bold Ideas How to Observe Shabbat, take the Tram and go to a Restaurant!
June 3, 2020It is clear a greater number of secular Israelis would like to become more observant. However, for various practical reasons, or due to social pressures, they are unable to make this switch. One of the great challenges, if not the greatest, is Shabbat, the only official day of rest in Israeli society, when people enjoy visiting people, or meeting friends at a restaurant. But none of this is possible without the use of cars or taxis and with no open restaurants. Here are some suggestions to overcome these obstacles
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Torah: The Confrontation with Ourselves
May 20, 2020The people of Israel, according to Jewish tradition, are not the authors of the Torah. Rather, the Torah is the author of the people. As a covenant between God and humankind, the Torah is what brought the people into being. Moreover, despite the fact that the people have often violated the commanding voice of this text, it created the specific and unique identity of the Jewish nation.
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Yom Yerushalayim: The City and People of Eternity
May 14, 2020A poem for Yom Yerushalayim.
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Pesach and the Coronavirus: Where is God
April 1, 2020The Coronavirus has once more confronted us with the absence of God in modern times. This absence is often seen as the cause for much secularism. No longer, it is argued, are there enough indications for God’s interference in the national and private affairs of mankind. Is there another way to look at this seeming absence? Might we find God in silence?
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The Message of The Corona Virus
March 19, 2020The new reality in the age of COVID-19 forces us to break with the monotony that most of us are used to. Almost all of us jump into routine every morning – whether it’s a job, or the need to sleep, eat, or entertain ourselves. And now, the corona virus suddenly forces us to rethink everything, making us wonder what this life of ours is really all about.
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The Perfect Torah Versus the evolving Torah
February 20, 2020Announcing a new initiative by the Cardozo Academy Think Tank: a series of guest essays by Yehudah DovBer Zirkind, based on Rabbi Cardozo's discussion of the Mei Hashiloah, Torah and Halacha.
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Fundamentalism, Education and The Wisdom of the Gentile
February 13, 2020By designating Yitro to be the father-in-law of the most holy Jew of all times, God made it clear that He would not tolerate racism and that a righteous gentile could climb up to the highest ranks of saintliness.
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Praying, Soulmates, Army Service and the Halachic Chess Game
February 6, 2020Podcasts on Prayer, finding One’s Soulmate, and Army service of the Ultra Orthodox, plus a previously published essay on the similarity between Halacha and a chess game.
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Parashat Bo: Knowing How to Lose
January 30, 2020The secret to Moshe Rabenu's greatness is that he knew that his failures were in fact the building blocks for his future successes. While he may never have known what his accomplishments were, he continued to fight and ultimately prevailed.
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75 Years After the Holocaust: Rembrandt and the Quest for Integrity
January 23, 2020Rembrandt reminds us that if we want to really live we must show flawless integrity and demonstrate great authenticity. It is all about making a genuine contribution to the world, with no regard for gain, and even being prepared to pay the price of one’s rank and position in the conventional community. A person must make sure that he can look himself in the mirror at the end of his life and say, I lived my life; it did not just pass me by.
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Conversion, the Most Difficult Mitzva, and the Need for Heresy
January 16, 2020Judaism was born out of opposition, rebellion and protest. It overthrew and outlived mighty empires and gave the world a radically new understanding of itself. Judaism has nothing to fear. It has prevailed over all those who criticized it but has also learned much about itself by listening to opposing voices. Through these voices, it has been able to sharpen its own claims and if necessary change its mind when the inadequacy of these claims has become clear. Only in this way will it continue to play a central role in the future of mankind.
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The Talmudic Olympic Games
January 9, 2020Last week, something remarkable happened. Thousands of Jews from all over the world came together to study the last page of an old book with the ineffable anticipation of starting to study it all over again from page one and not to lose a minute.
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Bilaam, Pontius Pilatus, Jesus and the Jewish Tradition
January 2, 2020It is extremely difficult to know whether the stories and observations about Jesus in the Talmud actually refer to the Jesus of the New Testament. Scholars have made the important observation that there is also a very great discrepancy between the picture which emerges from the actual text of the New Testament and the one developed by the church.
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The Tragedy of Jesus and a Hand Wave
December 26, 2019We should be careful in the way how we deal with people who are contemplating the possibility of leaving the fold. Much could be prevented, and too much is at stake.
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God’s False Accusations and the Mystery of this World
December 18, 2019God who is beyond time and space, is the source of all what happens and so uses false accusations, pretexts, and insidiousness against human beings while teaching them simultaneously that they are free to act and that they carry full responsibility for their deeds.
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Two New Podcasts: On the Jewish Mission and the Most Difficult Mitzva
December 12, 2019Dear Friends, Shalom u-vracha. Although we have received several new gifts, for which we are most thankful, our financial situation has still not been resolved. The unfortunate “witch hunt” against some of my ideas seems to continue and has created much financial damage to our programs, projects and writings. As I have stated before, I […]
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The Religious Value of Doubt
December 5, 2019Faith means striving for faith. It is never an arrival. It can only burst forth at singular moments. It does not arise out of logical deduction, but out of uncertainty, which is its natural breeding ground. To have faith is to live with unresolved doubts, prepared to rise above ourselves and our wisdom. Looking into the Jewish tradition with its many debates, one clearly understands that those who deny themselves the comfort of certainty are much more authentic than those who are sure.
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Avraham and Individuality: Old Age and Facelifts
November 27, 2019For the authentically religious personality, religion can be experienced and lived only in a state of originality. Any imitation of fellow worshipers is serving oneself and not God. In essence, religion is an attempt to search for God, the ultimate Original.
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Chaye Sarah: Leader or Captain
November 21, 2019Avraham was an unparalleled leader and walked in front of everybody else. But he was also a captain who cared for the underdog and who pleaded with God not to leave the wicked people of Sedom and Amora behind.
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The Religious Challenge of Akedat Yitzchak
November 15, 2019Avraham learns that to be religious is to live with a God Who carries contradictions and incongruities. Consistent gods are idols because they don't teach man how to live in a world that is full of dichotomies and inconsistencies. To be religious means to know how to navigate unresolvable conflicts, to be bold enough to negotiate, and to stand upright even when failing.

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The Curse of Fluency
November 6, 2019Praying to God can be risky! All of us frequently succumb to the danger of prayer by rote, which can easily lead to other serious problems. The worshipers may be so arrogantly satisfied with themselves that they completely forget before Whom they stand while praying.
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Praying – Suffering – Noach and Spinoza
October 30, 2019Noah does not represent genuine religiosity. Yes, many religious Jews believe that it is only in obedience that one must live one’s religious life. But that is not what the first Jew and authentic Judaism are all about. Judaism is a covenant between man and God, in which man is co-creator. God orders him to take action beyond His commandments. He is asked to build the world with the ingredients that God supplied at the time of creation. And when God destroys the world, it is man’s task to restore it.
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News from the Cardozo Academy plus Two New Podcasts
October 24, 2019Many friends have asked me to explain a little more why the David Cardozo Academy no longer has the finances to send new weekly Thoughts To Ponder, authored by myself as I have done for many years.
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The Dangerous “Day After” Yom Kippur
October 10, 2019The day after Yom Kippur, the synagogue service really should be a completely different experience from what people are used to. Yom Kippur should still be in the bones of all synagogue participants. Its spirit should still be felt with every prayer. It should be completely impossible for synagogue services to return to their old ways, in which prayers are said as if “nothing happened.”
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Yom Kippur, Family, and Time-Traveling
October 3, 2019Two new podcasts, plus an essay for Yom Kippur.
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Music, Children and Israeli Politics
September 25, 2019A parable for Rosh Hashana, plus, two new podcasts: On music as religious experience, and on the importance of bringing children into the world.
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The Future of Thoughts to Ponder
September 18, 2019To my great regret, due to a severe lack of funds, the David Cardozo Academy has been forced to leave its offices, hence, I will not be able, at least for the meantime, to write and send out my weekly Thoughts to Ponder.
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Is Torah from Heaven
September 11, 2019Why do we believe that revelation may be possible? If revaluation is by definition not amenable to scientific investigation, what other faculty is available to us to contemplate the prospect of revelation? Believe it or not, this depends on our openness and capacity to wonder, to be perplexed and stand in amazement, which happens when we have no other way of dealing with something extraordinary.
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Why the Shofar? An Introduction to Rosh Hashana
September 4, 2019The blowing of the shofar proves that we can surpass ourselves. On our own, using our vocal cords, we are unable to produce this sound – a terrifying penetrating resonance. Alone, we cannot produce a sound that comes close to the piercing and penetrating heavenly voice of the shofar, which can cause human beings to break down, pick themselves up again, and transform into new individuals.
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Parashat Re’eh: The Purpose of Judaism is to Disturb
August 28, 2019Religion is a protest against taking life for granted. There are no insignificant phenomena or deeds in this world, and it is through Judaism’s demands and far-reaching interference in our daily life that we are made aware of God as our steadfast Companion.
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When Times Change, Jewish Education Changes
August 21, 2019Jewish education has only one goal, and that is to inspire students to reach for Heaven (Yirat Shamayim)—to transform them into outstanding human beings, who demonstrate concern for their fellowmen and dedication towards the Jewish people and the notion to serve mankind as its ultimate mission, according to the commandments of the Torah.
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Parashat Va’etchanan: Sweetening the Divine Word
August 15, 2019There is little meaning in living by Halacha if one does not hear its grace. It is not a life of Halachic observance that we need, but a life of experiencing Halacha as a daily living music recital. Observance alone does not propel man to a level of existence where he realizes that there is more to life than the mind can grasp.
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Rabbinic Despair and Simple Courage
August 8, 2019In the wake of the destruction of Jerusalem the leaders of the Jewish people despaired. But the ordinary Jews did not. Despite the total collapse of Jewish life, they opted for the impossible. They not to listen to their leaders, but continued building the nation of Israel, as they had previously been taught by the very sages who now despaired. Sometimes, the simple man has more faith in the Jewish future than the greatest Talmudic scholar.
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A Command to Cancel the Commandments
August 1, 2019Judaism’s recognition of God is not the triumphant outcome of philosophical deduction. It results from the performance of mitzvoth. Through the observance of the commandments we perceive the Commander.
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Shabbat: To Postpone is to Profane
July 25, 2019To set one’s schedule around fixed times—for prayers, for meals, for learning, etc.—does not only inject order into one’s life, but also meaning; and as such one gains an opportunity to sanctify those moments. The chaos of a week without order, of days without set times, is yet another manifestation of the secularization of society and the profanation of the sacred.
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Life: The Courage to Say “Li”
July 18, 2019Just as there is a need to continuously grow in a marriage, so it is with Judaism. One needs to work on one’s commitment. Both the spouse and Judaism need to become the ultimate priority in our lives.
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The Divine Insanity of Halachic Chess
July 11, 2019Halacha is the greatest chess game on earth. It is the Jewish game par excellence. For people who want to live a life of great meaning and depth, nothing is more demanding and torturous while simultaneously uplifting and mind-broadening. They love the rules because they are the way to freedom. Certainly chess is just a game, while Halacha, if properly understood and lived, deals with real life, deep religiosity, moral dilemmas, emotions, and intuitions far more significant in a person’s life than a chess game.
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“Limmud” – An Open Letter to the Chief Rabbi of South Africa
July 4, 2019I love to go to Limmud, to listen and to teach. Limmud is a place where I am challenged; where I hear new things (including some utter nonsense); where I can fall in love with my fellow Jews, laugh and cry with them, and share my commitment to and struggles with Judaism.
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On Being Called a Rabbi & Third-Epoch Halacha – Ten Questions for Rabbi Cardozo by Rav Ari Ze’ev Schwartz
June 27, 2019In the next 50 years, we will see radical changes in the condition and nature of the Jewish people, as well as in Orthodox Judaism and Halacha. While during the last 2,000 years Halacha was “exile-orientated” and “defensive,” we are slowly growing out of this. The sources that until now were the basis for Halacha will have to be replaced by new Orthodox / Israeli “prophetic” Halacha. The first signs of this are already taking place.
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My Struggle with Persuasion and the Truth Concerning other Religions – Question 10 (part 1)
June 13, 2019It is because of my awareness that any religious belief can be justified that I have become so critical of mainstream Orthodox Judaism and skeptical about the way I promulgate my own Judaism, in the way I see it. Do I believe in it only because it’s something I have grown into and feel at home and comfortable with, or is there something more that makes my Judaism’s claim to truth stand out from all the others?
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Is the Torah Divine? Thoughts for Shavuot on Combustibility
June 6, 2019A flame grows or diminishes depending on the combustibility of the material it comes in contact with. So it is with human openness to the divine. Their receptivity to the divinity of Torah is proportionate to the condition of their soul.
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A Vote of Confidence
May 30, 2019While most people today believe that one should not burden children with obligations, but rather allow them to make their own choices, Judaism teaches us that giving a child the feeling that he has a moral task to fulfill is giving him the option to experience immense joy.
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To Madonna
May 22, 2019Shabbat is the day on which we are asked to put aside all the profanity of clattering commerce and the fury of greed; of trying to convince ourselves that we are the absolute owners of this world. It is a day of protest against all the external pomp, glitter, and power. Its purpose is to turn the world into an island of tranquility in the stormy sea of worldliness, for one day each week.
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On Music Baths And Art As Protest
May 15, 2019Natural beauty, art, and music exist to disturb our complacency. Their purpose is to awaken in us a sense of wonder. And while beauty, art, and music facilitate that wonder, the role of religion is to provide us with the means to respond to it.
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Yom Ha’atzmaut – The Eternal Marriage
May 8, 2019Yom Ha’atzmaut commemorates the anniversary of a marriage that has lasted more than 3,500 years. This may sound like a paradox, but it is the inescapable truth about the Land of Israel and the Jews. No marriage has lasted so long, been so deep in its commitment and so overwhelming in its love as the one between the Jews and their homeland.
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My Chareidi and Modern Orthodox Struggles (Part 2)
May 2, 2019I believe the world is constantly changing because this is the will of God. God doesn’t want a static world. From the very beginning, we see an evolving world that is constantly on the move and trying to improve itself (with ups and downs). New conditions express God’s will, and it follows that God wants Halacha to “change” accordingly.
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Bread is an Arrogant Matza
April 18, 2019On Pesach, which symbolizes the beginning of the Jewish people, Jews are once more reminded that their mission to become a light unto the nations can only start in the spirit of humility. Arrogance can never be the foundation of spirituality and moral integrity. It cannot inspire others, nor will it have a lasting effect.
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My Chareidi and Modern Orthodox Struggles
April 11, 2019It’s important to realize that nobody can inherit religion, not even from oneself. It has to be an ongoing discovery. I converted when I was 16, but over the years I’ve come to realize that to convert only once is almost meaningless.
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Radical Otherness and the Israeli Elections
April 4, 2019Israel’s very existence is the manifestation of divine intervention in history to which it must attest. In Israel, history and revelation are one. Only in Israel do they coincide. While other nations exist as nations, the people of Israel exist as a reminder of God’s involvement in world history. Only through Israel is humanity directly touched by the divine.
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Book Review: The Passover Haggadah of Rabbi Dr. Eliezer Berkovits
March 28, 2019It is a great joy to study Faith and Freedom: Passover Haggadah, With Commentary from the Writings of Rabbi Eliezer Berkovits. In this Haggadah, not only do we find very interesting insights by Rabbi Berkovits on themes that relate to Pesach, but we also get somewhat of an introduction to his philosophy and unique halachic approach in general.
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Purim – Serious Reflections on the Proper Use of Alcohol
March 20, 2019Some appropriately irreverent thoughts to...well, no, not to ponder on the occasion of Purim.
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The Hardship and Privilege of Honest Teaching: The Baal Teshuva Movement Impasse
March 14, 2019I strongly believe that new ideas, ideologies and movements are God-given and have great religious meaning. This means that we are religiously obligated to incorporate them into Judaism—sometimes by just accepting them and other times by reworking them.
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Critics, Laughter and Writing Serious Stuff: Ten Questions for Rabbi Cardozo – Question 7 (Part 2)
March 7, 2019It is important to remember that great controversies are also great emancipators. They give us new and fresh insights. We are in dire need of them. We should not only allow them but encourage our students to advance them!
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My Controversy with the Mainstream Orthodox Community – Part 1
February 27, 2019I am often attacked for my views, and I understand that. To question our views, with the implication that we may need to change our ways, is not always pleasant. But if we want to make sure that Judaism has a future, we have no option but to take that road.
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My Fascination with the Chaotic World of the Talmud: Ten Questions for Rabbi Cardozo
February 21, 2019The Talmud is the ongoing discussion of what God wants from us while, for the most part, not giving us a final answer and leaving us in limbo. Why is this? Because it is only through discussion and disagreement that a tradition can stay alive and be relevant. Once it is finalized, it will die. This is the reason that I object so strongly to the codification of Jewish law.
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The Sanctity of Shabbat: Yes to the Ayalon Bridge, No to the Eurovision Song Contest
February 6, 2019However much money Israel may make from hosting Eurovision, it is absolutely wrong and shameful that Israel’s leadership will allow violation of Shabbat on this occasion. It is self-evident that this has nothing to do with pikuach nefesh. Israel should cancel the Eurovision Song Contest if its organizers are not prepared to find a solution so that Israel can keep its head high and show the world what it means to stand for one’s principles.
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My Search for, and Momentary Loss of, God: Ten Questions for Rabbi Cardozo by Rav Ari Ze’ev Schwartz
January 31, 2019What is holiness? It has something to do with the constant awareness that God is to be discovered in all that one does, speaks, thinks, and feels. But that’s nearly unattainable. How does one live up to this?
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Why I Ask and Doubt but Have Strong Faith: Ten Questions for Rabbi Cardozo by Rav Ari Ze’ev Schwartz
January 23, 2019Faith is like music. It is true because of its beauty, not because of its intellectual certainty. It stems from impossible paradoxes, as well as a great deal of imagination that surpasses rationality and scientific or historical facts.
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Why I (Refuse to) Pray: Ten Questions for Rabbi Cardozo by Rav Ari Ze’ev Schwartz
January 16, 2019For me, praying is the admission that we need His help and that we are not God! I have to make myself aware that I need to praise Him because I am not His equal; not because He needs me for anything. But sometimes, as after a tragedy, I want to turn my prayer into a protest against God.
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The Great Paradox: The Non-Existent God and the Need to Serve Him
January 3, 2019Is God really perfect as we always maintain? God Himself tells Moshe Eheyeh asher eheyeh—I will be what I will be. Not “I am what I am” as the Septuagint mistranslates. But how can that be? It means that He is not yet what He should be and that He never will be. Apparently He is incomplete, because He seems capable of changing and moving toward perfection, but He will never be able to actually reach perfection. God is trapped in a contradiction. So, is God a verb? Always “godding”? Always imprisoned in a becoming mode? What then is God? An unending trial to be God?
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Why I am Controversial: Ten Questions for Rabbi Cardozo – Question 1
January 9, 2019I was recently asked by Rav Ari Ze’ev Schwartz of the Society of Independent Spirituality: Can you say a little about the educational and spiritual goals of your weekly articles? What do you want your readers to experience when they read these articles? How do you yourself experience these goals and articles? Here is my response.
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Torah Beyond Halakhah – An Interview with Rabbi Cardozo
December 20, 2018The Beauty of the Jewish tradition is that it is not always precise and consistent, because ife is not clear-cut or coherent. We need flexibility to work out the different opinions so that Jewish Law and beliefs stay fresh and thriving. The moment we codify or dogmatize it all, we destroy it.
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Judaism: Thinking Big
December 13, 2018We are in desperate need of bold ideas that will place the Torah in the center of our lives and make us receptive to God’s presence through a daring new encounter with Him. Let it be heroic. Not staid and comfortable, but painful and hard-won; a deep breath in the midst of the ongoing conflict ever-present in the heart of humankind.
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Parashat Miketz – The Pain of Being a Tzaddik
December 6, 2018To be righteous, with the full awareness that nobody will ever know the real story, and to have one’s deeds condemned, is one of the most painful human experiences and is a great tragedy. Only the knowledge that the One Above knows the real story, and the conviction that it is more important that others benefit from one’s deeds than to be assured of the recognition of one’s real intentions, gives the ultimate feeling of spiritual satisfaction for which the tzaddik strives.
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Parashat Vayeshev: Divine Emanations, Chanuka and the Future of the State of Israel
November 29, 2018Judaism suggests that at certain times God sends emanations to this world so as to awaken human beings to act, just as Pharaoh received his dreams in order that Joseph’s imprisonment would come to an end.
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Parashat Vayishlach: Amalek, Jewish Injustice, Converts, and a Warning to the Chief Rabbinate
November 22, 2018The Torah teaches us to erase Amalek’s memory by doing everything in our power not to give cause to hostile feelings within ourselves toward other nations.
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Parashat Vayetze: Be Fearful of Religion
November 15, 2018We are not asked to dream the inconceivable. We are asked to dream what is actually achievable. It is the Halacha that rescues us from unrealistic dreams, substituting them with those that are viable. Mount Sinai and the giving of the law replaced impossible dreams with those that are within our grasp.
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Parashat Toldot: Admitting A Mistake: Even God Does
November 8, 2018When even God can' make a "mistake", and admit it, we can rest assured that it is nothing less than honorable to act similarly.
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Faith, Death and Frontal Encounter
November 1, 2018If one invests in one’s faith by singing God’s praises during times of prosperity and good health, then, in the loneliness of difficult and sorrowful times, one may be able to continue believing in God’s faithfulness even when there is little evidence of such Divine allegiance.
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The Curse of Religious Boredom
October 25, 2018Young people are developing a fresh approach to what Judaism is really all about—open to new adventures. They are keenly aware that one cannot inherit Judaism but only discover it on one’s own through an often difficult spiritual struggle, and even warfare.
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God and Natural Disasters: God is not a “What,” or a “When,” and not even a “Who”
October 18, 2018Moshe asks God to reveal His name to him before he conveys the message to the Jews that He will redeem them from Egyptian bondage. God refuses to do so, and His answer is astonishing: “I will be Whoever I will be.” I am not a “what,” or a “when.” I am not even a “who.” There is no term you can use to describe Me. Any attempt to give Me an image is a serious violation of My very being. Any conclusive explanation of My deeds is idol worship. I permit you to describe Me in human terms only as long as you know that any such description will ultimately break down. No word can ever contain Me.
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Parashat Noah – Natural Disasters: Are We To Be Blamed?
October 11, 2018Must we believe that the whole universe was created only to test man’s moral and religious conduct? Is it not be more logical to conclude that God’s reasons for creating the universe are much greater and more significant than the problem of human behavior?
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Introduction to Torah – The Unavoidable and Disturbing Text
October 4, 2018Learning Torah requires human authenticity; it means standing in front of a mirror and asking yourself the daunting question of who you really are, without masks and artificialities.
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Simchat Torah: The Unapproachable Text
September 27, 2018On Simchat Torah we begin reading the Torah all over again. Even the greatest Torah scholars once again come to the conclusion that they need to reread it, since they failed bitterly the previous year. After all, we only start reading the first words and already we get stuck, unable to understand the actual meaning; and we can never really get beyond that place. While in the non-Jewish world the whole point is to finish a book, in Judaism we are all just perpetual beginners.
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Simchat Torah – Technology and the Outdated Torah Scroll
September 20, 2018Running our world by remote control has not been good for our souls; and walking on the moon has not helped us to know our next-door neighbor any better. On the contrary, technological progress has robbed us of our own humanness. It is therefore most meaningful that one item has maintained its constancy. It carries a text that has had greater influence in the world than any other we know of. It has changed the universe as nothing else has; it encourages people to move, to discover, and to develop. But it is written on parchment, by the hand of a person, holding a quill, as if to say: Be yourself. Don’t get run over by the need for progress.
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Yom Kippur: Do We Deserve Life? The Art of Spiritual Administration
September 13, 2018The call of the hour on Yom Kippur is this: a full day is given to us to realize that our lives are undeserved. Life is only great when it is earned through a dignified response.
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Rosh HaShanah: What Really Counts
August 30, 2018Every ordinary act should be turned into a kind of mitzvah, a spiritual challenge, making it a dignified encounter with God. On Rosh HaShanah and Yom Kippur we are reminded that our deeds must redeem God’s presence and rescue Him from oblivion. In doing the finite we must be able to perceive the infinite.
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The Joy of Saying “I am Sorry” – The Portuguese Spanish Selichot
August 23, 2018To be given the opportunity to do teshuvah is an enormous privilege. It is a joy to be able to say I am sorry. This is the ultimate expression of religious optimism. Judaism teaches man that there is no karma that traps him, and no original sin that stands in his way. Man is free to re-engage with God and his fellow man. Whatever obstacles there may be, all that is required is the will to change his ways and the effort to work hard at it.
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Parashat Shoftim: Surround Yourself with Cleanliness
August 16, 2018Jewish law contains a far-reaching codex for personal and environmental cleanliness that would seem novel and forward-thinking to many twenty-first century environmentalists. Unfortunately, these laws do not seem to be of great concern within many orthodox communities today. By implementing the Torah’s laws in this realm, orthodox communities will make a tremendous kiddush Hashem, which is in fact the purpose of being a Jew.
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Achieving Unity While Remaining Divided
August 9, 2018Paradoxically, the only way to create unity among different denominations is for all to recognize that they are fundamentally divided. We need to stop asking for compromise on the very beliefs that are matters of personal conscience and therefore categorical.
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The Jerusalem Parade: Homosexuality
August 2, 2018All discussions of why certain marriages or sexual relationships are forbidden are doomed to fail! No human reasoning is able to explain them in any consistent way. It is for this reason that religious thinkers should distance themselves from giving primary reasons for these prohibitions.
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Parashat VaEtchanan: The Revelation is Taking Place Today!
July 26, 2018When a person learns Torah as a religious experience and hears its revelation, the gap of several thousand years—from the Revelation until now—no longer exists. Accordingly, Torah is given today
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Tisha b’Av – Who needs the Temple?
July 19, 2018The Temple whose destruction we mourn on the 9th of Av has no inherent value. It is only a means to something that no physical object can contain. On Tish’a B’Av, we do not mourn the loss of the Temple but rather the loss of its message, which we no longer seem to grasp.
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The Controversy Surrounding My Louis Jacobs Memorial Lecture
July 11, 2018Louis Jacobs is not at all as radical as some would like to believe. In fact, some ultra-Orthodox thinkers were even more radical than Rabbi Jacobs but remained completely committed to Orthodox Halacha and the belief in Torah from Heaven.
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The Search for God: The Struggle to Achieve the Greatness of Halachic Living
July 5, 2018We must teach Halacha as a musical symphony, in which all students see opportunities to discover their inner selves. Teachers must stand in front of their classes as a conductor stands before his orchestra and draws it out of its confinement, moving it beyond itself. They must show their students how to pull the ineffable out of the dry halacha and turn it into an encounter with God.
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Scandalous Halachic Decisions: Ethiopians and Wine
June 28, 2018The ruling by the Eida HaHareidit that Ethiopian Jews are not fully Jewish is scandalous and deeply embarrassing. It disgraces Judaism and is as anti-Jewish as can be. This and many other rabbinical decisions are not part of the Judaism I converted to. I abhor them and want no part of them.
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Parashat Chukat – The Curse of Religious Coercion
June 20, 2018For the sake of later generations—who would need to know that the ways of the Torah are ways of pleasantness, of the gentle word and not the hard strike—God denied Moshe the merit of living in the land. He made it clear to all that leaders who seek to turn Israel into a holy nation by way of threat or by force may very well bring disaster to themselves and their people.
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Parashat Korach: The Curse of Camouflaged Jealousy and the Blessing of Enjoying the Achievements of Others
June 14, 2018Among world leaders, governments, the academic world, and even the Jewish world, we see symptoms of Korach's conduct. And while it also happens among the average population, it is with the “mighty ones” that the consequences are much more serious."
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Conversion: An Open Letter to Israel’s Chief Rabbis
June 7, 2018The first convert and Jew, Avraham, was only asked to observe a few of the commandments, such as circumcision. An incubation period was required to allow for Judaism to develop slowly and be solidified at Sinai with the giving of the Torah. In this time frame, the great moral-religious foundations of Judaism and the conditions for creating the Jewish nation were shaped. We should allow potential converts this option to slowly work their way up to Sinai.
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Parashat Behaalotecha Theocracy, Democracy, and Halacha
May 31, 2018Halacha seeks to create a certain duality within the Jewish polity and allows space for a democratic model in which human beings decide the law, not only God. This is with the full permission, nay, on the initiative of God Himself as reflected in the Torah. In other words, the Torah itself gives its imprimatur to state law: “Appoint yourselves shoftim [judges sitting in the Sanhedrin] and shotrim [magistrates who judge according to ‘the law of the king,’ civil law].
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Why a Second Day of Yom Tov? The Incomparable Greatness of the Land of Israel
May 24, 2018Since the days of Hillel HaNasi, an official and fixed Jewish calendar (independent of eye witnesses) is in operation and, consequently, there is no longer any doubt about which day is the correct day of Yom Tov. Why then, did the Sages did not annul the second day Yom Tov?
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Atheism Belief in the Unbelievable
May 16, 2018I am jealous of atheists because they are able to believe the unbelievable. And I, in my simplicity, cannot reach that state of belief.
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Parshat Bechukotai – To Have or to Be, That Is the Question
May 10, 2018To be satisfied is one of the greatest blessings that can ever be bestowed upon human beings. The Torah teaches us that when the People of Israel live in accordance with the requirements of the Torah, what will matter is not what a person “has” but what a person “is.”
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Sefirat HaOmer: The Secret to Human and Rabbinical Autonomy
May 3, 2018The real struggle for moral liberty started the day after the exodus from Egypt. The first day was a given; it was the day of God, not of the people. It was the day of passivity and complete surrender. Only the next day did the spiritual labor of the human being begin, and that is therefore the first day of our spiritual elevation.
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The Tragedy and the Challenge: A Forgotten Mission
April 26, 2018We Jews are messengers, but we have forgotten the message. It is our obligation to rediscover it and advance it into eternity. Our task is to be more than human, more than good, and more than pious, to surpass all these and once again become God’s stake in the future.
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Yom HaShoah – Jewish Life or Merely Israeli Life?
April 12, 2018Rabbi Yochanan taught us that Jews can survive without Israel, as long as there is Torah, the portable homeland of the Jewish people. But Jews will not survive solely because of the existence of Israel—however powerful it may be—if Israel does not incorporate a large percentage of Jewish traditional resources.
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Pesach: The Mystery of Karpas
March 29, 2018Why do we use karpas—a green vegetable—dipped in salt water at the beginning of the Seder? Could it have something to do with the other meaning of karpas—fine woolen cloth? There is a lesson here, hidden in plain sight, about causality and Divine Providence.
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Plato’s Haggada in the “Dialogues”
March 22, 2018When we read the text on the Seder night, we should be aware that it only provides the opening words. The real Haggada has no text. It is not to be read, but is rather to be heard. And, just as with the Torah, we have not even begun to understand its full meaning. We are simply perpetual beginners.
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An Open Letter to Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman and the Charedi Leadership
March 15, 2018Radical change has taken place in the Jewish world after the Holocaust and the establishment of the State of Israel. We have been shown that it is impossible for all of us to stay outside of history. The Holocaust has taught us that we cannot survive without entering history. To argue that our yeshiva students are the ones who really defend us against our enemies, and that we do not need soldiers, is an escape from reality.
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Wonder and the Question of Revelation
March 8, 2018Judaism is about an upheaval in the soul and the need to break with all sorts of idols. It is about living with spiritual trepidation in which man realizes that he was created from dust but has the ability to reach Heaven. Whether or not man succeeds will depend on his willingness to stand in awe.
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Megillat Esther and the Nervous-Syndrome Chess Game
February 28, 2018Purim Torah: How acting crazy helps your chess game!
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Amalek: A warning to the Chief Rabbinate
February 21, 2018The Torah demands of the Jews: “You shall erase the memory of Amalek from beneath the heavens. You shall not forget.” This commandment seems to be a paradox: How can we erase the memory of Amalek if we are not allowed to forget what he did?However, it is very possible that the Torah hints here not only to the monstrous deeds of Amalek, but also to the injustices that were done by our forefathers to the ancestors of Amalek.
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Finding One’s Neshomeh
February 15, 2018To attend synagogue is an art. People must come with a sincere urge to discover their Jewishness, to reconnect with their inner being and with the Jewish people. To enter the synagogue is to hope for a metamorphosis in one’s soul and a transformation of one’s personality.
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The Enduring Preciousness of the Secular Jew
February 8, 2018There is little doubt that secular Jews, consciously or unconsciously, keep a large number of commandments. Many of them may not be in the form of rituals, but there is massive evidence pointing to secular Jews’ commitment to keeping interpersonal mitzvot. Beneath the divisiveness of traditional commitment lie underpinnings of religion such as compassion, humility, awe, and even faith.
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The Challenge of Yitro – Would you convert?
February 1, 2018Yitro confronts us for the first time with a new phenomenon: to be a Jew by choice. By doing so, he presents all Jews with a major challenge: how to become a Jew by choice even when one has been born into the fold; how to feel the fire needed to live the life of an authentic Jew, as Yitro did. Such an undertaking is possible only if one is able to re-enact and experience Yitro’s journey to Judaism.
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Parashat BeShalach – Jewish Self-Delusion
January 25, 2018How can we understand the self-delusion of the Jews who complained against Moshe for taking them out of Egypt? Obviously, the Israelites were well aware that their life in Egypt was not one of tranquility while sitting by pots of meat! I would suggest that they did not intend to deny the past, but that they wanted to deny the future. Not that it did not happen, but that it would not happen again!
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A Call to all Jews – Circumcision: Why Risk Your Child’s Well-Being?
January 18, 2018When we object to circumcision on the basis of its denying the child’s right to autonomy over his body, it could seem that we are making a valid claim. Indeed, by what right are we, as parents, allowed to make the decision to bring a child into the Covenant? But shouldn’t we also ask ourselves honestly whether we have the right to bring a child into this world at all? Is that not a much greater injustice than circumcision?
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Moses: The Successful Failure
January 11, 2018What was Moshe’s secret that enabled him to continue to fight for his goals, in spite of everything, and succeed where so many others would have failed? The answer is simple: he knew how to lose. He knew that his failures were in fact the building blocks for his future successes.
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The Universal Commotion about a Little Jewish Boy Called Jesus: A Warning to Our Rabbis
January 4, 2018How much might Judaism have benefited from people like Jesus, Elisha Ben Avuyah and Spinoza, had they not been rejected and had they contributed to the tradition in which they were raised?
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Solving the Conversion Crisis – The Birth of Non-Jewish Jewish Communities: Another Approach
December 28, 2017Today, Israel has many thousands of immigrants who are of Jewish descent, yet not halachically Jewish. Should we convert them even though we know that they will not live a fully committed Jewish life? Or should we abandon them, basically ignoring and excluding them as we do now? I believe there is a third way, a way of reconciling these difficulties.
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Halacha means Liberty
December 21, 2017A strictly secular approach to major moral issues may have to be much more restrictive than that which any religion would ever demand. In fact, a secular moral attitude may make life extremely difficult and even impossible.
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Jewish Law as Rebellion: Soul Jews & Halachic Jews
December 14, 2017Some Jews should not be Jews and some non-Jews should be Jews. Authenticity, after all, cannot be inherited; it can only be nurtured. Ideally, only those who consciously take on the Jewish mission, and live accordingly, should be considered Jews. If not for the need for a Jewish people, it would have been better to have a Jewish faith community where people can come and go depending on their willingness to commit to the Jewish religious way and its mission – similar to how other religions conduct themselves.
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The In-Authenticity of Codifying Jewish Law
December 6, 2017Halacha is the practical upshot of unfinalized beliefs, a practical way of life while remaining in theological suspense. In matters of the spirit and the quest to find God, it is not possible to come to final conclusions. The quest for God must remain open-ended to enable the human spirit to find its way through trial and discovery.
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Jewish Law (Halacha) as Rebellion
November 30, 2017Like the generation of the Tower of Babel, in which the whole world was “of one language and of one speech,” we are producing a religious Jewish community of artificial conformism in which independent thought and difference of opinion is not only condemned, but its absence is considered to be the ultimate ideal.
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Be Fearful of Religion – Parashat Vayetze
November 23, 2017Rather than ignore the body, Halacha draws a person’s attention to its complexities. It informs human beings not to fall victim to grandiose dreams. There are limits to human existence, and it is exactly this fact that makes life a challenge and a joy.
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The Bet Midrash of Avraham Avinu
November 16, 2017When teaching, our rabbis’ and teachers’ personal conduct must be a reflection of what they impart in the classroom, as there is truly no better education than by example. Thought and practice must illuminate each other.
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The Bet Midrash of Avraham Avinu: On Being Controversial and the Art of Teaching
November 9, 2017Nobody can deny that Judaism today finds itself in a crisis that threatens to have devastating consequences. Instead of Judaism growing upward, vertically, it is becoming corpulent, growing horizontally. The growth of adherence to Halacha in the last few decades has clearly not been accompanied by a true religious revival. Genuine religiosity has nothing to do with the Yiddish expression of frumkeit, an untranslatable expression of routine religious observance.
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The Bet Midrash of Avraham Avinu – Lectures and the Academy
November 2, 2017To live a life of faith is to be prepared to live a committed religious life according to an inner belief of the heart and not because there is absolute empirical certainty. There is a constant need for questioning and rethinking one’s beliefs. In many ways, religion must be warfare—a fight against the indolence and callousness that stifles inquiry.
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The Bet Midrash of Avraham Avinu: The Wonder of Judaism
October 26, 2017The breaking of idols and slaughtering of sacred cows is, in itself, a Jewish task that began with Avraham Avinu. Consequently, we should not be afraid to do so, or at least to discuss the possible need for change. This could raise some eyebrows in certain religious circles, and we might even become controversial. So, we must keep in mind that great controversies are also great emancipators. They often clarify and enhance essential philosophies behind majestic traditions.
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Freud’s Subconscious Discovery of God
October 19, 2017Jewish tradition teaches that man was created in God’s image. Whatever this may mean, it definitely includes the fact that God created man in such a way that man, in desperate need to discover himself, would constantly search for Him. Freud, we believe, gave a most original interpretation of this fact. With his discovery of the father figure he may have uncovered the mechanism through which God created an idea of Himself as the ultimate Father in the human mind.
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Simchat Torah: The Unbending Sefer Torah
October 10, 2017Ours is a future-orientated religion. We are not afraid of the latest technologies because they allow us to fulfill, in ways unimagined by our forefathers, the divine mandate to cure diseases, create more pleasant ways to live our lives, and make the world a better place. All this is beautifully expressed by our Sages, who direct us to become partners with God in the work of creation. But the very text that demands this does not allow for any changes in its content and bars us from using the latest technological devices in the writing of this same text! What is the message conveyed by this paradox?
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Yom Kippur: Repenting Religious Exhaustion
September 9, 2021What is the source of religious passion? It is the awareness that something cannot become exhausted. To appreciate Judaism and see it as a blessing is to understand that just as the ocean is unfathomable, so Judaism transcends all interpretations. Understanding Judaism cannot be attained in the comfort of observing its laws or studying its texts. It occupies infinite space, beyond the limitations of the human mind and heart.
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Rosh HaShana: The Curse of Indifference
September 19, 2017Because we Jews have experienced, as no other nation has, what indifference can lead to, it is our duty, more than anybody else, to care about our fellow human beings and be an example for the rest of the world.
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The Bet Midrash of Avraham Avinu: Embryonic Judaism
September 14, 2017Every generation must find its own way to God and subsequently to the Jewish tradition. From a religious point of view, were this not the case, there would be little reason for that generation to exist. What, after all, is the meaning of human existence if not to reveal another dimension of God’s multi-colored world and Torah, and thus to gain a greater understanding of self?
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The Bet Midrash of Avraham Avinu – The Scandal of Halachic Performance
September 7, 2017The very fact that today we encounter a serious endeavor to see Halacha as the only expression of Judaism, and that some halachic authorities constantly attempt to bring the hashkafa (religious philosophy) of Judaism back to finalized dogmas, is a clear indication that those very authorities try to Halacha-ize issues of faith. But doing so robs Judaism of its vital flowing life force. We need to understand that Halacha is the practical upshot of un-finalized beliefs, a practical way of living while remaining in theological suspense.
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The Bet Midrash of Avraham Avinu
August 31, 2017There are two schools of thought in Judaism, two types of batei midrash: the Bet Midrash of Moshe Rabbeinu and the Bet Midrash of Avraham Avinu. Although both of them are integral parts of Judaism, the difference between them is critical. Judaism began as an existential movement in which all that humankind does, thinks, feels, and says is touched by the spirit of God. The Bet Midrash of Avraham Avinu aims to teach in order to inspire a re-awakening and transformation of the soul. It is here that we find the roots of Judaism in their most central form.
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The Turmoil in the USA
August 24, 2017A fairy tale with much relevance to today's times.
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Traveling to Home Base and Eternal Life
August 17, 2017When confronted with death, our first reaction is consternation. We are stunned and broken. But slowly, our sense of shock gives way to a feeling of mystery. The mysterium magnum enters, and a new perspective makes itself known as a kind of revelation and elevation. Suddenly, our whole life, which we knew so well, gradually becomes concealed behind a great Secret. Our speech is silenced. Our understanding fails. There is only awe for the Other.
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Betraying Judaism in the Name of Halacha
August 10, 2017In Biblical days the Halacha was astir while the world was sleeping. Today the world is astir while the Halacha is sleeping. Only when it wakes up and starts to challenge our society with novel ideas and rulings will it once more be the vital mover of Jewish life. It must be prepared to look inward, challenge its own verdicts and once again understand that its main function is to protest and rebel.
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Halacha: To Trouble the Comfortable
August 3, 2017For a nation to maintain sensitivity and concern for “the other,” it must continue to live in some form of strangerhood. It must never be fully secure, and must constantly be aware of its own existential uncertainty. As such, the Jew is to be a stranger.
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Halachic Fundamentalism and Intellectual Dishonesty
July 26, 2017We are in need of a radically different kind of yeshiva: one in which students are confronted with serious challenges to Halacha and its weltanschauung and learn how to respond; where they become aware that it is not certainty, but doubt, that gets you an education; where it is not Rabbinic authority that reigns supreme, but religious authenticity.
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The Problem and Future of True Halacha
July 20, 2017Like the generation of the Tower of Babel, in which the whole world was “of one language and of one speech,” we are producing a religious Jewish community of artificial conformism in which independent thought and difference of opinion is not only condemned, but its absence is considered to be the ultimate ideal.
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Handicapped Students and Secular Indoctrination
July 13, 2017Israeli teachers should create tension in the classroom by presenting their own ideas about Judaism and Jewishness, and then wage war on them, asking the students to fight them with knives between their teeth and come up with new ideas. In that way, the students will begin to appreciate and love what Judaism is all about. And only then should the teachers introduce biblical, Talmudic and midrashic texts as part of the discussion.
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In Defense of Rabbi Dweck and Orthodox Judaism
July 6, 2017If the Spanish-Portuguese community and Chief Rabbi Mervis give in to blatant blackmail by ultra-Orthodox elements then rabbis will no longer be able to speak their minds. The S&P and other communities will lose their independence and be subject to censure by all sorts of self-acclaimed rabbinical extremists, creating a situation that will terribly compromise Judaism.
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The Waters of Strife – the Devastation of Religious Coercion
June 29, 2017For the sake of later generations—who would need to know that the ways of the Torah are ways of pleasantness, of the gentle word and not the hard strike—God denied Moshe the merit of living in the land. In this way, He made it clear to all that leaders who seek to turn Israel into a holy nation by way of threat or by force may very well bring disaster on themselves and their people.
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A Modern Day Inquisition – Rabbi Joseph Dweck: The Tragic Story of Rabbinical Small-mindedness
June 22, 2017When Orthodox rabbis are told that they are no longer able to speak their minds, offer new insights into Orthodox Judaism, or try to find solutions to serious problems by using innovative ideas, we are faced with a rabbinical world that is wearing blinders, is comprised of yes-people looking over their shoulders, and is generating a hazardous small-mindedness that has far-reaching effects.
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Speaking Lashon HaRa about the World
June 15, 2017The world is far from ideal, but it seems that we view our globe as we would a white paper with a black spot on it. When asked what we see, we say, “a black spot,” completely ignoring the white paper. It is only the odd, the out-of-place that catches our attention. Why is this?
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The Holocaust: Divine Retribution?
June 8, 2017It is difficult to argue that the Holocaust was caused by divine anger for the violations of Torah precepts and deliberate heresy. The curses in the Torah are meant to come down on those who, against better judgment, and with the full understanding that they are violating God’s will, decide to do so; but not on those who are confused by or are the victims of others’ misunderstandings.

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Shavuot: The Desert and the Wandering Divine Word
May 25, 2017Only BaMidbar, in the emptiness and silence of the desert, that the authentic Word can be heard—a Word stripped of all distractions. Naked, without any excuse. But it can be heard only by a people of the wilderness; a people who are not rooted in a substance of physical limitations and borders; a people who are not entirely fixed by an earthly point, even while living in a homeland. They are never satisfied with their spiritual conditions and are therefore always on the road, looking for more.

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The Ban on Circumcision: Blatant Anti-Semitism and Ignorance
May 18, 2017What gives us the right to bring a child into a religious covenant by way of circumcision, without his consent? Circumcision, after all, to be Jewish means to be part of a nation that is rooted in a covenant that asks Jews to risk their very existence for the sake of a moral and religious mission. How can we commit children to a lifelong mission that they may not wish to fulfill? On the other hand, what right do we have to bring children into the world without giving them a higher mission? What right do we have to throw children into this turbulent jungle, filling them with anxieties and uncertainties, without giving them a clue as to their higher purpose?

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Kohanim: The Challenge of Educational Dissent
May 11, 2017Living Judaism must be able to stand up against ideas that are highly un-Jewish and at the same time be open to new ideas. But this can be achieved only by fostering a notion of spiritual dissent rooted in eternal ideas that have the capacity to re-invent themselves. It can be accomplished only by radical thinking and audacity informed by deep learning and faith.
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The Unchallenged Holiness of the Jew: A Dangerous Claim
May 4, 2017When contemplating the re-establishment of the State of Israel after nearly 2000 years of exile, no Jew should believe that the land is guaranteed to remain theirs forever. It could easily be taken away, as it has been in the past. If its inhabitants do not behave properly. If they hide behind the claim that they are observant or moral, while in fact they are fighting each other and disobeying the ethical dictates of God, the Book of Amos makes it clear that the State of Israel will not endure. Nor can we hide behind the abundance of Torah learning today to save us.
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Boredom and the Immature Elderly
April 27, 2017In the old days, it was a privilege to be mature. It was something people strived for. It meant maturity of attitude, well-considered opinions, and a great amount of experience and knowledge of how to deal with the problems of life. This is no longer the case.
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Sefirat HaOmer: What really counts
April 18, 2017Nothing is more dangerous for a person than to remain spiritually stale, and we are therefore required to count the 49 days of the Omer. In order to prepare ourselves for the upcoming celebration of Shavuot and the giving of the Torah, we are asked to climb a ladder of 49 spiritual steps, each day adding another dimension to our souls.
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Pesach: God’s Sporadic Presence and Overwhelming Absence in Human History
April 5, 2017Contrary to what is commonly believed, the story of the Exodus was mainly one of Divine silence, in which only occasionally a word of God entered the human condition. While Pesach Haggada relates the miracles, the “empty spaces” in between tell us of a frightening Divine silence of some 38 years. And just as our forefathers must have often wondered where God was all those years, so do we. But just as they made it through, so must we.
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Parashat VaYikra: The Trouble with Sacrifices
March 30, 2017We need to ask ourselves a pertinent question: Is our aversion to sacrifices the result of our supreme spiritual sophistication, which caused us to leave the world of sacrifices behind us? Or, have we sunk so low that we aren’t even able to reach the level of idol worshipers who, however primitive we believe them to have been, possessed a higher spiritual level than some of us who call ourselves monotheists?
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Rabbi J.B. Soloveitchik and his Paradoxical Influence
March 14, 2017While I greatly admire Rabbi Soloveitchik’s essays such as The Lonely Man of Faith, I wonder why he never addressed some of the issues that keep many people away from Orthodoxy, such as the issue of Torah Min HaShamayim and Bible criticism. It may be true that the Rav avoided the issue of Bible criticism out of principle. But if so, then he was out of touch with reality. At the time, Bible criticism was a major topic of discussion, as it still is. This subject is of utmost importance, and if anyone could have dealt with it head-on it was the Rav.
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The Tent of Meeting and Johann Sebastian Bach
March 22, 2017The divine instructions relating to the building and the architecture of the Mishkan (Tabernacle) are laid out in great detail; not even the smallest nuance is excluded, and nothing is left to human imagination. Preciseness stands out, and every pin and string is mentioned. This is in total opposition to the spiritual condition and devotion required of every Israelite when helping to erect the Mishkan, which called for personal input, creativity and inspiration. How do we reconcile these contradictions: formality versus spontaneity; total commitment to the letter of the law versus unprecedented emotional outbursts of religious devotion? Are such notions not mutually exclusive and irreconcilable?
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Purim and the Challenge of the Holocaust
March 9, 2017Why continue to praise God for a hidden miracle when it seems that even hidden miracles came to an end with the Holocaust? This question should be on the mind of every Jew who celebrates Purim.
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Sinai Now!
February 23, 2017Learning Torah is equivalent to standing at Sinai. Learning Torah is hearing it and consequently seeing its contents transmitted at Sinai in the here and now. So the learning of its text is a religious happening, the experience of something that normally can only be recalled.
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Parshat Yitro: Racism and the Wisdom of a Gentile
February 16, 2017The Israelites' experience of slavery had made them utterly convinced that mankind at large was anti-Semitic. God therefore sent them a righteous gentile by the name of Yitro, to impress upon them that the non-Jewish world includes remarkable people, who not only possess much wisdom but actually love the people of Israel and contribute to Jewish life.
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The Genius and Limitations of Rabbi Joseph Ber Soloveitchik z”l
February 8, 2017Rav Soloveitchik himself was a traditionalist, who combined that ideology with religious Zionism and tried very hard to give it a place in the world of philosophy and modernity. He was unable to overcome the enormous tension between these two worlds and so became a “lonely man of faith,” with no disciples but with many students, each one of whom claimed their own Rav Soloveitchik. The truth is that the real Rav Soloveitchik was more than the sum total of all of them – a man of supreme greatness who was a tragic figure.
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The Chief Rabbinate and Its Disgrace: Who Is an Exceptionally Great Sage?
February 1, 2017Only when making a sincere effort to reduce the pain of one’s fellow human beings can one be called a great person! Chief Rabbis, as well as other halachic authorities who do not apply this approach, are not only inadequate religious leaders, but they also become an obstacle to Judaism and should step down. Allowing them to maintain their authority is a sheer disgrace.
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The Unknowable, Loving and Aggravating God
January 26, 2017Judaism declares that emotions are what make a person; they are real and of crucial importance. In fact, emotions are central to a person’s existence, since they are the foundation of moral behavior. It is for this reason that Judaism views God as an emotional Being. By metaphorically attributing emotions to God, they are raised to a supreme state. If God has emotions such as love, mercy, jealousy and anger, then they must be genuine, important, and not ignored when found in humans.
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Rabbinical Tyranny and Freedom of Thought
January 18, 2017Religious condemnations, whether by bans or by other means, reflect negatively on those who issue them. Truth will not be served by imposing bans and issuing condemnations, but only by honest investigation and dialogue.
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Calling for Religious Unity Only Leads to Division – The Need for Personal Conscience
January 12, 2017In our day, the word “tolerance” has become very popular, as have words such as “pluralism,” “democracy,” and “unity.” These terms are used so often that one would hope most people have a proper understanding of their meanings. This is, however, far from true.
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Torah beyond Halakhah – Interview with Rabbi Cardozo – Part Two
December 27, 2018In last week’s Thoughts to Ponder (no 623), we published the first half of an interview with Rabbi Cardozo. At the end of his observations, Rabbi Cardozo discussed the codification and dogmatization of Jewish Law and religious beliefs as they took place in the diaspora and showed that these developments did not do justice to—and in fact opposed authentic Judaism. Here is the continuation of his arguments.
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Syria and the Scandal of Our Orthodox Synagogues
January 5, 2017“Lord of the Universe, I beg You to redeem Israel; but if You do not want to do that, then I beg You to redeem the gentiles.” Rabbi Yisrael Hopstein, Maggid of Kozhnitz and legendary Chassidic leader in Poland (1733-1814) (1) When Rabbi Professor Abraham Joshua Heschel (1907-1972), the famous American Chassidic thinker who lived […]
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God and the Fires – Part Two
December 15, 2016Do terrible tragedies which afflict the innocent beg the question of whether it is more honest to deny God’s existence? Does all the pain in this world not make a strong case for such a proposition? Is the constant attempt to justify God’s existence, by way of apologetics, not a farce, and futile?
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God and The Fires -“Because of Our Sins, This Has Befallen Us?” Part One
December 8, 2016Only two weeks ago nearly all of the land of Israel was surrounded by huge fires which destroyed thousands of homes and possessions. Luckily and because of the great and heroic effort of so many fire brigades from Israel and other countries this time nobody lost her or his life unlike in the 2010 Mt. Carmel forest fire, when over 44 people lost their lives.
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The Abuse of Halacha: Keeping Halacha under Control (2)
December 1, 2016The foremost point of departure in any halachic decision must be that all people are created in the image of God and that all human life is holy. While different tasks, inclinations, and historical events should be recognized and allow for distinctions between people, no discrimination can ever be tolerated.
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The Abuse of Halacha: Keeping Halacha under Control – Part 1
November 24, 2016Judaism is in trouble. More and more of the unacceptable is being done and said in its name. Besides causing infinite damage to Judaism’s great message, it is a terrible desecration of God’s name. And all of this is seen and heard by millions of gentiles watching television, browsing websites, or listening to the radio.
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Walking Mountains, Shabbat and the Buddha
November 17, 2016It is well known that the institution of Shabbat is one of the best inventions God ever came up with. It no doubt qualifies Him to receive the Nobel Prize for innovative thinking, and the venerable judges in Sweden should sincerely consider bestowing this honor on the Lord of the Universe.
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The Curse of Religious Boredom
November 10, 2016Psychologists tell us that one of man's greatest enemies today is boredom. Sometimes, when reading a paper or popular journal; watching television or a DVD; using an MP3 or an iPod; or posting on Facebook every hour to inform our friends of what we just did, we are confronted with the most absurd manifestations of monotony and apathy.
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Torah: The Unavoidable and Disturbing Text
November 3, 2016Torah study has become nearly impossible, and the problem lies not with the Torah but with the reader. Reading the text requires courage. Not to open the Book and start reading, but courage to confront oneself. Learning Torah requires human authenticity; it means standing in front of a mirror and asking yourself the daunting question of who you really are, without masks and artificialities.
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The Deliberately Flawed Divine Torah
October 27, 2016I believe that the Torah is min hashamayim (“from heaven”) and that its every word is divine and holy. But I do not believe that the Torah is (always) historically true (sometimes it seems like Divine fiction), or that it is uninfluenced by external sources.
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Simchat Torah, The Rush and the Stagnation – the Need for Independent Torah Interpretation
October 20, 2016For hundreds of years, we Jews have followed the custom of completing the yearly Torah reading in the synagogue on the day of Simchat Torah, only to immediately begin all over again. Why the rush? There is nearly no time to contemplate what one has read the previous year!
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Succot, Approaching Tragedy with Joy
October 13, 2016As is well known, the Succah visualizes our life span in the world. For what is a Succah? It is a frail structure which we need to dwell in for seven days. Many commentators remind us that these seven days represent man's average life span which is about seventy years.
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Yom Kippur: Who is Able to Eat?
October 6, 2016This awesome thought is the focal point of Yom Kippur. Am I worthy to have a claim on life? Or, have I been born but lost my right to live? This is by far the most important question for man to ask. The trembling of the earlier generations on Erev Yom Kippur was indeed that of great pachad (fear) – not fear of punishment or death, but of not rising to the challenge of living in God’s presence and fulfilling one’s destiny!
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Rosh Hashana – Do We Dare to Blow the Shofar?
September 29, 2016Something strange happens on Rosh Hashana. We spend hours declaring God’s majesty, using poetic and unique phrases. We refer to Him as the Ultimate King and Mover of this world. We ask Him to strengthen and reinforce His relationship with us and show us His omnipotence.
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Against Indifference: A Prayer for the World
September 21, 2016There is probably no greater curse in our world today than the curse of indifference. While we are surrounded by abundant beauty and have much to be thankful for, millions of innocent people live lives of war, hunger, displacement, and other disasters. Here is a prayer, in Hebrew and English, which I suggest we say in all our synagogues on Shabbat, when saying the prayer for the State of Israel and our soldiers, or when praying at home. It is not just a prayer to God; it is also meant as a reminder to us not to remain indifferent to the pain in our world and to what requires our care and serious attention.
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God Does Not Exist
September 15, 2016Jewish tradition forbids the pronunciation of the four-letter name of God. This name, rooted in the Hebrew word for “being,” consists of the Hebrew letters: Yud, Heh, Vav and Heh. According to the Sages of Israel, the name reflects the different dimensions of “being” related to time: past, present and future. Can we say that such a being "exists"?
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Yes to Faith, No to Dogma – For Poets, Musicians, Artists and Deep Souls
September 8, 2016The difference between dogma and faith is like the difference between a word spoken and a word set to music. Faith is the refutation of human finality. It transforms dogma into something untouchable and gives man entry into the imponderable.
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Let Us Violate Shabbat So As To Sanctify It – The Holy Day and the Tel Aviv Railway
September 1, 2016Shabbat is serious business, not only because of its halachic requirements but also because of its magnificent and majestic message. To violate it is not just a transgression but a tragedy.
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Wanted: Rabbis with Knives between Their Teeth – The Need for a Genuine Upheaval
August 25, 2016When I contemplate the future of the State of Israel and its inhabitants, I realize more and more that religious Judaism must become its primary driving force so as not merely to survive but to actually flourish. Without Judaism Israel will not make it.
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A Slap in the Face to the Holy One Blessed Be He?-Some Afterthoughts on Tish’ah be-Av
August 18, 2016I must confess that this year’s Tish’ah be-Av, a few days ago, was the first time in 54 years (since I was 16) that I did not go to synagogue to hear Eichah (the reading from the Scroll of Lamentations) and recite kinot (elegies written by famous sages throughout the centuries regarding the destruction of both Temples and the many later tragedies that befell the Jewish people).
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Tisha B’Av – Rabbinic Despair and Simple Courage
August 11, 2016In the wake of the destruction of Jerusalem the leaders of the Jewish people despaired. But the ordinary Jews did not. Despite the total collapse of Jewish life, they opted for the impossible. They not to listen to their leaders, but continued building the nation of Israel, as they had previously been taught by the very sages who now despaired. Sometimes, the simple man has more faith in the Jewish future than the greatest Talmudic scholar.
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The Chaos Theory of Halacha – Part 3 of 3
August 4, 2016Halacha is in need of more “chaos.” It must allow for many ways to live a halachic life unbound by too many restrictions of conformity and codification. It must make room for autonomy on the part of individuals, to choose their own way once they have undertaken to observe the foundations of Halacha.
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The Chaos Theory of Halacha (Part 2 of 3)
July 28, 2016One of the most remarkable aspects of Orthodox Halacha is that it is almost an open market within the confines of the masoret, an unwritten and undefined tradition going back thousands of years. Some will view the masoret as a minimal and almost fundamentalist observance, and others will view it as a maximal and highly flexible tradition, which allows for much innovation.
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The Chaos Theory of Halacha (Part 1 of 3)
July 21, 2016Chaos is God’s signature when He prefers to remain anonymous. The same can be said about Halacha. Halacha is the chaotic way through which God wants the Jew to live his life, according to strict rules that seem to be part of a well-worked-out system. People do not come before God as actors in a play that has been planned down to the minutest detail. If they did, they would be robots and life would be a farce.
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Faith is the Joy of Religious Doubt and Uncertainty – Part 2
July 7, 2016To have faith is to live with unresolved doubts, prepared to rise above ourselves and our wisdom. Looking into the Jewish tradition with its many debates, one clearly understands that those who deny themselves the comfort of certainty are much more authentic than those who are sure.
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Faith is the Joy of Religious Doubt and Uncertainty – Part 1
June 29, 2016We are currently living in a transitional phase of monumental proportions and far-reaching consequences. Our religious beliefs are being challenged as never before. We are forced to our knees due to extreme shifts and radical changes in scientific discoveries; our understanding of the origins of our holy texts; our belief in God; the meaning of our lives; and the historical developments of our tradition
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The Kotel – Have We Gone Mad?
June 23, 2016You, dear readers, must forgive me for asking this question, but: Have we Jews gone mad? Kotel mad? Have we lost it? Are we Jews, who represent the best brains in the world, incapable of solving a minor – albeit pressing – problem in our long history of unprecedented upheavals and unparalleled challenges?
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Israel, the American Elections and the Turmoil in Our World
June 16, 2016Once upon a time, in a large, gloomy palace high on a mountain, where the night wind howled outside its massive walls, there lived a king—a real one. He had a beard as long as a silver waterfall and a voice that boomed like thunder. A king needs no more.
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Shavuot: Would You Convert? Like Yitro?
June 9, 2016As we are daily confronted with a steady increase in the number of Jews who have not only left the fold but are actively involved in anti-Jewish activity inside and outside Israel, it would perhaps be meaningful to study an episode in the life of a biblical non-Jew who decided to join the Jewish people at all costs.
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Parshat Bechukotai – The Miracle of Satisfaction
May 26, 2016“Your threshing season will last until your grape harvest, and your grape harvest will last until the time you plant. You will have your fill of food, and you will dwell securely in your land.” (1) This blessing is promised to the people of Israel on condition that, as a unified nation, they observe the laws of the Torah and live by its spirit. Its promise is quite surprising.
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The Omer: Giving Birth
May 19, 2016As a woman anticipates giving birth, so the people of Israel await the redemption. The labour pains start with ten plagues. Toward the end, the people are confined to their homes: "You shall not leave your houses until morning." They await the birth.
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Yom Hashoa: The Quest for Authenticity – Rembrandt and the Holocaust
May 5, 2016On Yom Hashoa one can virtually smell the blood of the six million Jews killed, including one and a half million children. Walking through Yad Vashem in Jerusalem, I see the faces of many of them, and it is not difficult to imagine that these children could have been mine. After all, I missed the Holocaust by a hair’s breadth.
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Blessed Are Those Who Eat Chametz!
April 17, 2016The Talmud (1) poses the following question: Why is it prohibited to eat or to possess chametz (leaven), such as bread, on Pesach? What is there in the nature of leaven that makes it forbidden on Pesach? For that matter, why only on Pesach?
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The True Art of Sport: Game or Torture?
April 7, 2016Jews in earlier centuries were never seriously involved in sport, though. This is most likely due to the historical conditions of Second Temple period. With Alexander the Great’s conquest of the land of Israel in the 4th century BCE, Hellenist culture began to infiltrate the Jewish way of life. In fact, it was the attempts by Antiochus Epiphanes to Hellenize Judea that led to a declaration of war on the part of the Maccabees.
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Parshat Shemini – Are You Really Eating Kosher?
March 31, 2016Kosher animals, as is well known, can be identified by two simanim (physical signs). They must chew their cud, and their hooves must be wholly cloven. (2) In order to be kosher, the animal must possess both simanim. The Torah goes out of its way to emphasize the fact that an animal in which only one sign is present cannot be considered kosher in any way.
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The Making of an Enemy – The Birth of Amalek
March 24, 2016The Jews’ most formidable enemy in Biblical times was the nation of Amalek. This nation was, and symbolically still is, the personification of evil, brutality, racism and anti-Semitism. Amalek is seared into the Jewish consciousness as the unprecedented enemy of the People of Israel after their exodus from Egypt. What revealed Amalek’s moral bankruptcy was not only that they dared to fight the Israelites; it was their strategy as well. They attacked the Israelites from the back, focusing on the weak and tired people. (1)
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Purim, God’s Hidden Face, and the Advantage of a Permanent Job
March 17, 2016The story of Esther centers around a famous talmudic principle called hester panim (the concealed face of God). This refers to the belief that at times divine intervention in the affairs of human beings is no longer at work and that conditions are left to the forces of nature and to the inconstancy of historical developments. This is mostly, but not always, seen as a type of divine punishment for the failure to observe the commandments. (2)
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Rabbinical Courage and the Frozen Text
March 3, 2016The Talmud discusses the identity of a Gavra Rabba, an exceptionally great person or Torah sage. It quotes a most remarkable observation made by the well-known Sage Rava, who states: “How foolish are some people who stand up [out of respect] for a Sefer Torah but do not stand up for a Gavra Rabba” (1).
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Have Some Pity on the Anti-Semite!
February 25, 2016The anti-Semitic world has a hard time with us Jews, and we should feel some pity for all those who work relentlessly to give us a bad name. They boycott us in academia, journalism, European governments, the market place, or just in the streets of daily life. But let’s be honest. Aren’t they right? Are we not truly a nuisance?
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Shut Down the Kotel!
February 18, 2016I was not planning to write about this, because by now the issue has sparked so much debate of such low quality that it has embarrassed Judaism, the Jewish people and the Kotel itself.
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Mission Statement of the David Cardozo Academy – A Remorseless Judaism
February 11, 2016Judaism is about bold ideas. Its goal is not to find the truth, but to inspire us to honestly search for it. Torah study is not only the greatest undertaking there is, but also the most dangerous, since it can easily lead to self-satisfaction and spiritual conceit. The leashing of our souls is easier than the building of our spirit.
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Milk and Meat: The Dangerous Mixture – Parshat Mishpatim
February 4, 2016There is one law in the Jewish tradition that no doubt has puzzled many scholars: that which prohibits the mixing of milk and meat. Its source is found in the Torah (1), but no clue is provided as to its meaning. Strangely enough, it is this mysterious law that has had the greatest influence on the daily life of Jews for thousands of years, right up to this very day.
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Halacha as the Art of Playing Chess – Divine Insanity
January 28, 2016There is probably no game as difficult and captivating as chess. Millions of people break their heads over strategies to win this game and spend years learning its ins and outs. It holds them captive as nothing else does. They dream about it and discuss the move of one single pawn as if their lives depend on it.
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Am I Still Orthodox? – Answer to a Jerusalem Rabbi
January 21, 2016Once the city magistrates of 17-century Amsterdam had made it abundantly clear to the Portuguese-Spanish Jewish Community that it could settle in Amsterdam only on condition that no member would ever dare to challenge the belief in the biblical God and the Old and New Testaments, Spinoza’s so-called heretical ideas became a serious challenge for the rabbis and leaders. It was a clear infringement of the agreement with the City of Amsterdam.
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The Desecration of Halacha
January 14, 2016Twenty years ago, Yigal Amir assassinated Prime Minister Yitzchak Rabin in the name of Halacha (Jewish law), claiming that the prime minister was a rodef (someone who is attempting or planning to murder) because he put all citizens of the State of Israel in mortal danger once he participated in the 1993 Oslo accords.

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The Threat of Freedom
January 7, 2016When reading the story of the Exodus from Egypt, we are confronted with a strange phenomenon: the mashchit (destroyer). After the Jews were told to mark their doorposts with the blood of the korban pesach (paschal lamb), they were informed that God would pass over their doors “and He will not allow the destroyer (ha-mashchit) to enter your homes and attack you” (1).
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The Art of Praying (1)
December 31, 2015How does man dare to speak to God, the Master of the Universe? The presumption that man can just open his mouth and believe that God will listen to him is unrivaled impertinence. When someone wishes to get an audience with the Queen, much paperwork has to be done, many meetings are held by ministers and officials, and security issues are considered.
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Spinoza – It Is Time to Lift The Ban
December 24, 2015Spinoza, the celebrated seventeenth-century Amsterdam Jewish philosopher, is known as the father of the Enlightenment and has influenced generations of philosophers to this day. At the age of 23, he was excommunicated by the Portuguese-Spanish Jewish community of Amsterdam because of his heresies, which included his denying the existence of the Biblical God as well as the divinity of the Torah.
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Needed: Redemptive Halakhah – How Halakhah Must Transcend Itself
December 10, 2015In September 2015 the Journal of the Institute for Jewish Ideas and Ideals, “Conversations”, published a long ground breaking essay on the need to redeem the Halacha and to bring it into line with the larger mission of the Jewish people in our days. Below are some segments.
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Chanukah: Hypocrisy or Authenticity
December 3, 2015One of the great problems any religious person must struggle with is whether or not it is actually possible to be religious. What, after all, is the essence of genuine religiosity? It is no doubt the cognizance that one lives in the presence of God and feels and acts accordingly.
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A Prophetic View: The Gentile Aliyah Epidemic
November 26, 2015We will soon have to expand our borders far beyond our wildest dreams – this time at the request of millions of Europeans, Americans and possibly many others who will wish to come on Aliyah.
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Oh, that I Could Take Off My Kippah!
November 19, 2015I need to be honest. I am contemplating taking off my kippah. Why, you might ask? I no longer want to be observant. Observance, for me and for many young people, has become irrelevant. It has been used by large sections of religious Jews to live in self-assured ease. Their religion is part of their contentment.
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Admitting A Mistake: Even God Does.
November 12, 2015Nothing is more difficult than admitting a mistake, yet nothing is more human than making one. This may well be the reason why even God sometimes makes a "mistake." In a famous passage in the Talmud, we read that the Sages decided a certain law against the opinion of Rabbi Eliezer who was known to be the sharpest mind of his day and was fully supported by God:
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How Old Would You Be If You Did Not Know How Old You Are?
November 5, 2015As I watch some of my friends entering retirement, I realize how dangerous it is to “take it easy” and fall into the pit of idleness, thinking that one is at the peak of one’s life while one may very well be at its lowest point. Retirement can be a real killer, and surviving its hazards is an art.
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The Religious Scandal of Akeidat Yitzchak and the Tragic God Parashat Lech Lecha
October 29, 2015What is Avraham to do now? Should he rescue God from Himself and refuse to have a hand in this suicide attempt? Or should he perhaps become an atheist? After all, such a God cannot exist! But Avraham chooses neither of these options.
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Israel: The Blessing of Insecurity
October 22, 2015Israel is summoned to remind the world of God’s existence, not only concerning religion but also as a historical reality. There is no security for Israel unless it is secure in its own destiny. We must shoulder the burden of our own singularity, which means nothing less than fulfilling our role as God’s witness. And we must draw strength from this phenomenon, especially in times like these when Israel’s very existence is again at stake. Once Israel recognizes its uniqueness, it will, paradoxically, enjoy security and undoubtedly be victorious.
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Spinoza’s Blunder And Noach’s Misguided Religiosity
October 15, 2015In his Tractatus Theologico-Politicus, Spinoza accuses Judaism of demanding obsessive and outrageous obedience. Parashat Noach teaches us that while Spinoza’s assessment is entirely mistaken, it is a warning to many religious Jews who know nothing other than "negative" obedience as opposed to positive obedience. Judaism teaches us to stand on our own feet and make our own decisions.
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Tragedy and the Silence of God
October 8, 2015How do we live with a God Who sometimes violates all that our own limited thoughts and feelings can grasp and express? It would be easier if we could deny God's very existence, the grandeur of all creation is too powerful to allow us to deny that He is there. But how are we to answer His silence when tragedy strikes?
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Simchat Torah – Needed: Extraordinary Torah Commentary
October 1, 2015The Torah reading in synagogue is not conventional Torah learning, but rather a kind of a wake-up call. We are shocked by the text before we even have a chance to get used to its deeper content. And although we have read it for many years, the fact that the story appears again an entire year later, and no earlier, gives us a chance to forget it and then rediscover it as never before.
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Sukkot: Joy in Insecurity
September 24, 2015No matter how powerfully the outside walls and the leaking roof reveal our vulnerability and uncertainty, inside these walls we need to make our life as attractive as possible and enjoy its great benefits and blessings.
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The Secret of Kal Nidrei – We Are All Marranos
September 17, 2015I would like to suggest that in the last few hundred years nearly all Jews have become marranos. Although no longer forced to convert to Christianity, or any other religion, they willfully adopt philosophies that estrange them from their Jewish roots. Alienation has become the very condition under which most Jews today live their lives. They believe that Judaism is outdated and needs to be replaced. Often they arrive at such conclusions due to a lack of Jewish knowledge and a greater familiarity with non-Jewish sources.
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Rosh Hashana: Is Judaism Your Supreme Passion?
September 10, 2015Why is it, asks the Talmud, that children of the Sages rarely became talmudic scholars and pious Jews? Should it not have been they, more than anyone, who walked in the footsteps of their parents, reaching even greater heights in learning and genuine observance? How could it be that their parents, the Sages, did not provide them with the tools to do so? The answer has important implications for all of us.
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Courage, Rabbis, Courage! The Need For Mass Conversion
September 3, 2015Rather than waiting until a potential convert is ready to take on all of Jewish law, and only then converting them, we should first convert them, and then slowly introduce them to Jewish religious values and Halacha. This should be done by way of gentle persuasion and love, with no coercion whatsoever. We must give them the option of making their own choices, introducing them to a ladder of observance that they can climb at their own pace and within their own abilities.
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Conversion and Annie Fischer’s Interpretation of Schumann’s Klavierkonzert in A Minor
August 27, 2015Just as a human being who’s never had an encounter with classical music won’t know what he’s missing until he is introduced to Mozart, Beethoven or Bach, so it is with Judaism. But it all depends on who is playing the music.
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The Immortal Highway – Parashat Re’eh
August 13, 2015In the Torah, nobody dies; rather, one is “gathered to his ancestors.” No neshama becomes dust, and no spirit turns to ashes. It is neshamot that compose immortal and untouchable words, create infinite art and abstract thoughts.
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Torah: Hearing the Divine Voice at Sinai Now
July 30, 2015Rabbi Dostai bar Yannai said, in the name of Rabbi Meir: ”Whoever forgets [even] one word of his [Torah] learning, the Scripture considers him worthy of death.” But why should a person’s failure to remember a detail of Torah that he learned be considered proof that he forgot what he had seen with his own eyes when he stood at Sinai?
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The Temple is of Little Importance
July 23, 2015One of the most puzzling elements of Jewish Tradition is the institution of sacrificial rites in the Temple. Although the Temple serves many purposes, sacrifices lie at the very heart of its mission. There are profound differences of opinion among the early and later commentators regarding how to understand the meaning of sacrifices. Are they really an integral part of Judaism, or simply a compromise to human weakness and something to be gradually abandoned?(
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Needed: Majestic Mountains, Rembrandts, and Music Baths
July 16, 2015The Sages made a number of remarkable observations concerning beauty. The Torah commands the urban planners in Israel to leave 1000 amot (cubits) of untilled land around each of the cities to be given to the Levites, allowing nature to manifest its beauty. The Sages further mandate that one must remove all unseemly objects, and even not plant trees in the immediate vicinity of a city, to ensure that the landscape will always be pleasing. Beauty – whether in nature, art, or music – can calm us when we are stressed, or inspire our creativity and spur us on to great accomplishments. Jewish educators should encourage our children to study and appreciate natural beauty, art, and music. This should be done within the framework of the school and home, with emphasis on the religious significance of the aesthetic experience. With the proper perspective, visiting an art museum, or taking a walk in the woods, can effect real spiritual growth.
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The Supreme Court of the United States, Same-Sex Marriage and Other Prohibitions
July 9, 2015Now that the Supreme Court of the United States has legalized same-sex marriage, we need to ask ourselves why there has never been any discussion about other illegal sexual relationships, such as incest, and why a union as obvious as a heterosexual marriage is actually permitted. This question may sound very strange, even disturbing and shocking, but it is one of the most profound questions we must ask. Doing so will help us understand what is behind the fierce debate that is now taking place concerning the Supreme Court’s decision.
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Faith Means Joyful Uncertainty
July 2, 2015We are currently living in a transitional phase of monumental proportions and far-reaching consequences. Our religious beliefs are being challenged as never before. We are forced to our knees due to extreme shifts and radical changes in scientific discoveries; our understanding of the origins of our holy texts; our belief in God; the meaning of our lives; and the historical developments of our tradition. We find ourselves on the precipice, and it is becoming more and more of a balancing act not to fall off the cliff.
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Faith Means Joyful Uncertainty
July 2, 2015We are currently living in a transitional phase of monumental proportions and far-reaching consequences. Our religious beliefs are being challenged as never before. We are forced to our knees due to extreme shifts and radical changes in scientific discoveries; our understanding of the origins of our holy texts; our belief in God; the meaning of our lives; and the historical developments of our tradition. We find ourselves on the precipice, and it is becoming more and more of a balancing act not to fall off the cliff.
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Religion is Dangerous – Plato, Halacha and Dreams
June 25, 2015Being religious is fraught with danger. Man is often pulled in directions where he can easily break his neck. To be religious is to allow your neshama (soul) to surpass your body, taking the latter to places where it cannot dwell and is asked to commit suicide.
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In spite of Religion, God is still around
June 17, 2015It is in those who are still uncomfortable with God that new insights about Him are formed. And it will be in those uneasy environments that Judaism will be rediscovered and developed. The need for religious transcendence, and for the spiritual thread that keeps many young people on their toes, is enormous. Numerous secular people are joining a new category of spiritual theologians. Matters of weltanschauung are pivotal to many secular Jews now. The problem is that for them, and for the religious, the Torah is transmitted on a wavelength that is out of range of their spiritual transistors’ frequency. Yes, we turn on the radio, but we hear strange noises and unusual static. There is serious transmission failure. We are no longer sure where the pipelines are. God has relocated.

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Bold Ideas: Take the Bike or Tram, Get a Free Coffee, and Observe Shabbat!
June 11, 2015One of the great challenges, if not the greatest, is Shabbat, the only official day of rest in Israeli society when people enjoy visiting their parents and friends who live far away or who may be in hospital. Many would love to go to a restaurant and enjoy an afternoon ride through neighborhoods in Yerushalayim or other cities. But none of this is possible without the use of cars or taxis and with no open restaurants. This article offers some suggestions to overcome these obstacles.
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Halacha: The Disturbing Search for God
June 4, 2015Religion is a protest against taking life for granted. There are no insignificant phenomena or deeds in this world, and it is through Judaism’s demands and far-reaching interference in our daily life that we are made aware of God as our steadfast Companion. This is clearly the meaning of the famous talmudic statement by Rabbi Chanania ben Akashia (2) when he said: “The Holy One blessed be He desired to make Israel worthy, therefore He gave them Torah and mitzvot in abundance, as it is said: ‘God desires for the sake of His righteousness that the Torah be expanded and strengthened. ’” (3).
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Make Anti-Semitism a Source of Jewish Pride
May 28, 2015While we must help to combat anti-Semitism in every way possible, we should be aware that it is not a Jewish problem. Its solution will be possible only when the world makes peace with ethical Judaism. Only when Jews will be able to convince the world of the power of Jewish ethics, and will ensure that it is taught in every classroom, church and mosque is there a chance that anti-Semitism will slowly come to an end.
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Shavuot: The Wonder and Glow of God’s Word
May 21, 2015This is the great challenge facing today’s halachic authorities: are their decisions made in a sterile vacuum in which every surprise is ignored and even suppressed? Or, are they made to stimulate a religious condition in which man will live in great awe, will grow, and will feel Halacha’s inner spirit? Are today’s rulings transformative, or do they promote stagnation? Shall we have prophetic Halacha, or petty Halacha?
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The Dangling Bridges of Halacha
May 13, 2015Halacha makes rules where rules should not exist but need to exist lest chaos ensue. But it is these very rules that create unsolvable problems that are inherent to our existence.
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Yeshivot and the Toy Industry The Art of Imagination
April 29, 2015One of the most unique talents with which human beings are blessed with is the faculty of imagination. Unlike any other creature, the human has nearly unlimited potential for constructive fantasy.
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Yom Ha’atzmaut – There Is No Security For Israel Unless It Is Secure In Its Own Destiny
April 23, 2015Israel's inability to conform to any framework is a living avowal of our uniqueness. Israel’s very existence is the manifestation of divine intervention in history to which it must attest. In Israel, history and revelation are one. Only there do they coincide. While other nations exist as nations, the people of Israel exist as a reminder of God’s involvement in world history. Only through Israel is humanity touched by the divine.
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Jumping Into Deep Waters -The Cornerstone of Judaism
April 16, 2015Judaism is about new ideas. It is dependent on fresh concepts deeply rooted in its tradition. Innovative thinking is the need of the hour. It is time for halachic authorities, rabbis, and religious thinkers to take notice of the immense changes that have taken place in our day. Never has the world gone through so many adjustments in so short a time. Never have the Jewish people been confronted with so many challenges. It is not only the security of the State of Israel that is at stake, but even more so, its very spirit and spiritual future.
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What Is Really Wrong With Chametz?
April 3, 2015The Talmud poses the following question: Why is it prohibited to eat or to possess chametz (leavened food) on Pesach? What is there in the nature of chametz that makes it forbidden on Pesach? And what is so special about matzah that makes it the most desirable food to eat on this holiday?
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Rejection or Integration: The Secret of Pesach
March 26, 2015It is characteristic of the Jewish tradition that once its foundations have been well established, the structure of Judaism stands like an unshakable mountain and can weather any unwelcome influences from without. It can then absorb all forms of genuine human wisdom if they will add to a deeper understanding of Judaism and grant the Jew a greater commitment to his tradition. Judaism has never been afraid to confront human wisdom and has always proudly responded to attacks on its tradition.
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Parshat Vayikra – Sacrifices: Progressive or Regressive Judaism?
March 19, 2015The Judaism of today is a concession to human weakness, but at the same time a belief in the greatness and strength of man. It calls upon man to do whatever is in his power to climb as high as possible, but warns him not to overstep and fall into the abyss. Judaism asks man to be a magnificent being, but never an angel – because to be too much is to be less than. But Judaism also believes that man may one day reach the point where what is impossible today may be possible tomorrow. What ought to be may someday become reality. It is that gap that Halacha tries to fill. Indeed, a mediator.
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Parshat Pekudei and Johann Sebastian Bach (TTP-431)
March 12, 2015Achilles: You mean, the composer was Bach, and these were the so-called “Goldberg Variations”? Tortoise: Do I ever! Actually, the work was entitled “Aria with Diverse Variations,” of which there are thirty. Do you know how Bach structured these magnificent variations?
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Parshat Pekudei and Johann Sebastian Bach
March 12, 2015Since the Torah is normally very parsimonious with its words, nothing is more surprising in Parshat Pekudei (and Vayakhel) than the great amount of detail and repetition in the divine instructions relating to the building of theMishkan (Tabernacle). Not even the smallest nuance is excluded, and nothing is left to human imagination. Preciseness stands out, and every pin and string is mentioned. This seems to stand in total opposition to the spiritual condition and devotion that was required of every Israelite when busy building or helping to erect the Mishkan. How do we reconcile these contradictions: formality versus spontaneity; total commitment to the letter of the law versus unprecedented emotional outbursts of religious devotion? Are such notions not mutually exclusive and irreconcilable?
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Purim and the Alcohol of Berkeley and Kant
March 5, 2015Some appropriately irreverent thoughts to...well, no, not to ponder on the occasion of Purim.
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Biblical Studies: Relevance, Eternity and Unawareness
February 19, 2015Understanding Chumash (the Five Books of Moses) is far more than knowing how to give expression to the deeper meaning of the biblical text. After all, it is impossible to treat the Chumash as any other classical work since, according to Jewish Tradition, the People of Israel are not the author of this text; rather, it is the author of the people.
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To Be Secular Would Be Hell, Everything Would Be Forbidden
February 12, 2015A few years ago I saw a cat hit by a car. It rolled over several times but escaped unhurt. Its face showed no sign of shock (1), but its body language indicated clear signs of panic and disorientation.
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To Be Religious Is To Be a Halachic Poet
January 22, 2015Halacha is the practical expression of discovering the infinite within the finite. To grasp the world of religiosity, or the real essence of halacha, it is not enough to know all of the Written and Oral Torah. One must also see how the birds fly and the flowers blossom; one must sit by the bed of the dying, watch the stars, and have unexpected meetings. Because all of these are a living commentary on the Text.
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One Should Listen to Bach, Mozart, or Beethoven, Before Ruling on a Halachic Problem
January 15, 2015The posek has to understand that he may be called upon to give guidance to an often extremely secular and troubled world that is in great need of hearing the words of a Jewish sage. His decisions must reflect the imperative that we Jews are to be a light unto the nations—a light that must shine everywhere. It is no longer possible to focus on the often narrow world of Orthodoxy and look down on or ignore the secular and gentile world.
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Judaism: The Art of Rebellion
January 8, 2015When we teach our children to eat kosher, we should tell them that this is an act of disobedience against consumerism that encourages human beings to eat anything as long as it tastes good. When we go to synagogue, it is a protest against man’s arrogance in thinking that he can do it all by himself. When couples observe the laws of family purity, it is a rebellion against the obsession with sex. By celebrating Shabbat, we challenge our contemporary world that believes our happiness depends on how much we produce.
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Circumcision, Jesus, Elisha ben Avuyah and Spinoza – A Warning to Our Rabbis
January 1, 2015A harsh approach to those who are on the verge of leaving the fold has caused much damage. Sadly, this phenomenon seems to repeat itself in every generation. Whenever people quarrel over matters related to ideology and faith, and a person discovers that his more lenient opinion is in the minority, all too often—although his original view differed only slightly from the majority—the total rejection he experiences pushes him over the brink. Gradually, his views become more and more irrational and he becomes disgusted with his opponents, their Torah and their practices, forsaking them completely .
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What is Death?
December 25, 2014Do our souls cease to exist after they leave our bodies? Does the spirit turn to ashes once it is on its own? How is it possible that souls speak immortal words, think eternal thoughts, create art and music, and then just evaporate into nothingness and vanish? A soul doesn’t grow out of nothing. It’s rooted in another world. Does it then perish and just disappear when it leaves this world?
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God, Where are You? Murder in Har Nof, Yerushalayim
December 11, 2014I apologize in advance, but it has again become difficult to believe that You are actually living among us. Only three weeks ago, some of your most faithful devotees were standing, in the middle of their prayers, when they were suddenly attacked and brutally murdered in a synagogue in Har Nof, Yerushalayim. You didn’t stop the butchers but allowed them to savagely snuff out the lives of these husbands and fathers while You stood by without lifting a finger. They were speaking to You, praising Your greatness, and while conversing with You, they were struck down with guns, knives and hatchets. Don’t You think this is too much for us to bear?
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Who Is Really a Jew?
November 9, 2014What makes one a Jew? Being born to a Jewish mother? Converting to Judaism? Not really. It is living by the spiritual order of Judaism that makes one a Jew; living through the Jews of the past and with the Jews of the present and future. We are Jews when we choose to be so; when we have discovered Jewishness on our own, through our search for the sacred; when we fight the never-ending spiritual struggle to find God, realize that the world needs a moral conscience, and carry that exalted burden so as to save the world and provide it with a mission.
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The Great Challenge for Judaism: Thinking Big
November 9, 2014Jewish education today is, for the most part, producing a generation of religious Jews who know more and more about Jewish observance but think less and less about what it means. This is even truer of their teachers. Many of them are great Talmudic scholars, but these very scholars don’t realize that they have drowned in their vast knowledge. The more they know, the less they understand. Just as a young child may think it is an act of kindness to lift a fish out of an aquarium and “save” it, so these rabbis may be choking their students while thinking they are providing them with spiritual oxygen. Doing so, they rewrite Judaism in ways that are totally foreign to the very ideas that it truly stands for. They are embalming Judaism while claiming it is alive because it continues to maintain its external shape.
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The Joy of a Bar Mitzvah
November 9, 2014Religious Jews carry a secret that few people have understood. For them, freedom can be earned only by great discipline. One needs to conquer it every moment of one’s life and work hard to maintain it. Freedom is the will to be responsible. It is a mental state, not just a physical condition. Its primary requirement is to live for something that is worth dying for. A life without a mission is not worth being born into. It is only through dignity that one becomes free, and in the words of Avraham Joshua Heschel, “the dignity of man stands in proportion to his obligations.”
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Halacha, Paradoxes and Constraints
November 9, 2014Halacha makes rules where rules need to exist lest chaos ensue. But it is these very rules that create unsolvable problems that are inherent to our existence. In trying to ask for both religious authenticity and conformity, Halacha nearly collapses in its attempt to satisfy both, and consequently builds bridges that dangle loosely and are then declared by Halacha to be castles of security. Halacha is constrained by man’s need to look after his own spiritual wants: the playfulness and innocence of the child in all of us; our real I; and the fact that we have consumed the apple and must now behave because we could not deal with the tree. It is this balancing act that becomes beautiful once the Divine Will declares it holy and teaches us that life’s absurdity has meaning.
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Avraham and the Impossible God: The Challenge of Akeidat Yitzchak
November 6, 2014To be religious means to know how to navigate unresolvable conflicts, to be bold enough to negotiate, and to stand upright even when failing. It is in the unresolved that real life is lived. Only that can lead man to true religiosity. In Parashat Vayera, Avraham learns that a God Whom one fully understands is only half a God. Because a life without dichotomies is a life not lived. The overwhelming paradoxes are what portray life in its full force and reality.
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Noah: The Danger of Misguided Frumkeit, Spinoza‘s Accurate Critique and Terrible Blunder
October 23, 2014For Jews, it is Avraham, rather than Noah, who represents genuine religiosity. Judaism is a covenant between man and God, in which man is co-creator. God orders him to take action beyond His commandments. He is asked to build the world with the ingredients that God supplied at the time of creation. And when God destroys the world, it is man’s task to restore it. He is obligated to storm out of the comforting "ghetto" of the ark, protest and start rebuilding.
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Simchat Torah: The Unyielding Sefer Torah
October 7, 2014A Sefer Torah presents us with a stunning paradox: It is a text that has had greater influence in the world than any other we know of. It has changed the universe as nothing else has; it encourages man to move, to discover and to develop. But it is still written in the traditional way--on parchment, by the hand of man, holding a quill pen.
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Rosh HaShanah: Profundity and the Challenge of the Deed
September 18, 2014Every ordinary act should be turned into a kind of mitzvah, a spiritual challenge, making it a dignified encounter with God. On Rosh HaShanah and Yom Kippur we are reminded that our deeds must redeem God’s presence and rescue Him from oblivion. In doing the finite we must be able to perceive the infinite.
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My Brother and the Kosher Wine Bottle – Defensive Halacha and Prophetic Halacha
September 11, 2014Laws such as issur maga nochri become an obstacle to the universal mission of the Jewish people when they are applied to those to whom they are not applicable.
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The Divine Word Is Deadly, Only A Melody Can Rescue it.
September 4, 2014The Divine Word is deadly and causes paralysis. The Word, wrought by fire in the upper world, is unmanageable and wreaks havoc once it descends. Its demands are not of this world; they belong to the angels. The Word therefore comes to naught once it enters the human sphere, since there is no one to receive it. All have died before the Word is able to pronounce its second word. How then can it delight the living soul?
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The Survival of Israel and the Art of Recognizing Miracles
August 28, 2014When one carefully studies Jewish history from the early biblical days to our own times, one can only conclude that, in spite of the many pogroms, the Inquisition and the Holocaust, Jews were constantly accompanied by highly unusual events, large and small. The fact that Jews survived these atrocities, outlived all their enemies throughout the millennia, and made it back to the Land of Israel is unprecedented and a vexing conundrum for historians and sociologists. It is indeed miraculous.
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Our Struggle with God’s Goodness, part 1and 2
August 14, 2014It is time to stop justifying God. Morally, His ways are sometimes inexcusable. Allowing a Holocaust in which six million Jews were killed in the cruelest ways imaginable, causing unbearable pain to innocent children, is morally intolerable.
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Will Our Boys Fight Again?
August 7, 2014Throughout the centuries, historians, philosophers and anthropologists have struggled with the concept called Israel more than with nearly any other idea.
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The Fight for a 4,000-Year Marriage
July 31, 2014Marriage and the merit of living in the Land of Israel have much in common. After Sarah’s death, Avraham buys a portion in the Land of Israel, including the Cave of Machpelah, for the purpose of burying her there.
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Prayer on Behalf of the Jewish Soldier (English-Hebrew)
July 24, 2014Lord of the Universe We, the people of Israel who are dwelling in the Diaspora come to you in humility and pray for Your help
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On The Israeli-Arab Conflict: A Biblical Perspective
July 16, 2014Impartial observers of the Middle East will realize that these are extraordinary times. Tens of thousands of Jews from many different countries are returning to their national and historic homeland after thousands of years.
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Let Us All Sit Shiva and Mourn the Death of a Child
July 10, 2014Just as millions of Israeli Jews prayed for the safety of our three sons and showed unprecedented unity and moral character as no nation has ever shown, let us now sit shivah and mourn the terrible atrocity that has been committed by a few of our sons.
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An Open Letter to God: The Murder of Our Sons
July 3, 2014Lord of the Universe! I ask for forgiveness, but I have no option but to speak to You with words of protest. I must tell You that it has again become very difficult to live in Your presence. In the last few weeks, we, the people of Israel, have all become one family whose sons were brutally murdered almost three weeks ago.
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God Is Too Great to Be Justified – Part 1
June 26, 2014It is time to stop justifying God. Morally, His ways are sometimes inexcusable. Allowing a Holocaust in which six million Jews were killed in the cruelest ways imaginable, causing unbearable pain to innocent children, is morally intolerable.
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The Frustrating but Beautiful World of Halacha
June 19, 2014One of man’s strongest longings today is for authenticity. We want to be ourselves, or to become ourselves. We admire children’s spontaneity, because they do not yet know how they “ought to be.” They are still impulsive and natural.
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The Paradox of Who Is a Jew
June 12, 2014What makes one a Jew? Being born to a Jewish mother? Converting to Judaism? Not really. It is living by the spiritual order of Judaism that makes one a Jew; living through the Jews of the past and with the Jews of the present and future.
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Shavuot – Bible Criticism and the Problem of Revelation
May 29, 2014One of the most challenging aspects of religious life is how to relate to the concept of revelation. The uncompromising claim by Judaism that the Torah is not a book written by man, but is the result of the most famous disclosure of God’s will to man,
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Jews, Sisyphus and Sports – ( With tongue in cheek!)
May 21, 2014The need to engage in sports is self-understood. Exercising and keeping our bodies in good condition is considered a mitzva of the highest priority.
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Soccer Talk: The World Cup Some Rabbinic Advice from a Dutch Expert
May 12, 2014As the Brazil World Cup draws near, I suffer sleepless nights and struggle with serious depression. In the name of Zeus, why is it that time after time we Jews find ourselves not at the center of these games? No doubt this is on the minds of all my readers.
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Sefirat HaOmer: What Really Counts
May 8, 2014Nothing is more dangerous for man than to remain spiritually stale. It is for this reason than one is required to count the 49 days of the Omer. To prepare ourselves for the upcoming celebration of Shavuot and the giving of the Torah, we are asked to climb a ladder of 49 spiritual steps in which each day will add another dimension to our souls.
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The Danger of Universal Love
May 1, 2014In a world that is filled with much animosity, the concept of universal love has become a famous and much discussed topic. We are taught that only when all people begin loving each other equally will our multitude of problems be solved and universal peace prevail.
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Yom HaShoa – Jewish Life or Israeli Life
April 24, 2014In one of its most dramatic texts, the Talmud (1) discusses an episode that was perhaps the most decisive moment in Jewish history prior to the Holocaust. It took place in the first century C.E. just as the Second Temple was to be destroyed by the Romans, who were occupying the land.
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Looking Through the Clouds: The Red Sea and the State of Israel
April 10, 2014The establishment of the State of Israel was no doubt an epoch-making event. It is the completely extraordinary nature of this event that stands out – the transformation of the Jewish people’s earthliness into a radically different situation. While miracles no doubt occurred to enable it to happen, the most important religious dimension is, again, the enduring astonishment at this event, especially after the Holocaust. Only when the establishment of the State of Israel is seen in the light of the miracle at the Red Sea will its fascination continue.
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Spinoza’s Sub Specie Aeternitatis, Yeshiva Students and the Army
March 27, 2014Whenever I think of the huge demonstration of Chareidi yeshiva students at the beginning of this month, I think of Gateshead Yeshiva in England where I spent many years studying Talmud.
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Halacha and Absurdity – Part 3
March 20, 2014In the first two parts of this essay, we have seen that no objectivity is possible in Halacha. This enables us to understand not only why there are many opposing opinions in the Talmud, such as those of Beit Hillel and Beit Shamai, but also that the weltanschauung (world view) and ideologies of the halachic authorities play an enormous role in the way they decide halachic issues.
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Purim: The Call for Eternity
March 13, 2014In a remarkable Midrash on Mishlei, we read the following: “All of the festivals will be abolished in the future [the messianic age], but Purim will never be abolished” (1).
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Halacha and Absurdity – Part 2
March 6, 2014Once the human being has recognized that ultimately there is no way to know why God created the world and mankind, he can make his way back to reason and meaning. Once he leaves this “divine absurdity” behind as an unsolvable problem, his intelligence is able to guide him through the labyrinth of human existence.
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Halacha and Absurdity – Part 1
February 27, 2014Much has been written about the meaning and purpose of Halacha, based on philosophy, metaphysics and psychology. Scholars have suggested that Halacha is the art of living in the presence of God.
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Anti-Semitism at Its Best – Two Essays
February 20, 2014Centuries after Shakespeare said “Something’s rotten in the state of Denmark,” we have hard proof of a big stink in Denmark and nearby Scandinavian countries.
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The Inscrutable God
February 13, 2014Few prayers are more perplexing than the one called “Ein Keloh-einu.” This famous song is chanted at the end of the morning prayers. But it makes little sense. In fact, it seems more than just odd. We first sing “Ein Keloh-einu” (There is nobody like our God), and then we ask “Mi-Keloh-einu” (Who is like […]
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The Assault on Circumcision
February 6, 2014To be truly alive is only possible when one lives for some supreme goal. The ultimate question regarding our lives is whether there is anything worth dying for. If the answer is no, then we must ask ourselves whether there is anything to live for. For most thinking people there is more to life than our physical survival or having a great time. It is about the exaltation of existence and the ability to hear a perpetual murmur emitted by the waves beyond the shore of worldliness, which gives us the feeling that life is of utmost significance.
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Retirement: Time to Start Living
January 30, 2014As I watch some of my friends entering retirement, I realize how dangerous it is to "take it easy" and fall into the pit of idleness, thinking that one is at the peak of one's life while one may very well be at its lowest point. Retirement can be a real killer, and surviving its hazards is an art. For most people, old age and retirement often arrive with a jolt. We are not ready. There are no official classes in our youth to prepare us for this stage of our lives. As a result, many stop dreaming and are devoid of any ambition. Some even start apologizing that they are still alive.
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Bar Mitzvah as a Vote of Confidence
January 23, 2014Few matters are as misunderstood as Judaism’s “obsession with the law.” In the life of a religious Jew, not a moment goes by that he is not reminded of his obligations as stated in the Shulchan Aruch (Code of Jewish Law).
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Yitro and Franz Rosenzweig – Jews by Choice
January 16, 2014Yitro forces each one of us to ask ourselves whether we would have opted for Judaism had we not been born Jewish. And if yes, would this not mean that we would have had to start all over again, discovering it on our own so as to comprehend what it is really all about? If Yitro traveled his road to Judaism step by step in order to fully grasp its beauty and truth, we may have to re-engage ourselves with every mitzvah as if we had never done it before, as real beginners.
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Judaism: Thinking Big
January 9, 2014It is time to start thinking big about Judaism. Great opportunities are awaiting us and too much is at stake to let them pass by. For too long, Judaism has been jailed in compartmentalized and awkward boxes. It is time to liberate it.
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Kaddish: The Ultimate Way to Be a Child Again
January 2, 2014I still remember it as if it were yesterday. Six years ago. The year of mourning for my dear mother z"l had just ended. It was a most unusual experience, which I did not anticipate.
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Heresy Is a Necessity – A Plea to Bring Spinoza, Locke and Sartre into the Beit Midrash
December 26, 2013Leadership is one of the most difficult qualities for man to achieve. It requires a rare combination of wisdom, courage, knowledge and experience. Very few people possess all these qualities, and even fewer know the art of combining them in a balanced way.
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The Abuse of Halacha
December 19, 2013Judaism is in trouble. More and more of the unacceptable is being done and said in its name. It's causing not only infinite damage to Judaism’s great message but also a terrible desecration of God’s name.
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Secular Prohibition and Religious Endorsement
December 5, 2013A few years ago I saw a cat hit by a car. It rolled over several times but escaped unhurt. Its face showed no sign of shock (1), but its body language indicated clear signs of panic and disorientation.
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The Joy of Religious Doubt – The Road to Faith is Paved with Uncertainty
November 28, 2013We are currently living in a transitional phase of monumental proportions and far-reaching consequences. Our religious beliefs are being challenged as never before. We are forced to our knees due to extreme shifts and radical changes in scientific discoveries;
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JDOV VIDEO: Johann Sebastian Bach, Judaism and the Art of Being a Rebel
November 21, 2013The following words were spoken at Limmud, Johannesburg, South Africa on August 11.2013 for the JDOV, video program. This is a slightly edited transcription of my lecture.
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God and the Philippine Typhoon
November 14, 2013Do good and evil events in this world really always depend on human behavior? Was there no other reason for God to create the universe than to test human beings and reward or punish accordingly? Is man really the measure of all things?
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Debating Orthodox and Reform Beliefs – Wanted: Rabbinical Courage
November 7, 2013What Orthodox leaders must remember is that we owe much of our knowledge not to those who agreed with us, but to those who differed and therefore challenged us to sharpen our minds. “Accept the truth from whoever says it” was Maimonides’ sage advice in his introduction to his famous treatise Shemonah Perakim.
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Bravo, Chief Rabbi Mirvis! Courage, Dayan Ehrentreu!
October 31, 2013Courage is the word that comes to mind when we think of Britain’s new Chief Rabbi Ephraim Mirvis’ decision to come to Limmud, the largest Jewish conference in the world, which will take place in England at the end of the year. It is a sad commentary on the state of contemporary Orthodox leadership when a chief rabbi is called courageous because he accepts the invitation to teach Torah at such a remarkable Jewish event. What could be more obvious? But the truth is that courage has indeed become a rare commodity in large segments of Orthodoxy.
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The Ban on Circumcision, and the Council of Europe
October 24, 2013Request to our readers The following essay (with some slight changes) was published in The Jerusalem Post Friday Magazine on September 14th, 2012, as well as in the Shabbat Magazine of the Israeli, Hebrew newspaper Makor Rishon on Friday, November 9th, 2012. It is important that this essay gets as much exposure as possible. Please send it on to your friends, to newspapers and to journals! *********** As the discussion around circumcision is gaining momentum and more and more people, including doctors and philosophers in Europe, publish their opinions, it is time to bring some balance to the debate.
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Akedath Yitzchak and Avraham’s mistaken presumption
October 17, 2013The most tragic figure in the Bible is God, said the famous Talmudic scholar Saul Lieberman. Indeed. No one has been more misunderstood than God. But let’s be honest; it’s His own fault. After all,
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The Sweetening of the Divine Word
October 10, 2013Rabbi Azariah and Rabbi Acha said in the name of Rabbi Yochanan: When, at Mount Sinai, the Israelites heard the word “Anochi” (“I” — the first word of “The Ten Words”), their souls left them, as it says [Devarim 5:22]: “If we hear the voice of God any more, we will die.”
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Yom Kippur – To Dream Harder
September 12, 2013In former times, no hours were more extraordinary in our forefathers’ lives than those just before the onset of the awesome day, Yom Kippur.
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The Joy of Saying: I am Sorry
August 29, 2013One of the most remarkable features of the Portuguese Spanish Selichot (1), besides the text, is the choice of melodies. The tunes are not like those of the Edot HaMizrach, the Eastern Sefardi communities.
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Rosh Hashana and the Missing King
August 22, 2013Once upon a time, in a large, gloomy palace high on a mountain, where the night wind howled outside its massive walls, there lived a king—a real one. He had a beard as long as a silver waterfall and a voice that boomed like thunder. A king needs no more.
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Rosh Hashanah, Nicolaes Maes and the Uproar in Our Souls
August 15, 2013The Holy One blessed be He has many ways to create an uproar in our souls. He can show us a moment in the life of a person who seems to live a simple life, with such tranquility and profundity that we are immediately transformed.
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Halacha, Legal Hairsplitting and The Great Compliment
August 7, 2013Few matters are as misunderstood as Judaism’s “obsession” with Halacha. Not a moment goes by in the life of a religious Jew that he is not reminded of his many obligations, both religious and moral, as codified in the various works of Jewish Law.
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God Does Not Exist – The New Thirteen Principles of Faith – Principle Two
July 25, 2013The truly great need no synthesis. They absorb whatever experience offers them. Their intensely creative personalities act like a fiery furnace, melting away contradictions.
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The Strenuous Balancing Act of Halacha
July 11, 2013One of man’s strongest longings today is for authenticity. We want to be ourselves, or to become ourselves. We admire children’s spontaneity, because they do not yet know how they “ought to” be. They are still impulsive and natural.
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The Rebellion of Chief Rabbi Sacks
July 4, 2013Let it be said. Jonathan Sacks has been a rebellious chief rabbi. Now that he is stepping down, we had better keep an eye on him and hope he will become even more of an insurgent.
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Judaism: Thinking Big (1)
June 27, 2013It is time to start thinking big about Judaism. Great opportunities are awaiting us and too much is at stake to let them pass by. For too long, Judaism has been jailed in compartmentalized and awkward boxes. It is time to liberate it.
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The Challenge and Opportunities at Limmud – Reflections from Australia
June 20, 2013Judaism is the most astonishing and daring religion the world has been blessed with. It defies definition, standing head and shoulders above anything else I know. It is not just a faith, a sentiment, or a ritual;
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Imagination, Torah and Toys
June 13, 2013One of the most unique talents that human beings are blessed with is the faculty of imagination. Unlike any other creature, the human has nearly unlimited potential for constructive fantasy.
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Protesting the Tragic God of Sublimity
May 23, 2013The most tragic figure in the Bible is God, said the famous Talmudic scholar Saul Lieberman. Indeed. No one has been more misunderstood than God. But let’s be honest; it’s His own fault.
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Autobiography – Lonely But Not Alone
May 16, 2013A Spiritual Short Autobiography by a Jew Who Should Never Have Been
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Human Courage and the Unavoidable, Disturbing Text
May 2, 2013Torah study has become nearly impossible, and the problem lies not with the Torah but with man. To read the text requires courage. Not courage to open the Book and start reading, but courage to confront oneself.
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God Is Relocating
April 18, 2013Lately, a strange feeling has gotten hold of me. I am not yet able to fully articulate it, but something tells me that God is relocating to a different residence. He has hired a moving company and they are at this time loading all His furniture and possessions into a van
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Yom Ha’atzmaut – The Mystery of Israel
April 11, 2013Throughout the centuries, historians, philosophers and anthropologists have struggled with the concept called “Israel” almost more than with any other topic. While attempting to place Israel within the confines of conventional history, they experienced constant academic and philosophical frustration.
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The Holocaust, Rembrandt and the Quest for Authenticity
April 4, 2013As we approach Yom Hashoa, I think of Rembrandt’s superb Large Self-Portrait, which is exhibited at the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna. It cast a spell on me when I first saw it.
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The Rise and Fall of the Israeli Chief Rabbinate and Benedict XVI
March 7, 2013Benedict XVI has just left, and soon our Israeli chief rabbis will follow suit. The difference is that Benedict left on his own accord, much to the dismay of many in the Church, while our chief rabbis, whose terms of office have ended,
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The New Thirteen Principles of Faith
February 28, 2013Faith can only be found in the light of one’s soul, never in dogma. Dogmas reach only the mind but not the human heart. Trying to translate faith into dogma is a misguided technical skill that leaves the human heart empty of that which is crucial to a religious experience.
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Purim and the Intricate Web
February 21, 2013From a subjective point of view, it seems that the existence and behavior of a single human being is of little importance. Barring those leaders, thinkers and scientists
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Faith, Death and Frontal Encounter
February 14, 2013Faith is deeper than knowledge. While scientific data is absorbed only in the brain, faith permeates all parts of the human personality.
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To Be a Stranger Is to Be Moral
February 7, 2013Once again, residents of the State of Israel are threatened by political unrest, escalating with each passing day, in their neighboring countries of the Middle East. The Arab Spring is spreading across the region like water bursting through a dam.
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Yitro and Franz Rosenzweig – Jews by Choice
January 31, 2013As we are daily confronted by a serious increase in the number of Jews who have not only left the fold but are actively involved in anti-Jewish sentiments in and outside of Israel, it would perhaps be meaningful to study an episode in the life of a biblical non-Jew who decided to join the Jewish people at all costs.
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The Great Bar Mitzvah of Compliments
January 24, 2013Few matters are as misunderstood as Judaism’s “obsession with the law.” In the life of a religious Jew, not a moment goes by that he is not reminded of his obligations as stated in the Shulchan Aruch (Code of Jewish Law).
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Denial and Self-Loathing
January 17, 2013One of the most common psychological defense mechanisms used by human beings is denial. We all repress unpleasant experiences and do not want to be confronted with reality when it is too uncomfortable.
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To Be Religious Means to Be Rebellious
January 10, 2013Leadership is one of the most difficult tasks for man to undertake. It requires a rare combination of wisdom, courage, knowledge and experience.
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The Trouble with Jesus
January 3, 2013It is extremely difficult to know unequivocally whether the stories and observations about Jesus in the Talmud actually refer to the Jesus in the New Testament. Several dates do not correspond, and many other problems are evident.
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Christmas, Jesus and the Rejection of a Jewish Child
December 27, 2012This week, our gentile brothers and sisters celebrated the birth of one little Jewish child, one who turned the world on its head as no child has ever done.
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Grandparents, Grandchildren and the Fraternity of the Committed (TTP-324)
December 20, 2012The Mishna in Eduyoth (2:9) makes the following unusual observation in the name of Rabbi Akiva: “A father endows his son with handsome looks, strength, wealth, wisdom, longevity, and mispar hadoroth lefanav, the number of generations before him.
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Introducing the Unknowable: God
December 12, 2012“The riddles of God are more satisfying than the solutions of man.” (1)
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Rockets and Survival, Israel and Miracles
November 28, 2012As Israel was once again bombarded with short-range mortar shells, Grad artillery rockets and, Hamas’s latest addition, Iranian long-range Fajr-5 missiles, forcing nearly a million people to hide in shelters for over a week, it is understandable that many wonder whether this will ever end.
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Prayer on Behalf of the Jewish Soldier (English-Hebrew)
November 19, 2012Lord of the Universe We, the people of Israel who are dwelling in the Diaspora, come to you in humility and pray for Your help. Once more, our soldiers are asked to defend our brothers and sisters in the Holy Land against our enemies.
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God and Sandy
November 15, 2012As the USA is trying to get back on its feet after the devastating “Superstorm Sandy,” which left over 120 people dead, destroyed the homes and possessions of tens of thousands, and left millions without electricity, ruining the lives of countless people, many good souls wonder what is the higher meaning behind all this.
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To Be an Example – The Tragedy and the Challenge
November 8, 2012There is a high price to pay for living as a Jew. One must be holy so as to be acceptable. One is commanded to surpass civilization so as to be adequate. Our existence is neither desired nor easily accepted. God has positioned us in history in a most curious way.
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The Mortal Danger of Retirement
November 1, 2012As I watch some of my friends entering retirement, I realize how dangerous it is to “take it easy” and fall into the pit of idleness, thinking that one is at the peak of one’s life while one may very well be at its lowest point.
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The Inadequacy of Jewish Dogma – part 3
October 25, 2012The Secular Renaissance of Judaism and the Inadequacy of Jewish Dogma
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Mind Control – Rabbinical Tyranny and Freedom of Thought Part 2
October 18, 2012It is a well-known fact that after the death of Darwin, his evolution theory became more and more popular and many young Jews were attracted by his ideas and left the fold.
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Rabbinical Tyranny and Freedom of Thought – A Protest
October 11, 2012The primary concern of Judaism is the art of living. To accomplish this, it is committed to a strong sense of tradition and a determination to realize certain optimal goals. It is this that has made Judaism unique, standing out among the community of religions.
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Simchat Torah – Technology and the Outdated Torah Scroll
September 27, 2012We will soon be celebrating Simchat Torah, and Jews throughout the world will dance with Sifrei Torah in their synagogues, community centers, university campuses and even in the streets. This is remarkable for many reasons.
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The Trouble with Kal Nidrei – We Are All Marranos
September 20, 2012Kal Nidrei (1) is by far the most celebrated prayer in all Jewish Communities around the world and the most attended throughout the Jewish year. Tens of thousands of Jews who would otherwise never participate in a synagogue service will make sure
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Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur, The Deed, the Choice and the Challenge
August 30, 2012“On Rosh Hashana all those who came to the world pass in front of Him like a flock of sheep.”
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Rosh Hashana – The Need for Ideological Repentance
August 29, 2012As we approach Rosh Hashana and ask ourselves what we should do to become better Jews – not just as individuals but also as a community – we must realize that we need to change our attitudes and not just our deeds.
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Wanted: Rabbinical Courage
August 23, 2012This statement by Martin Luther King came to mind as I was reading One People, Two Worlds (2), a candid and provocative dialogue between two rabbis on the fundamental differences between Orthodox and Reform Judaism.
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The bigotry of the anti-circumcision zealots – by Frank Furedi
August 16, 2012The international campaign demonizing the religious practice of circumcising young boys is fuelled by a new form of misanthropic bigotry. It represents a synthesis of twenty-first-century cultural correctness and old-fashioned prejudice.
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The Talmud and the Olympics Who won?
August 9, 2012Last week something remarkable happened in the Jewish religious world, unequaled in the non-Jewish one. While millions flew to the London Olympics
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In Search of a New Posek HaDor
August 2, 2012Nothing is more difficult than being a “Posek HaDor,” the foremost leading halachic arbiter of the Jewish people, in our complicated and troublesome days.
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Tisha B’Av – Of Simple Courage and Rabbinical Despair
July 25, 2012An extraordinary statement in the Talmud offers us a glimpse into the frame of mind of the Sages immediately following the destruction of the Temple,
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The Cutting Edge of Circumcision
July 18, 2012As the discussion around circumcision is gaining momentum and more and more people, including doctors and philosophers in Europe, publish their opinions, it is time to bring some balance to the debate.
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Animosity, Jesus and Circumcision
July 12, 2012As anti-Semitism in Europe is on the rise, and antagonism towards the State of Israel escalates, there is a need for careful assessment of the nature of anti-Semitism.
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The Ideal and Idyllic: A View of Halacha as a Musical Sonata
July 5, 2012A young scholar completed his learning of the entire Talmud for the third time. Full of enthusiasm, he ran to tell his teacher the good news.
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Halacha: The Greatest Chess Game on Earth
June 28, 2012There is probably no game as difficult and captivating as chess. Millions of people break their heads over strategies to win this game and spend years learning its ins and outs.
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Halacha: The Microscopic Search for God
June 21, 2012There is little doubt that Halacha greatly complicates life for the religious Jew. There is no other religion that requires so much dedication and includes so much emphasis on detail.
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Shabbath, Carrying and the Buddha
June 13, 2012The fact that Judaism constantly surprises us is not a surprise. That the institution of Shabbath is one of the best inventions God ever came up with is well known.
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The Expulsion of God in Halacha (1)
June 7, 2012When trying to understand Halacha’s failure to inspire many Jews in modern times we need to recognize that not only has it been flattened by over-codification and stagnation,
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Halacha and Absurdity – Part 3
May 29, 2012In the first two parts of this essay, we have seen that no objectivity is possible in Halacha. This enables us to understand not only why there are many opposing opinions in the Talmud,
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Shavuoth, The Torah is No longer in Heaven
May 14, 2012One of man’s strongest longings today is the need for authenticity. We want to be ourselves, or to become ourselves. We admire children’s spontaneity, because they do not yet know how they “ought to be.”
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Yerushalayim, The City of Eternity
May 13, 2012I stand at the Kotel, the Wailing Wall
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Freud and Belief in God
May 9, 2012Sigmund Freud (1856-1939), the father of psychoanalysis and a figure as eminent as Galileo or Einstein, devoted a great deal of attention to religion.
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The Absurdity of Halacha – Part 1
April 19, 2012Much has been written about the meaning and purpose of Halacha, based on philosophy, metaphysics and psychology. Scholars have suggested that Halacha is the art of living in the presence of God. Others have posited that it requires the need to live a life dedicated to kedusha (holiness), while many argue that Halacha’s purpose is to achieve a high level of ethical standards.
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Pesach, Deus Absconditus and Divine Silence
April 3, 2012The continuing absence of distinctive Divine Providence in modern times is often seen as the cause for much of secularism. Since the days of the Renaissance man has become more and more skeptical about the frequency of divine intervention. No longer, it is argued, are there enough indications of God’s interference in the national and […]
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The Trouble with Chametz
March 29, 2012The Talmud (1) poses the question: Why is it prohibited to eat or to possess chametz (leaven), such as bread, on Pesach? What is there in the nature of leaven that makes it forbidden on Pesach? And what is so special about matza that makes it the most desirable food to eat on this holiday?
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Pesach, Modern and Ultra Orthodox Judaism, To Roast or to Boil?
March 22, 2012The Torah’s dietary laws of kashrut and those that instruct the Jew to remove all chametz (leaven) on Pesach and to eat matzot do not include instructions on whether food is to be cooked or to be roasted. The only remarkable exception to this is the law concerning the korban Pesach (Passover lamb). What difference does it make if the meat is cooked or roasted?
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Why They Still Hate Us – Why I Am Proud to Be a Jew
March 7, 2012Every so often we hear again about increasing hatred against the Jews. Attempts to stop anti-Semitism have, for the most part, proved ineffectual, and we still have a long way to go. Nevertheless, many gentiles are our best friends and we should not forget this. Here are some quotes by Gentiles of international repute, who fell in love with the Jews and Judaism. Let us not forget!
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Purim and its Irrelevance
March 1, 2012A remarkable Midrash on Mishle states that while all the other festivals will be discontinued, the festival of Purim will never be suspended. This assertion seems to fly in the face of Jewish Tradition, which states categorically that the Jewish festivals mentioned in the Torah, such as Pesach, Shavuoth and Succoth, will never cease to be celebrated.
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Moshe’s Fatigue and the Need for a Gentile’s Advice
February 9, 2012After Moshe left Egypt with a multitude of people, his father-in-law, Yitro, criticized him for the way he was arbitrating disputes among the Israelites, and suggested that Moshe reform the existing legal system. Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch poses a very simple question: Could Moshe not have determined this himself?
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Why I Love to Teach at Limmud
December 8, 2011Printed in the Jewish Chronicle London, United Kingdom, December 2011 Judaism is the most astonishing and daring religion the world has been blessed with. It defies all definitions and stands head and shoulders above anything else I know. It is not just a faith, a sentiment, or a ritual, but above all an immense yet […]
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On Dolls and Torah: The Art of Imagination
October 27, 2011One of the most unique talents that human beings are blessed with is the faculty of imagination. Unlike any other creature, the human has nearly unlimited potential for constructive fantasy. In fact, our civilization is built on imagination. Without this capacity, no progress could ever be made, whether in science, literature, philosophy, art, music or […]
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Gilad Shalit: Justice and Injustice
October 23, 2011Thank God, Gilad Shalit is finally home. He has transformed Israel into a different country: more holy and united, but also more pained. Pained for those who lost their loved ones in many wars and terrorist attacks and whose murderers have now been freed in a deal to return Gilad to his parents. For more […]
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Simchat Torah and the Stagnation of the Text
October 11, 2011For hundreds of years, Jews have had the custom to complete the yearly Torah reading in the synagogue on the day of Simchat Torah only to immediately begin all over again. Why the hurry? There is nearly no time to contemplate what one read last year! What is the point of reading something which, for […]
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Rosh Hashana: The Introduction of Bold Ideas
September 22, 2011This article will be printed Erev Rosh Hashana in the Hebrew weekly, Makor Rishon Rosh Hashana is a day to contemplate the need for great Jewish Ideas. A day to think big. To get out of our compartmentalized boxes. Hayom Harat Olam: Today the world is born. On Rosh Hashana the world should be newly […]
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Rosh Hashana Without End
September 9, 2011God has many ways to create an uproar in our souls. He can show us a moment in the life of a person who seems to live in complete tranquility, sometimes using the most unusual people to convey an important message. In the famous Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam there is a portrait by Rembrandt’s most celebrated […]
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The Next Mass Demonstration
August 19, 2011“I have a Dream” Wanted: Rabbis with Knives between Their Teeth Things are going well in Israel. Mass demonstrations for social justice, housing, proper hospitalization, and adequate wages for physicians, teachers and the underprivileged are finally underway. Hundreds of thousands of Israelis have gone to the streets to convince the government that things need to […]
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Who is a Jew? What is a Jew?
August 5, 2011Authenticity and Conformity: Free Spirit and Law What makes one a Jew? Being born from a Jewish mother? Conversion? Not really. It is living in the spiritual order of Judaism that makes one a Jew: living through the Jews of the past and with the Jews of the present and future. We are Jews when […]
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Real or Artificial: The Dilemma of Halacha
July 29, 2011In honor of the birth of our great granddaughter Malka Eva Rachel Tchiprout Granddaughter of Rabbi Michael and Deborah Sarah Cohen Daughter of Yaacov and Tzipporah Tchiprout Detroit-Yerushalayim One of man’s strongest longings today is the need for authenticity. We want to be ourselves, or to become ourselves. We admire children’s spontaneity, because they do […]
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On Boredom and Religious Plagiarism: The Blessings of Jewish Self-Discovery
July 22, 2011“How beautiful it is to do nothing, and then rest afterward!” (1) Psychologists tell us that one of man’s greatest enemies today is boredom. Sometimes, when reading a paper or popular journal, watching television or a DVD, using an MP3 or Ipod, or just listening to the old-fashioned radio, we are confronted with the most […]
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Jerusalem, The Echo of Eternity
June 1, 2011I stand at the Kotel, the Wailing Wall. Seeing her frozen tears and eternal smile, Her clouds passing with mournful sighs Her pitiful laughter at those who wanted to destroy her But did not succeed. � I read holy books, And hundreds of thousands of names,� Those from Egypt, Babylon, Rome, Spain, Hungary, �America […]
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Pesach: To Roast or to Boil. That is the Question
April 27, 2008The Torah does not often give instructions related to food. Besides the laws of Kashruth, and those that relate to Pesach, there are no instructions on how to prepare food or how to eat it.
The only remarkable exception to this is the law concerning the Korban Pesach, the Passover Lamb.
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Pesach. To Roast or To Boil
April 17, 2011To Roast or to Boil: That is the Question
Secularism, Modern and Ultra Orthodoxy
The Torah's dietary laws of kashrut and those that instruct the Jew to remove all chametz (leaven) on Pesach and to eat matzot do not include instructions on whether food is to be cooked or to be roasted.
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Letter of Protest to God – Itamar and Japan (Part 2)
April 10, 2011"Perhaps someday someone will explain how, on the level of man,
Elie Wiesel: Legends of our Time
**
During the past three weeks I have received numerous responses to my Letter of Protest to God. In Awe and Humility (TTP 270 - See www.cardozoschool.org/), many of which included important observations and questions. Some were highly supportive of my ideas, informing me that I had expressed many of the questions that people are troubled by, while others were slightly antagonistic and asked how I dared to challenge God. The answer I suggested seems to have helped even those. On the whole, this has been most refreshing since it shows that people, whether they agree or disagree with my approach, are deeply affected by the issues I have raised.
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Sacrifices – The Great Jewish Embarrassment?
March 13, 2011Does Judaism really need animal sacrifices? Would it not be better off without them? After all, does the sacrificial cult not compromise Judaism? What does a highly ethical religion have to do with the collecting of blood in vessels and the burning of animal limbs on an altar? No doubt Judaism should really be sacrifice-free. Yet it is not.
So, is the offering of sacrifices Jewish, or not? The answer is an unequivocal Yes! It is Jewish, yet it does not really belong to Judaism.
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The Mathematics of the Tabernacle & Johann Sebastian Bach
March 6, 2011Since the Torah is normally very parsimonious with its words, nothing is more surprising in Parashat Pekudei (and Vayakhel) than the great amount of detail and repetition in the divine instructions relating to the building and the architecture of the Mishkan (Tabernacle). Not the smallest nuance is excluded, and nothing is left to human imagination. Preciseness stands out, and every pin and string is mentioned.
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Parashat Ki Tisa -The Wonder of and Need for Authentic Halacha
February 20, 2011…This feeling of wonderment is the source and inexhaustible fountain-head of his desire for knowledge. It drives the child irresistibly on to solve the mystery, and if in his attempt he encounters a causal relationship, he will not tire of repeating the same experiment ten times, a hundred times, in order to taste the thrill of discovery over and over again….The reason why the adult no longer wonders is not because he has solved the riddle of life, but because he has grown accustomed to the laws governing his world picture. But the problem of why these particular laws and no others hold remains for him just as amazing and inexplicable as for the child. He who does not comprehend this situation misconstrues its profound significance, and he who has reached the stage where he no longer wonders about anything, merely demonstrates that he has lost the art of reflective reasoning.
[Max Planck, Scientific Autobiography, NY, 1949, pp 91-93]
In this week's parasha we find a fascinating passage concerning Moshe's descent from Sinai. We are informed that Moshe decided to cover his face with a mask after realizing that his facial skin had become radiant causing people to withdraw and not dare approach him (Shemot 34: 29-35).
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Bring a Heretic into the Beth Midrash – Moshe’s leadership and rebellion
January 30, 2011Leadership is one of the most difficult qualities for man to achieve. It requires a rare combination of wisdom, courage, knowledge and experience. Very few people possess all these qualities and even fewer know the art of combining them in a balanced way.
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Yithro – A Protest Against Racism
January 21, 2011Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch (1808-1888), one of the great Jewish leaders and thinkers of modern times, asks us to take notice of a strange incident in the days of Moshe. After Moshe left
What are you doing to the people? Why are you sitting by yourself and letting all the people stand around you from morning until evening?
The people come to me to seek God, replied Moshe to his father-in-law. Whenever they have a problem, they come to me. I judge between man and his neighbor, and I teach God's decrees and laws.
Moshe's father-in-law said to him: What you are doing is not good. You are going to wear yourself out, along with this nation that is with you. Your responsibility is too great. You cannot do it all alone. (Shemoth 18: 14-18) (1)
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Jesus and Spinoza. The Story of a Jewish Tragedy
January 3, 2011This time of year millions of eyes are on one Jew: Jesus. While we Jews have no part in this, it is important that we ask ourselves why this man has fascinated the world as few people ever have, yet simultaneously has been totally rejected by the Jews. What can be learned from the tragic story of a man who is worshipped by many as a god but seen by the Jews as nearly an outcast?
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The Fire That God Wrought – Thoughts on Theodicy and God’s Responsibility
January 24, 2011It has become common practice in the Jewish orthodox religious community to trace any national or personal disaster back to human moral or religious failure. It is divine wrath that befalls us. Any tragedy is seen as an expression of God's anger with the behavior of mankind, especially of Jews.
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Word Painting, US Customs and God’s Deserts
December 3, 2010There is a technique in writing called word painting. It differs from the way most of us write in that it paints an image in the reader's mind. It does not merely state a description, such as "the grass was green and the heavens were blue." Rather, it recognizes that some matters strike us as beautiful not because of aesthetics - when colors match or the symmetry is perfect - but because they make a deep psychological impression on us due to the mood or the value they embody. Word painting uses rich evocative words that accurately portray the images in the writer's mind. Experiences such as these can mollify many ugly moments we human beings have to endure.
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Chanukah: The Menorah, Religious Equilibrium and the Jewish Mission
November 28, 2010For the Jewish religious community to deny this is to embarrass Judaism. For religious Jewry to live an authentic Jewish life, it will have to teach its children that our true task as Jews is our universal mission to be an example of the balance between the spiritual and the physical. This is the message of the middle light on the biblical menorah towards which all the other lights are to point.
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Spinoza and Noah’s Ark
November 21, 2010In his Tractatus Theologico-Politicus, Benedictus Spinoza (17th century), the famous Jewish ‘philosopher apostate', launches one of his most outspoken attacks on Judaism. Not mincing words, he accuses it of demanding obsessive and outrageous obedience: "The sphere of reason is…. truth and wisdom; the sphere of theology is piety and obedience" (XV). "Philosophy has no end in view save truth: faith… looks for nothing but obedience and piety" (X1V). "Scripture … does not condemn ignorance but obstinacy" (X1V).
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Determinism and Free Will
October 24, 2010
God's False Accusations and Man's Responsibility "We must believe in free will. We have no choice." This observation made by Isaac Bashevis Singer introduces one of the greatest enigmas in Jewish and general philosophy - free will versus determinism. Many have attempted to solve this paradox, but not one philosopher has been able to come up with a completely satisfactory solution.
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Contemplations About a Cat
October 15, 2010Secularism's Prohibitions; Religion's Permissions
Recently I saw a cat hit by a car. It rolled over several times but escaped unhurt. Its face showed no sign of shock (1), but its body language indicated clear signs of panic and disorientation. It ran to the side of the road, turned over several times more as if in total confusion, and then calmed down. I waited a few seconds wondering what I could do to help, but a moment later the cat went on its way and then disappeared.
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Yom Kippur and Arthur Schopenhauer
September 16, 2010All religions and philosophies are, without a doubt, confronted with the question of how to relate to "existence." Should one oppose "existence" and ideally opt for "non-existence," or should one view "being" as good and "non-being" as the opposite?< ?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />
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Poem to God
September 5, 2010September 1, 2010
22 Elul 5770
The Holy Souls
Yitzchak and Talya Ames
Kochava Even-Chaim
Avishai Shindler
May their memory be a blessing
How Does One Express a Tear on Paper?
You will win O Lord, if I make claim against You, yet I shall present charges….
Yirmiyahu the prophet
(Yirmiyahu, 12:1)
Were it not for the Lord…
they would have swallowed us alive
in their burning rage against us.
King David
(Tehilim 124:2-3)
Upon arising from my slumber this morning
I heard of the great slaughter
in Your land.
Four children of Abraham and Sara appeared before Your throne
within a second
without a chance to prepare themselves for the journey.
Innocent Jews gunned down by those who threw off Your image.
Seven children, forever deprived of their parents' love.
In emptiness will they stand at their chuppah
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Judaism’s Palette of Colors – Thank You Rabbi Francis Nataf, Welcome Daniel Sheer
August 29, 2010The beauty of Judaism is its unconventional combination of colors. Like Rembrandt's famous palette of colors, and unlike so many other traditions, Judaism perceives hidden layers that link its preternatural sensibility to an unknown reality. It transports all religious meaning, drawn from the creation and the Sinai revelation, to a plane where it then bursts out into a new creation.
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Soccer Talk
July 30, 2010"Some people believe football is a matter of life and death.
I can assure you it is much, much more important than that."
(Bill Shankly)
As the World Cup in
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The Preciousness of My Children – A Terrifying Story
July 2, 2010Recently, I experienced the great embarrassment of living in the presence of God, thinking that I knew what it entailed, only to realize that I had no clue. It was a rude awakening, dreadful as can be. I was confronted with a situation that I have always known exists but have never experienced before. In an instant I learned what no book could ever teach me in hundreds of years: that I should sense the ultimate in the ordinary; that I should live in awe when I encounter the trivial.
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God is Unjustifiable
April 18, 2010It is time to stop justifying God. Morally speaking (1), His ways are sometimes inexcusable. Allowing a Holocaust in which six million Jews were killed in the cruelest ways imaginable, causing unbearable pain to innocent children, is morally intolerable. Creating earthquakes, hurricanes, tornados and other "natural" disasters which kill people and other creatures is insufferable. Any attempt to justify these deeds of God is to profane His holy name.
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The Challenge of Freedom
March 29, 2010Nothing is more dangerous to the well-being of the human species than the mistaken notion of freedom. Today, freedom is defined as the ability to do whatever one wants. Entire generations have been thrown into a life of meaninglessness, passivity and boredom in the name of this artificial freedom. It wreaks havoc on many fine souls who no longer have a sense of what they are living for. After all, a life with no mission and commitment is not worth living.
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Rabbi Mordechai Elon and the Challenge of Teshuva
February 25, 2010
I will teach transgressors Your ways that sinners may return to You [Tehilim 51: 15]
Despite everything, I have great hopes for Rabbi Elon and believe he will deliver. I do not know what really happened, what is true and what is not. Surely something awful seems to have taken place. Nevertheless, though he may have seriously erred, caused people suffering, and damaged the honor of Judaism, and though he deserves to take responsibility and pay for his actions, I believe that it is in his power to teach us an important lesson.
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The High Priest, the Pope and I – Ten Questions for Rabbi Cardozo by Rav Ari Ze’ev Schwartz
June 20, 2019However blasphemous this may sound, the Kohein Gadol was to be the original pope. Basically, the papacy is a Jewish function, tasked not with the mission of spreading the gospel, but rather promulgating monotheism, morality and the Torah, as far as it is applicable to the non-Jewish world.
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Confronting the Torah
February 17, 2010To study Torah is a most difficult undertaking for modern man. It is not the Torah which is the problem but man. To read the text requires courage. Not the courage to open the Book and start reading but the courage to confront oneself. To learn Torah requires human authenticity, to stand in front of a mirror and ask oneself the devastating question of who one really is, without masks and artificialities. And that is one of the qualities modern man has lost. Man has convinced himself to be an intellectual, removed from subjectivity and to bow only to scientific investigation. As such he has disconnected himself from his self. Because man is a bundle of emotions, passions and subjectivities, he cannot escape however much he would like to his inner world. Still modern man formulates ideas; he may proclaim the rights of the spirit and even pronounce laws. But they enter only into his books, into his discussions, but not into his life. All these matters float in mid-air over his head, rather than walk with him into the inner chambers of his daily existence. They do not enter into his trivial moments but stand as monuments, impressive but far removed.
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Thoughts at a Wedding of a Grandchild
January 17, 2010< ?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />
When a grandfather stands before his grandchild at the time of her Chupah, many thoughts come to mind. These moments are infused with intense emotion and immense meaning. Above all, one experiences overflowing feelings of gratitude and thankfulness.
These special moments give rise to feelings of great anticipation and hope for renewal, combined with nostalgic reminisces and fading memories of the past.
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Gilad Shalit
December 6, 2009According to Israeli media, Gilad Shalit is soon to be released from his long and inhuman captivity in the hands of Hamas. This gang of murderers has managed to terrorize all of us using one young Jewish boy.
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I Am Taking Off My Kippah
November 22, 2009Don't be shocked. But I need to be honest. I am contemplating taking off my kippah. No, do not worry. I have no intention of becoming irreligious, or even less religious. Far from it. In fact, I want to become more religious and have come to the conclusion that my kippah prevents me from doing so.
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The Courage of Judge Goldstone
October 25, 2009Judge Goldstone must be a frustrated man. If not, he really has a problem. By now it has become abundantly clear that the Goldstone Report is not merely filled with inaccuracies. It is replete with procedural and substantive injustices and is a terrible disgrace for all those who believe in integrity, the supremacy of law and moral standards. It is the ultimate blunder for a respectable judge of international standing. Tens of articles penned by famous legislators and men of intellectual integrity, together with experts in other fields of jurisprudence and military knowledge, have demonstrated that this report is not worth the paper on which it is written. Judge Goldstone not only deviated from the truth, playing into the hands of Israel's worst enemies, but he willingly contributed to an international climate which gives credibility to the worst forms of terrorism and in which legitimate countries can no longer defend themselves. In fact, this report lays the ground for great human suffering, far beyond the borders of
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Thoughts on Forgiveness – The Man Who Made Me Jewish
September 17, 2009There is only one time I have ever forgiven an anti-Semite. But it was for a good reason. He had successfully helped me to become Jewish!
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The Wilderness of the Cardozo Academy – Graduation lecture – June 2009
June 25, 2009 "All Noble Things Are As Difficult As They Are Rare"
Benedictus de Spinoza
Ethics
Dear Friends,
The purpose of the
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To President Barack Obama
June 14, 2009
I am a Jew standing at the Western Wall. How long do I stand here? Nearly 4000 years, since the days of my grandfather Abraham, when he nearly sacrificed his son at I see the Wall, its tears frozen. Passing clouds with many sighs. I read millions of Jewish names, born in
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The Great Inner Struggle of Benedict XVI
May 17, 2009Some reflections on the Pope's visit to
Benedict XVI is confused. He has a hard time with himself. He is sandwiched between the old Catholic teachings in which he was raised and the new Christianity which his great predecessor John Paul II initiated and of which he, Benedict, was partially the theologian without wanting to admit it. This gnaws at his conscience, especially now that he's the pope and is visiting the Jews.
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The Great Compliment
March 8, 2009Few matters are as misunderstood as Judaism's "obsession with the law". No moment goes by in the life of a religious Jew in which he is not reminded of his obligations as stated in the Shulchan Aruch, the codex of Jewish Law. While later authorities have sometimes disagreed with certain decisions laid out in this codex, and have even ruled differently, still, Halacha stands at the center of Jewish life and is relentless in its demands. Nearly every moment in the Jew's life is codified, sometimes touching on seemingly absurd details such as the way he has to tie his shoe, or how many grams of matza he must eat on the first night of Pesach. (1)
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Prayer on Behalf of the Jewish Soldier In Gaza (Short Version)
January 14, 2009Lord of the Universe!
We, the people of
come to you in humility.
Once more, Jewish soldiers are asked
to defend our brothers and sisters in the
against our enemies.
We ask You to have pity on them,
to help them watch over our people
with clean hands
and a merciful heart.
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Prayer on Behalf of the Jewish Soldier in Gaza (Long Version)
January 14, 2009Lord of the Universe
We, the people of
come to you in humility
and pray for Your help.
Once more, our soldiers are asked
to defend our brothers and sisters in the
against our enemies.
We ask You to have pity on them,
to help them watch over our people
with clean hands
and a merciful heart.
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Prayer of the Jewish Soldier Before Going into Battle
January 13, 2009Lord of the Universe,
We, the soldiers of the People of Israel,
come to You in humility and pray for Your help.
Once more, we are asked to defend our people
and the Holy Land against our enemies.
We ask You to have pity on us, to help us watch over our People
with clean hands and a merciful heart.
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Our Greatest Challenge “Kiddush Hashem”
December 28, 2008The Gravest Sin of a Jew is to Forget Whom He Represents (1)
Written in Pain and in a Hurry
There is a high price to be paid for living as a Jew. He has to be holy so as to be normal. He is commanded to surpass civilization so as to be average. Our survival is neither desired nor easily accepted by many of those who surround us. God has positioned us in history in a most curious way. Either it is utterly inconvenient to be a Jew, or it is the most exalted merit man can ever attain. There are no short cuts and there is no middle road. Our choice is our undoing or our making. We are the most challenged people on earth. We are either superfluous or indispensable. It is either tragic or unsurpassably joyous to be a Jew. There is no neutrality.
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On Hypocrisy and Being Kosher
December 15, 2008Kosher animals, as is well known, can be identified by two simanim, physical signs. They must chew their cud, and their hooves must be wholly cloven (1). In order to be kosher, the animal must possess both simanim. The Torah goes out of its way to emphasize the fact that an animal in which only one sign is present cannot be considered kosher in any way.
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The Kotzker, Spinoza and I – Ten Questions for Rabbi Cardozo by Rav Ari Ze’ev Schwartz
February 14, 2019I've always wondered what would have happened if Spinoza had met the Kotzker. Both were obsessed with truth, but each approached it from a different point of view. In Spinoza's pantheism, there is a strong Kabbalistic element but, simultaneously, a denial of a personal (biblical) God. However much some Spinoza scholars want to claim that all of his philosophy was based on pure reason, it is very clear that there are elements in his philosophy that reveal aspects of mysticism. Both were searching for God and knew no compromise.
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The Mortal Danger of Retirement (1)
September 10, 2008How nice it is to do nothing and afterwards to take a rest"
Dutch proverb
As I watch some of my friends entering retirement, I realize how dangerous it is to "take it easy" and fall into the pit of idleness, thinking that one is at the peak of one's life while one may very well be at its lowest point. Retirement can be a real killer, and surviving its hazards is an art.
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The Prisoner Exchange-Part 2
August 24, 2008I don't know whether or not the Israeli government made the right decision when it agreed to receive the lifeless bodies of Eldad Regev and Ehud Goldwasser in exchange for Samir Kuntar, the child murderer who returned to
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The Prisoner Exchange – Part 1
August 11, 2008One of the most remarkable maxims in the Talmud is the concept of "Elu Ve-elu Divrei Elo-him Chayim", "These and those are the words of the living God." (See for example Eruvin 13b) This is a halachic-philosophical concept which states that, even when there are opposing views among the Sages of Israel concerning Jewish law, all these views, being rooted in the divine word, are considered to be authentic and treated as if they come from God Himself. Just as light emanates from one source and separates into a spectrum of colors once it enters our space, so it is with the word of God. This is the great secret behind the vitality of Halacha. There are no final halachic conclusions. Everything is open to debate.
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The State of Confusion
July 7, 2008As we watch the Israeli government's handling of the most sensitive issues, such as security, its dealings and negotiations with our enemies, and the freeing of arch terrorists, we realize that the State is run by people who are thoroughly confused about the most fundamental issues which confront the Jewish people in
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What is Conversion?(1)
June 23, 2008As the State of Israel and its rabbinical courts head towards a large-scale showdown concerning conversion, it is remarkable that not one of the participants, including the orthodox, has considered this major, crucial question: Is conversion at all possible? This may sound like a rhetorical question since the answer is in the affirmative. Yet, this question goes to the very core of the problem, and as long as we do not deal with it, all deliberations concerning this matter are more or less meaningless. The reason for this is obvious: Logically speaking, conversion to Judaism should not be possible. Just as it is impossible for a Jew whose father is not a Cohen to become a Cohen, similarly, it should be out of the question for a gentile to become a Jew. Either one is born into a family of Cohanim, or one is not. Presumably, then, either one is born a Jew, or one is not. God chose the patriarchs and their descendants as His people, and it is only they who can claim to be Jews. It would follow, then, that either one is part of this nation, or one is not.
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God and the Earthquake
January 17, 2010
In memory of the victims in This essay was published in the 10.6.08 after the earthquake in It has become very difficult to go to synagogue lately. Praying to God has become a real challenge. Watching
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Rabbis, Hindus and the Question of Mutual Respect
February 21, 2008Although I am usually very skeptical when it comes to official conferences, I was very pleased to have been invited to participate in a meeting between the Chief Rabbinate of
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How Holy is Life?
February 10, 2008There is no stronger reminder of the holiness of the Shabbath than the categorical imperative not to violate this day while building the Tabernacle and later the
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Sderot and Human Indifference
January 24, 2008Sderot, which, for years has been plagued by missiles fired on its population has lately been bombarded by no less than 50 deadly Kassam rockets a day. This means that its citizens are living under severe war conditions in which there is no day without ongoing attacks. Every few minutes they are forced to run from their homes and classrooms to (often non-existent) places of proper shelter. Its thousands of children live under constant fear, with severe traumatic consequences and some younger ones have not experienced a normal day since the moment they were born. The tragic failure of Israel's political leadership to properly deal with this, whether by not harshly tackling Hamas or by not providing the Sderot population with sufficient and effective shelters, only increases the overall anxiety of this city's heroic population.
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My Mother Bertha Lopes Cardozo z.l.
January 11, 2008The year of mourning for my dear mother z.l. ended last Friday. To my great surprise it became a most unusual experience which I did not anticipate. Suddenly I was once again allowed to listen to music (one of the great loves of my life), go to celebrations like chatunoth, and buy new garments. I returned to being like everybody else, so I am told. The world is back to normal.
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The Handwriting is on the Wall – Part 3
December 17, 2007Take the Bike and Observe Shabbath!
The religious and traditional Israeli Jewish population is on the rise while the secular population is shrinking drastically. Studies show that the numbers of Israelis who do not observe religious traditions have decreased, especially over the past decade, making up just a fifth of the total Israeli population. This is in contrast to earlier days when 41% of Israelis declared themselves secular (1974). About a third of the general Israeli population considers itself fully observant and the number of "traditional" Israelis has grown as well, from 38% to about 50%. (Israel Democracy Institute,
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The Conversion Crisis – Part 3
November 19, 2007When suggesting new ways to approach religious and halachic problems in Judaism one must be conscious of the great responsibilities that such suggestions carry. One should never forget that one enters holy territory and touches on issues which could shake the foundations of Judaism and Jewish existence. Still one cannot escape one's religious responsibilities by denying that there may be ways to help Judaism find solutions to serious problems, even though they may be controversial in the eyes of many greater than oneself.
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Solving the Conversion Crisis and Global Judaism – Part 2
October 28, 2007You see things; and you say "Why?"
But I dream things that never were; and I say "Why not?"
"Back to Methuselah"
George Bernard Shaw
Dear Friends,
Some of you have asked me to elaborate on my earlier Thoughts to Ponder (215) concerning the serious problems which the State of Israel and the Jewish People encounter in relation to conversion. It is with pleasure that I respond:
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Solving the Conversion Crisis (Part 1)
October 14, 2007
Conversion is a serious matter. It signals a transformation and involves a tremendous amount of soul-searching. Human beings are more than just accumulations of plasma, complex robots, or tool-making creatures that can change and adapt at the drop of a hat. Human beings have souls and profound emotions. They experience spiritual and moral struggles in which religion plays a major part. Conversion is a far-reaching decision: it culminates in immersion in a mikvah, a ritual bath that symbolizes the mother's womb. "A non-Jew who converts is like a newborn baby", says the Talmud in Yebamoth 22a. Conversion also implies a deep commitment to Jewish tradition. It requires a pledge to follow a particular lifestyle, the observance of the commandments and a deep emotional connection with the Jewish people. (2) It means becoming part of this mysterious "Jewish soul", which remains unexplainable but is as real as it can be.
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Yom Kippur – The Art of Spiritual Administration
September 20, 2007
Few matters are more difficult to understand than the nature and purpose of Yom Kippur. What is it that this awesome day wants to tell us? What does it want to accomplish? There is basically only one answer: The realization that life is undeserved and therefore actually a great embarrassment.
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The Handwriting is on the Wall – Part 2
August 29, 2007Whilst contemplating the increasing likelihood that, in the not too distant future, the State of Israel will be governed by a chareidi led government, we need to realize that several developments could possibly take place which would confront the State with a most dangerous situation and an inherent paradox. Strangely enough, yet fully comprehensible, it will get a stronger Jewish identity but, simultaneously, discover that it no longer has the power to defend itself. At the same time, the State will be confronted with a crisis in its universities, especially in the departments of humanities, with far reaching consequences. This will be followed by a backlash which will cause the dwindling secular community to turn its back on Judaism. While
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The Handwriting is on the Wall – Part 1
August 19, 2007A Chareidi Jewish State!
The hand writing is on the wall. In a matter of years, the State of Israel will be led by chareidi (2) political parties. There will be a chareidi Prime Minister and the majority of the members of the Government will be of chareidi affiliation. This will have enormous consequences for the Jewish People at large. Either it will become one of the greatest success stories in modern Jewish history, or it will ruin the Jewish State entirely. It will either pull the Jewish people out of its severe and far-reaching quandaries, enabling a much brighter Jewish future, or it will cause a disaster which will actually destroy the Jewish State and create unprecedented havoc for all Jews throughout the world.
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Wanted: Rabbis with Knives between their Teeth
August 2, 2007Two events have lately pre-occupied Israeli society: The publication of Avrum Burgs disturbing book, Defeating Hitler and the JPPPI conference, The Jewish People Policy Planning Institute conference, recently held in
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An open letter to President Shimon Peres
July 20, 2007An Open Letter to Shimon Peres upon his election as Israel's President: Return to your people what they have lost. This nation is thirsty for identity and spirituality and it is your task to show them the road back. You have done great things for the State of Israel but, like all of us, you also made mistakes. However, you can now remedy many of them.
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Is conversion really possible?
July 8, 2007As the State of Israel and its rabbinical courts are heading for a major showdown concerning conversion, it is remarkable that not one of the participants, including the orthodox, have considered a major and most crucial question: Is conversion altogether possible? This may sound like a rhetorical question since the answer is in the affirmative. Yet this question goes to the very core of the problem and as long as we do not deal with it, all deliberations concerning this matter are more or less meaningless. The reason for this is very obvious: Logically speaking, conversion to Judaism should not be possible.
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Boycott? The Trauma of the Anti-Semite
July 18, 2010The anti-Semitic world has a hard time with us Jews and we should feel pity for all those who work relentlessly to give us a bad name. They want to boycott us in academia, journalism, European governments, the market place, and even just in the streets of daily life. Indeed, we must admit that we are a real nuisance. It is not easy to live with us Jews; we are troublemakers and annoyingly irritating. There is no way of escaping this fact.
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Thoughts to Ponder on Shavuoth
May 29, 2007The giving of the Torah is a declaration of war. It is a protest not only against the world of Avoda Zarah, idol worship and immorality but also a call to be "unreasonable" since the "reasonable" man adapts himself to the world while the "unreasonable" man adapts the world to himself and what we need to realize is that all progress depends on the "unreasonable" man.
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Shavuoth, Torah, the Tabernacle and Bach’s Compositions
May 13, 2007When studying the last chapters of Shemoth (Exodus), we are puzzled by the great amount of detail and repetition in the instructions relating to the building and the architecture of the Mishkan (Tabernacle). While the Torah is normally very parsimonious in its words, here we find an overflow of seemingly repetitious words and an unusual emphasis on detail. Not the smallest nuance is left out, and nothing is left to human imagination. Preciseness stands out, and every pin and string is mentioned.
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A Personal Encounter with the Divine
April 15, 2007There are moments in life when one is confronted with hashgacha pratit, (divine intervention), which strikes as a thunder bolt from heaven. These are instances when one was clearly sent from Above to be in exactly the right place at the right time and in the right spiritual condition. Such moments leaves one speechless, standing in awe for the Divine stage which could not have been better orchestrated.
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Forsaken by God
March 25, 2007..........the Jerusalem Post (9.3.07) published in its ‘In Jerusalem' section an essay about haredi (ultra-orthodox) youth who left the fold and turned completely secular. Some of the reasons given for these drop outs are indeed very understandable - an overly dogmatic and strict religious upbringing at home, the total rejection of secular knowledge or the world at large causing a lot of harm.................
I responded to these accusations and called for another way to deal with this tragic phenomenon. The following letter was published by the Jerusalem Post in In Jerusalem on February 17 2007.
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My Mother a’h’, Heroism and the Gavra Raba
February 19, 2007It is difficult for a child to give an appropriate appraisal of his/her parents. Sometimes it is the intimacy of people which makes it impossible to fully grasp the greatness of another person. Too much familiarity causes too little appreciation. Only when some kind of separation has set in and the other is no longer immediately available, do thoughts break through which allow a better understanding of those who have been the closest to us.
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Sheloshim Reflections
February 8, 2007On the occasion of the "Sheloshim" of my dear mother, Bertha Lopes Cardozo a'h. 26 Shevath, 5767, February 14th, 2007.
Some reflections
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Some Perspectives on Mortality
January 28, 2007In Memory of My Dear Mother Bertha (Rivka) Lopes Cardozo, z.l., who passed away last week on the 26 of Teveth, 5767, January 16th ,2007, at the age of 88, and was buried in Beth Haim of the Portuguese Spanish Jewish Community in Amsterdam.
May Her Memory Be a Blessing. (1)
In Devarim (14.1), the Torah warns against excessive mourning, expressing itself in a most unusual way: "You are the children of God, your God, you shall not cut yourself, nor make a bald patch between your eyes for the dead." This prohibition teaches Man the correct approach towards death.
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The Gay Parade and other Prohibitions
November 16, 2006When discussing matters related to the ethical or religious foundation of sexual behavior, people tend to have severe differences of opinion. While up until the second half of the 20th century a more conservative approach was still prevailing, a radical change occurred in the second half of the last century. Well established norms were suddenly challenged, and often replaced by radical approaches which demanded greater "liberty" and "broadmindedness." This provoked a major confrontation between the conservatives and those who claimed that they were "modern-minded."
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Preface to Rabbi Francis Nataf’s book
November 2, 2006For thousands of years, Jews have read a portion of the Torah in the synagogue every Shabbath. It is customary to begin the first portion on Simchat Torah and to finish the Torah on the same day a year later. Once the last verses of the book of Devarim are read and the Torah scroll is closed, a second scroll is brought and the Torah reader starts all over again with the story of the Creation in the Book of Bereshit. This happens within seconds, and there is barely time to breathe between the first and the second readings. It is as if any delay is dangerous. And indeed it would be. The Torah is the life-blood of the Jewish people, and any hampering of its flow would be detrimental. It is the Jewish people's portable homeland, and for millennia it has been seen and experienced as the Divine voice speaking to all generations, instructing them in the correct way of living.
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Jealousy on Erev Yom Kippur
September 28, 2006In forgone times no hours were more difficult in our forefathers' life than those just before the onset of the awesome day of Yom Kippur. These were moments of such intense religious upheaval in the human soul, that it was as if the world had become a different planet, one in which all normal human needs and worries fell away. The solemnity of these awesome hours was hard to survive (1). Testimonies of these moments have come to us through the writings of our forefathers or by way of their oral information (2).What was our forefathers' secret through which they reached such a state of mind and heart?
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Israel and the Nations
August 9, 2006There is a Midrash (1) which speaks about 70 angels known as princes who are put in charge of the 70 nations of the world. Each of these princes supervises his own nation acting as its spokesman before the Throne of God. When their respective nations are embattled, they too become involved against each other and when the nations live in peace, so they too are at peace.
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The Mystery of Israel – A Reminder
January 7, 2011Throughout the centuries, historians, philosophers and anthropologists have struggled with the notion called
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Oh, that I may believe!
April 3, 2011It takes an instant to trust an idol but ages to attach to God. It requires effort, stirring, and preparation. It means growing in prayer, in selfless deeds, and in the realization of the mystery of all existence. Faith means striving for faith. It is never an arrival. It is a constant journey and can only burst forth at single moments. In no way can it be commanded.
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Rabbi Yochanan ben Zakkai and A.B.Yehoshua
June 11, 2006In one of its most dramatic texts, the Talmud (Gittin 56b) discusses an episode in Jewish history which describes perhaps the most decisive moment which occurred before the Holocaust. It took place in the first century C.E. at the very hour that the second
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Rembrandt, the Holocaust and the Quest for Authenticity
May 1, 2011On the eve of Yom Hashoa, I think of Rembrandt's superb "Large Self Portrait" which I believe is exhibited at the art museum in
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Abraham Lopes Cardozo z.l. – “Ne’im Zemiroth”
March 9, 2006When the great trumpet will sound and the dead will arise from their graves, the shortest walk to the place of assembly will be for those who were buried on the
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The Future of Israel and the Zionist Enterprise
February 26, 2006Nowhere is the extreme spiritual crisis of the Jewish people more evident than in the State of Israel. A loss of purpose and direction has overtaken the fast majority of Israelis and most of its leaders. Confusion and a feeling of hopelessness has become the call of the day among many people. When searching for the cause of this bewilderment it is crucial, however, not to get confused about the confusion. While many may believe that this feeling of hopelessness is the result of Israel's sudden realization that it has a Hamas state at its doorstep or that Iran is seriously preparing itself to destroy the State of Israel, it is most important to realize that this is to confuse the symptom with the cause. What is at the core of this crisis is a fundamental misreading as regards to the nature and destiny of the Jewish people.
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The Splitting of the Red Sea and the State of Israel
February 9, 2009Jewish history consists of many epoch-making events. However, not all of these events have made an inroad into the consciousness of the Jewish people. For this to happen, the event must become, as the Jewish philosopher Emile Fackenheim calls it, a root-experience, a moment in which the hand of God becomes most apparent through His active participation in Jewish history. Still, this alone is not sufficient to transform an event into a root experience of enduring value. It is also necessary that the experience takes place in front of the multitude, as in the case of the splitting of the Red Sea, when even the maidservants saw what the prophet Yechezkel ben Buzi could not see. It is not the opening of the heaven but rather the transformation of the earth that is decisive in affecting all future Jewish generations.
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The Tragedy of Amona
February 9, 2006The privacy of a nation and its inner struggles are challenged today as never before. What was once obscured from the eye of the world and consequently dealt with as a local affair is now shown on the world stage and judged accordingly. While this is true for all the nations of the world, in the case of the Jewish people and the State of Israel, it has far greater consequences. This is due to the fact that
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The Future of the Torah
January 26, 2006In one of its most fascinating narratives the Talmud (Shabbath 88a) draws attention to the problem of religious coercion at the time when God planned to give the Torah to the Israelites. The passage reports how God threatened the Jews while standing at Sinai and delivered an ultimatum. Holding an inverted mountain Sinai over their heads, He pronounced: "If you accept the Torah, fine, if not, there will be your grave" Tosafoth (ad loc) in their great commentary on the Talmud sensed a fundamental difficulty with this narrative. Was it not true that the Jews had already accepted the Torah previously when they promised that they would observe the Torah even before knowing what it actually entailed? This is reflected in the famous words: "We shall do and we shall hear"( Shemoth 24:7). This was a clear indication that they were prepared to make an ultimate leap of faith and were fully committed to live by the commandments whatever was demanded from them. So why was there a need to coerce them?
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Israel’s Predicament and the Need to be a Stranger
January 15, 2006As the inhabitants of the State of Israel find themselves once more undergoing one of their most critical moments, one wonders why, like no other nation, the Jews throughout the thousands of years of their history were never able to develop into a stable secure nation. The constant onslaught on its very existence, its lack of numbers, its deprivation of its homeland for nearly 2000 years and its difficulty to live with itself are unprecedented in world history. Even today with the re-establishment of their commonwealth in the form of the State of Israel, its mighty power and its unprecedented accomplishments, the Jews remain a nation in constant flux, never sure where the next day will take them, confronted with crisis after crisis and incapable of predicting its future in any conventional sense of the word.
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Jewish Nobel-ness
December 15, 2005"In studying the Jewish people we are face to face with a miracle and I venture to say: he who will be attentive cannot be incredulous.
Everything is miracle in this incomparable people.
Everything is miracle, its history, its origin, its fall, its dispersion, its stubbornness.
The contempt with which nations treat them who owe everything to them, who know the glamour of their past and the still greater brilliance of their future.
Add to this the unprecedented fact that this people alone, among all the other nations, forms one family and that this family though homeless and miserable kept itself isolated from the rest of mankind….
This fact alone would be an undeniable miracle, even if a prophet (Bileam) 34 centuries ago, at the frontier of Moab had not said: For from the top of the rocks I see him, and from the hills I behold him: lo, the people shall dwell alone, and shall not be reckoned among the nations." Bamidbar 23.9 (1)
We cannot help but think of the above when watching Nobel Prize laureate Professor Robert Aumann of
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Parashat Chayei Sarah – Leadership and Captainship
December 3, 2005Avraham passed away and died at a good age, elderly and full of days and he was gathered to his people. (Bereshith 25:8) The day that Avraham our father departed from the world, the great men of the nations stood in line and said: Woe to a world that has lost its leader, and woe to a ship that has lost its captain.(Baba Batra 91a)
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God, Gush Katif and New Orleans
September 15, 2005When contemplating the terrible destruction of
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The Future of the State of Israel
September 4, 2005The question at this crucial moment in Jewish history is not if the nations of the world understand the miraculous existence of the State of Israel, but if Jews themselves are prepared to see this reality. Miracles have only continued to be part of Israel's history as long as Jews in and outside the land have done everything to merit such Divine intervention by continuing to recognize the miracles.
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The Day after the Disengagement
August 18, 2005Or What To Do (1)
As
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The Solution
July 24, 2005The interpretation of history is a most delicate matter. Even more, so when one tries to understand the present. It was Charles Peguy in his Clio who said that it is impossible to write ancient history because we lack source materials and impossible to write modern history because we have too many. This is even more true for the religious personality. Trying to understand the hand of God behind historical and present events is like applying ones ear to an enormous seashell and listening to a perpetual murmur coming from waves far beyond the shore. Since the present is rolled up and muffed in impenetrable and countless folds any attempt to understand the present seems to be doomed to failure from the outset.
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Afterthoughts on Ruth and Conversion
July 8, 2005When carefully reading the story of Ruth, the question of why Ruth decided to convert to Judaism is of crucial and far reaching importance. What motivated this young woman who was educated in a most adulterous and idolatrous society to make such a radical step and commit herself to a lifestyle which, like no other, makes great moral and ritual demands on its followers? What is there in Judaism which is able to defeat the lusts of sensualism, materialism, prestige and easy lifestyle which was represented by the nation of Moav?
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Who is a Gavra Rabba, a Great man?
February 22, 2009
The Talmud in Makkoth 22b discusses the identity of a "Gavra Rabba", an exceptionally great man or Talmudic sage. It quotes a most remarkable observation made by the well-known sage, Rava, who states: "How foolish are some people who stand up out of respect for a Sefer Torah but do not stand up out of respect for a Gavra Rabba, an exceptionally great person, a great Torah sage." When asked what is so exceptionally great about these men, Rava ignores their astonishingly vast knowledge of Torah, and even their outstanding ethical and religious qualities. Instead, he accentuates their power and courage to change the obvious and literal meaning of a commandment as mentioned in the Torah. This is, to say the least, most remarkable!
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Israel is Gush Katif
May 16, 2005In Tractate Sanhedrin (91a), we read about a most relevant story which took place in the days of Alexander of Macedonia, known as Alexander the Great (4th century before the common era.) Just after Moshe' death, when Yehoshua was about to enter the land of Israel together with his people, there were seven tribes hostile to the Jews occupying the land. Yehoshua offered them peace and security on condition that they would commit themselves to the seven commandments of Noach, the basic moral code for all humanity.
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The Rabbi Slifkin Case – Part 3
April 21, 2005The Inadequacy of Jewish Dogma
Arbitrary Judaism is spreading in Israel. Halacha as the overall expression of Jewish commitment to a very specific lifestyle has nearly ceased to exist in the worldwide Jewish community. Judaism is often seen as an option, a tradition to choose from and to reject what is not to ones liking. One of the main reasons for this is that Halacha is no longer seen as response to the search for meaning in people's lives. The image of Halacha as a rigid tradition has taken the upper hand. It is seen as a desiccated remnant of a once living reality, which was reduced to definitions, codes and catechisms.
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The Rabbi Slifkin Case – Part 2
April 7, 2005Rabbinical Tyranny and Freedom of Thought - The primary concern of Judaism is the art of living. To accomplish this goal it is committed to a strong sense of tradition and a determination to realize certain optimal goals. It is this road, which has made Judaism unique and makes it stand out among the community of religions. This unique directness from a historical past into a messianic future, from Mount Sinai to justice for the orphan, widow and stranger and the ultimate abolition of war has saved Judaism from death by ice and death by fire, from freezing in awe of a rigid tradition and from evaporating into utopian reverie.
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The Rabbi Slifkin Case (Part 1) – The Hopelessness of a Ban
March 24, 2005It is a well-known fact that with the death of Darwin, his evolution theory became more and more popular and many young Jews were attracted by his ideas and left the fold. In 1885, in the city of Kovno, there was a meeting of rabbis, which included the famous Geonim Rabbi Elchanan Spector and Rabbi Alexander Lapides. On that occasion one prominent leader suggested that one should ostracize any Jew who studied Darwins works. Both Rabbis Spector and Lapides strongly opposed the move on the grounds that Mayim Genuvim Yimtaku (2), stolen waters are sweet and that Darwins theories would only be sweetened by putting a ban on his books.
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Siyum Ha-Shas
March 14, 2005The Completion of the Babylonian Talmud, Daf Yomi
Last week, hundreds of thousand of Jews throughout the world participated in the celebrations of Siyum Hashas, the completion of the Babylonian Talmud in a seven year cycle which was initiated by the great Torah scholar and tzaddik Rabbi Meir Shapiro z.l. of Lublin (1887-1934 ) Both in the past and at the present time, Jews from all religious and not so religious backgrounds have managed to study one daf, talmudic page, a day and so completed the Talmud, existing of about 40 volumes, once more. This is indeed a major accomplishment, unparalleled in the entire world of secular and religious scholarship. This is even more astonishing taking into account the fact that the Talmudic text exists (most of the time) of a cryptic Aramaic language, which is hard to decipher, even for scholars.
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A Call to Fast & Pray: Gush Katif & Tsunami
January 24, 2005And Moshes hands became heavy, so (Aaron and Chur) took a stone and placed it under him and he sat on it.
And (Moshe held) his hands in steady prayer until the setting of the sun.
Shemoth 17: 12
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Tsunami, Vulnerability, Religious Jewry and the Sanctification of God’s Name
January 10, 2005When contemplating the terrible disaster which struck South East Asia and the amount of people which were killed and wounded as well as the millions of people who lost their homes, one is reminded of the words of Rabbi Naftali Tzvi Berlin: The obligation of Jews to shower infinite mercy on the world.
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The Crisis and Challenge of Parshanuth
December 27, 2004Parashanuth, the art of biblical interpretation, is far more than the ability to know how to give expression to the deeper meaning of the biblical text. It is after all impossible to treat the biblical text as any other classical work. This is due to the fact that the people of Israel, according to Jewish Tradition, are not the author of this text but that the text is the author of the people. The text consisting of a covenant between God and man brought the people into being and despite the fact that the people often violated the commanding voice of this text, it created a specific and unique identity of the Jewish nation.
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Israel’s Uniqueness and its Future
December 9, 2004Rabbi Yochanan ben Zakai once saw a woman stooping among the dung of the Arabs donkey to gather barley grains She said to him, Do you remember, Rabbi, when you signed my ketuva (1)?.... He said to his pupils, I remember that I read that it promised millions of gold dinars from you fathers house, apart from the wealth of your father in law. She began to cry. He continued, How praiseworthy are you, Yisrael. Whenever you perform Gods will, no nation can rule over you, but when you fail to perform Gods will, you are handed over to the lowest of nations, and not just to the lowest of nations, but to their animals. (2)
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The Stagnation of the Text
June 10, 2010For hundreds of years, we Jews have had the custom to complete our yearly Torah reading in the synagogue on the day of Simchat Torah and to immediately begin all over again. This tradition requires renewed close examination. (1) Why the hurry? There is nearly no time to contemplate what one read last year! Why not read a very small section over several years and discuss it in the synagogue as part of the service? (2) What is the point in reading something which, for lack of time, cannot even sink in? Why not take a year off to re-examine what we have read previously? What, in fact, is the meaning of this annually repeated reading?
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Kal Nidre – We are all Marranos
October 6, 2008Kal Nidrei is by far the most celebrated prayer in all Jewish Communities around the world and the most attended prayer throughout the Jewish year. Tens of thousands of Jews who would otherwise never attend a synagogue service will make sure they are "there" for Kal Nidrei. Not a few will leave shortly after the prayer is said and only re-appear a year later for the same occasion. The tune of this prayer has become the most famous Jewish melody ever, by far outdoing
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Technology and the Existential Meaning of a Sefer Torah
September 14, 2004Last Sunday night my synagogue in Yerushalayim celebrated the inauguration of a new Sefer Torah, Torah scroll. It was a very happy occasion during which hundreds of people danced in the streets while the children carried torches which made it, together with the stars in the sky, a nearly mystical experience
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The Death and Life of the Divine Word
August 14, 2011Rabbi Aha said in the name of Rabbi Yochanan: When at Mt. Sinai the Israelites heard the word “I” (the first word of “I am the Lord your God” in the “Ten Words”), their souls left them, as it says, “If we hear the Voice….any longer, we shall die,”(Devarim 5:22), and it is also written, […]
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The Death and the Life of the Word
June 20, 2010Rabbi Aha in the name of Rabbi Jochanan said: When at mountain Sinai the Israelites heard the word "I , (the first word of "I am the Lord your God" of the "Ten Words" ) their souls left them, as it says, "If we hear the Voice….any longer, we shall die,"(Devarim 5:22) and also it is written, "My soul failed me when He spoke" (Shir Hashirim 5:6). Then the Word turned to the Holy One, blessed be He, and said, " Lord of the Universe, Thou are life and Thy Torah is life, yet Thou has sent me to the dead!, for they are all dead!." Thereupon the Holy One blessed be He sweetened the Word for them…. Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai said: The Torah which God gave to
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“Ein Keloh-enu” There is nobody like our God / Who is like our God?
November 30, 2008
In the famous prayer "Ein Keloh-enu" ("Nobody is like our God"), sung at the end of the morning service in the synagogue, we discover a most remarkable inconsistency. In this prayer we first state that there is nobody like our God (Ein keloh-enu) and then we continue and ask "Mi-Keloh-enu", who is like our God? Would it not have been more logical to first ask Who is like our God and then answer by stating that nobody is like Him?
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Mixing with this World
May 27, 2004In one of its unusual passages, the Talmud (Eruvin, 21b) reports that King Salomon instituted the laws concerning the Eruv, i.e. "mixing of the realms" through which one is allowed to carry objects otherwise forbidden on Shabbath from one domain to another, private and public. At another occasion King Salomon instituted the ritual washing of the hands. Both decrees were received with divine favor and a heavenly voice issued and proclaimed: "My son, if your heart is wise, Mine will be glad, even Mine…" (see Mishleh 23. 15)
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Tetzaveh – The Trivialities of the Tabernacle
February 13, 2011Judaism is the theology of the physical, the commonplace and the mundane. It is concerned with the everydayness of our lives and struggles, with the devastating effect brought on by the curse of the multitude of trivialities that often keep us busy from morning till night. It struggles with the emptiness of our lives when we do not even have the time to focus on the higher meaning of our existence. Man's paradox is that he is too much at home in this world yet needs to escape his worldliness in order to be consciously part of the universe.
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Why they Hate us at The Hague
May 27, 2004"Some people like the Jews, and some do not.
But no thoughtful man can deny the fact that they are, beyond any question, the most formidable and the most remarkable race which has appeared in the world." Winston Churchill (1)
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The Halachic Toleration of Heresy
November 8, 2009A Command to Cancel the Commandments (1) - New Version
Halacha deals with human life on two levels, the intellectual and the emotional. Life is the constant interaction between the two. To deny one of them is to deny life itself. Halachic demands must therefore function in a dialectical setting. Sometimes they must respond to cold, intellectual human calculation, and other times they must provide guidance during emotional upheavals in life. Mostly, they attempt to bring some purpose into the emotional condition of man so as to return him to the ways of reason and religious thinking.
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Afterthoughts about Simchat Torah
May 27, 2004Since Simchat Torah is the day in which we celebrate the Torah, its divinity, greatness and superiority, it is quite perplexing that there is no special mitzvah commanding the Jewish people to study Torah more deeply and for longer on this festival than on any other day. In fact little studying can be done since much of the day is occupied with dancing and singing and even the reading of the Torah is kept to a minimum: Specifically the concluding words of the Torah and not much more than some opening verses of Sefer Bereshith and a small portion related to some festival sacrifices in the Tabernacle.
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Rabbi Bezalel Rakov z.l. of Gateshead
May 27, 2004"Death is the supreme festival on the road to freedom"
Rarely do I write about my personal feelings. However, singular circumstances brought about by Divine intervention cause us to realize that our customary ways are but the dream state in which we believe we live, until a perpetual murmur from an eternal world wakes us up.
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Halachic Limits to Halacha
May 27, 2004There has never been a period in Jewish history during which Halacha has been so challenged as in our days and in this country. For nearly two thousand years, Jews have been living under foreign rule and as such were able to play the role of what I call "comfortable spectators".
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The State of Jewish Education Today
May 27, 2004 The Holy of Holies in the Temple of Jerusalem was a place where only the High Priest was allowed to enter once a year: On Yom Kippur. Now even the Holy of Holies was occasionally in need of repair. To provide for such an eventuality there were openings in the upper chamber leading down through the ceiling of the Holy of Holies. These holes were close to the walls and through them the workmen were lowered in "tevoth" (boxes) into this most holy place. These boxes were only open to the side of the walls, so that the workmen "could not feast their eyes on the Holy of Holies." (Pesachim 26a)
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The Waters of Strife
May 16, 2004Religious Coercion or Gentle Persuasion
Commentators have struggled with and argued about the incident of the "Me-Meriba", the waters of strife for a long time. After the children of Israel complained about the absence of water in the desert, Moshe was ordered by God to speak to the rock, but he hit it instead. (Bamidbar chapter 20.)
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“After Modern Orthodoxy, Then What?”
May 16, 2004As we know everything is anticipated in the Torah. Nothing in the world happens which is not first recorded in the Bible. So where do we find the source for preliminary remarks introducing a Chief?
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Halacha and “trivialities”
February 13, 2005Judaism is a religion of holy trivialities. Commonplace deeds are the moments through which man has the opportunity to meet God more intensively than at any other instant. Trivialities were created by God in order to show man that there are no insignificant moments and that every move of man counts, however small. It is God's opportunity to show man that He is concerned with every day of man's life and that every second counts.
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Brit Mila: An Oath of Loyalty
February 28, 2011In previous generations, parents arranged marriages for their sons and daughters, convinced that the spouses they chose for their children would be ideal life partners for them. In a similar way, Jewish parents throughout the generations bring their newborn sons into a covenant with the God of Israel, eternally uniting them with their most ideal Partner. Brit mila is the act by which a Jewish child and God become engaged.
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Faith – Frontal Encounter
November 13, 2008Faith is deeper than knowledge. While scientific investigation is only absorbed in the brain, faith enters into all of the human personality. All limbs of spirituality quiver and move, nothing is untouched and everything is transformed. As such it is much more difficult to achieve faith than knowledge and it is much more radical in its effect
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To Marry is an Act of Courage
May 16, 2004In an extraordinary statement in the Talmud, we get a glimpse of the frame of mind of the sages of Israel just after the destruction of the Temple when millions of Jews had been murdered and the complete breakdown of Jewish life in the ancient land of Israel had taken place:
"By right we should issue a degree that Jews should not marry and have children so that the seed of Avraham comes to an end on its own accord."(Baba Batra 60b)
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To Marry, to Buy and the Future of Israel
August 9, 2005In an extraordinary statement in the Talmud, we get a glimpse into the minds of the sages of
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Pesach, and the Silence of God
March 22, 2009The continuing absence of distinctive Divine Providence in modern times is often seen as the cause for much secularism. Since the days of the Renaissance, man has become more and more skeptical of the occurrences of divine intervention. No longer, it is argued, are there enough indications for God's interference in the national and private affairs of mankind. This viewpoint has ultimately led to the collapse of much of religious authority and in many ways undermined the role of religion in man's life.
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The failure of the Religious Parties
May 16, 2004(Rabbis with a knife between their teeth). Now that the chess players in Israeli politics have been drastically moved, and for the first time a mainly secular government is leading the country, it is high time the religious parties, religious institutions and their leadership ask themselves some hard and uncomfortable questions.
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Purim & the War with Iraq
May 16, 2004As the war between the USA and Iraq comes closer and closer (and probably has already broken out by the time this essay is read by our readers), one cannot escape the fact that, just like 12 years ago in the days of the Gulf war, it is again the festival of Purim and the miraculous redemption of the Jewish people from the hands of Haman which hovers over this conflict. This should not be lost on us
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Prayers for the Wicked
June 24, 2007While the winds of war with Iraq are coming closer and closer and in spite of our understandable concern with our own security, committed Jews have a special obligation to think where others may not want to think: The enormous loss of life this war is surely going to cost to many human beings who are or are not on our side of the conflict.
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World, Sadam
May 16, 2004While it is really difficult in these days to comprehend the ways of Divine Providence, it seems that some moments of divine revelation are granted to us when we carefully direct our attention to some biblical and rabbinical sources. Bereshith: 16: 11, 12: (*)
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Judaism in Crisis
May 16, 2004Opening Remarks by Rabbi Dr. Nathan Lopes Cardozo at the introduction of the
Great Issues Lecture Series on Judaism in Crisis. February 3, 2002-Adar 2, 5763
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Ilan Ramon. z.l.
May 16, 2004The first astronaut to ever be launched into space was Phileas Fogg. He was sent there by Jules Verne, famed author of 20.000 Leagues Under the Sea and Journey to the Center of the Earth. The launching took place in the year 1873 and became known world wide through Verne's masterpiece: Around the World in 80 Days.
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“Not yet” Jews by choice
May 16, 2004Reading the story of Yitro, Moshe's father in law and a convert to Judaism, is a serious challenge. For sensitive souls it is not just a meaningful narrative but above all a painful confrontation with one's own Jewishness.
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The Jewish Astronaut and My Worries
May 16, 2004IAF Col. Ilan Ramon, (With tongue in cheek)
I am worried. Very worried. No, not about Saddam Hussein, we will, with God's help, deal with him, but about Colonel Ilan Ramon, our first Jewish-Israeli astronaut who at this very hour is located, together with his crewmates, in space shuttle Columbia flying around our universe.
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Now is the time to write the Song of our lives
May 10, 2004 (Devarim 31:19)
With the above verse God commands Moshe to write down all the words of the Torah and make the Children of Israel contemplate these very words and use them as their guide to learning the art of authentic Jewish living. Commentators and philosophers have however wondered why the contents of the Torah are called a Song. Why not call it what it is: Words? Should it not have said: "Now, write these Words for yourselves and teach them to the Children of Israel?"
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Book Review: One People, Two Worlds
May 9, 2004 "One people, two worlds"
"A Reform Rabbi and an Orthodox Rabbi Explore the Issues that Divide Them"
By Amiel Hirsch and Yosef Reinman*
"The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in a moment of comfort and convenience, but where he stands in times of challenge and controversy"
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Marriage, “Li” and the Need for Martyrdom
July 8, 2004The great Chassidic leader Rabbi Menachem Mendel of Kotzk, complaining about the Jews' detachment from Judaism once said: When a bridegroom stands under the chupa (bridal canopy) he can say hundreds of times to his future bride: "You are betrothed" but it is as if he said nothing and they are not married. Only when he adds one more Hebrew word: "Li" "You are betrothed to me " is there a marriage. All the family and friends can be present, the music may be playing, the food served and the new home ready, but nothing has happened till the word "Li" is been uttered.
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The Protest of a Bracha
November 13, 2005In our contemporary world it is difficult to continue being surprised. Our educational system (with exceptions) has been teaching us for several decades that everything must make sense and nothing can be left to intellectual random. Scientific knowledge with its emphasis on order and consistency, together with the study of human behavior and its insistence on universal psychological patterns, have confiscated our minds and convinced us that basically there is no place for astonishment
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Simchat Torah, The Endless Beginning
July 8, 2004Jewish learning is a tradition of constant beginnings without any end in sight. At the end of Succoth, Jews over the world will be completing the reading of Torah in their synagogues and immediately starting all over again. This is a most remarkable tradition which takes place on Simchat Torah. Instead of being satisfied with this last reading, they conclude that they really did not read it well enough and that there is a need to read it once more. Taking into account that this kind of re-reading has already gone on for thousands of years and that there are no indications it will end in the future, one wonders when Jews will ever complete their reading of the Torah
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Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur: The celebration of the Human Deed
October 2, 2005
"On Rosh Hashana all those who came to the world pass in front of Him like a flock of sheep." With this saying the sages highlighted the uniqueness of man and his loneliness in his encounter with God. Human beings are above all individuals. They meet God privately and as such each one is created in a different way with different talents, emotions and wisdom. Privacy is after all the privilege of the individual.
"Like walking on a small narrow road where no two can pass by at the same time…"
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The Faith of the Pained
July 8, 2004One of the most astonishing facts about the current situation in the land of Israel is the outpouring of unprecedented faith. While confronted by ongoing terrorist attacks in which hundreds of people have been murdered and thousands have been injured we are encountering a new phenomenon in modern Jewish history: The capacity of trust in God and Judaism in the face of unparalleled pain and disaster by those who should have been the first ones to lose it.
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The Pain of Lacking Pain
July 8, 2004Commentary on a eulogy in Israel: It is told that there was once a great rabbi who was known never to be involved in any secular endeavor. His whole life was dedicated to spiritual matters, to the study and teaching of Torah. Once his students saw him reading the New York Times before leaving his home for the morning prayers.The students were not a little shocked: How could it be that their holy teacher would lower himself to read such mundane material as the NY Times?
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Tisha be Av and the Parah Aduma in us
July 8, 2004(This essay was written by Moshe Dan).
In order to understand the Parah Adumah we have to go back (at least) to the story of what happened to the scouts (meraglim). Their negative report so confused and demoralized the people that they refused to follow Moshe into Eretz Yisrael - sealing their fate (to die in the desert) and changing the course of history (settling the Land.without a struggle, bringing the messianic age). They failed to appreciate themselves and to believe in their relationship with God. It was catastrophic; the first Tisha B'Av.
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The medium of media, a rendezvous with death
July 8, 2004This essay was written by Daniel Soibelmannm -
"What we need is a story that starts with an earthquake and works its way up to a climax" - Sam Goldwyn 1882 - 1974
Amid the crisis surrounding Israel presently, is an increasing awareness, particularly by Jews living in Israel of the biases that plague journalism. Although this is not a rage I feel inclined to put aside verily, a more disturbing phenomenon calls me into its discussion at this moment.
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Moshe and Yitro, Major or Minor in Jurisprudence?
July 8, 2004As is well known, Yitro, the father in law of Moshe, advised his son in law
to change the juridical process being used to judge the people traveling in the desert on their way to the land of Israel
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Shavuoth
May 31, 2009
In a fascinating narrative in the Talmudic tractate of Gitin (56b), we are told that Rabbi Yochanan ben Zakai, outstanding leader of the Jewish people during the days in which the Roman Empire invaded the
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The Jewish Tradition and the Intifada (Part 2)
July 8, 2004Let us speak for a moment about the Palestinians. Who are these people? How is it that suddenly they are making hell out of our lives? Is it not most remarkable that until only a few years ago nobody had ever heard about a Palestinian people and suddenly they became a central issue in world politics? Suddenly they appeared out of nowhere land without any real historical roots and instantly the world accepted them as a nation with considerable power.
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The Jewish Tradition and the Intifada (1)
July 8, 2004It does not take much wisdom to realize that since its establishment the State of Israel has never faced so many difficulties as at this moment in time. Israel has undergone many wars, lost many of its soldiers and lived from crisis to crisis. Still, the latest conflict with the Palestinian people is of a very different kind. While all previous conflicts were wars with Arab countries which took place on the battlefield, this time the war is taking place on the home front and Israel has to deal with daily terrorist attacks in the center of its cities in which Palestinians blow themselves up, killing tens of Jews and injuring hundreds.
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Hating War against the Enemy
July 8, 2004"Perhaps one day we will forgive our enemies for killing our boys, but we will never forgive them for forcing our soldiers to have to kill ". Golda Meir
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A Call to my Brothers in the Diaspora
July 8, 2004American Jewry must therefore raise itself like a roaring lion. It is obligated to organize massive demonstrations in every city, like the one in Manhattan, not once not twice but as many times as necessary till the American administration starts to realize that it has crossed the borders of what is acceptable.Dear Jewish brothers in the USA:
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To Be a Matza
April 9, 2008
The Talmud in tractate Berachoth (17a) poses the question why it is forbidden to eat or even to possess chametz, i.e. leaven, such as bread, on Pesach. What is there in the nature of leaven that it should be forbidden on Pesach? And why is matza the most desirable food for Pesach?
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A personal letter from Nathan Lopes Cardozo
July 7, 2004The situation in Israel
Tuesday, 28 Adar, 5762, 12 March, 2002
While I am sitting here in my home in Jerushalayim writing to all of you, I can hear heavy bombing which makes my home shake as if heavy mortars are falling in my backyard. I see missiles flying over, hitting the headquarters of our enemies. The radio informs us of an ongoing terrorist attack, which this time, does not seem to end. Until now 6 Jews have been killed within the first minutes of the attack.
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The Jewish attitude toward killing
July 7, 2004In these most trying days for the people of Israel, in which many Palestinians have gone to the streets in Ramalah and other places, to celebrate the killing of Jews including children, babies, soldiers policemen and women in terrorists attacks, it is important for us to remember who we are.
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The Struggle for Faith – Part V
July 7, 2004The Talmud in tractate Pesachim 8b gives an interesting example of the tension between trust in God and the natural order of things while simultaneously adding a new aspect to this problem.
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The Struggle for Faith – Part IV
July 7, 2004We established in part III of "The Struggle for Faith" that it is forbidden to trust in God when this trust contradicts God's purpose for the world. Since man must have the possibility of exercising freedom of will, there must be a natural order to the world. If not for the laws of nature, it would not be possible for man to make any moral decision, since he would never be able to know what the consequences of his decisions would be.
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The Struggle for Faith – Part III
July 7, 2004The question to what extent one can actually trust God and rely on His protection is closely related to the question why He created the world. It should be claimed that one can only rely on His protection and help as long as this does not contradict the very purpose of existence.
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Parashat Vayera – The Struggle for Faith – Part II
July 7, 2004It is most important to realize that in biblical days and even in the days of the Mishna and the Talmud, hardly anybody doubted the existence of God. That He exists was beyond doubt. It is for this reason that we do not find any discussion in the Tenach, Mishna or Talmud about God's existence. It is only in the Middle ages that Jewish philosophers started to debate this matter.
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The Struggle for Faith – Part I
July 7, 2004Faith is one of the most difficult attributes to acquire. To have faith in God has become a struggle for many human beings, including those who are desperately looking for it. In modern times with their tendency to secularize nearly anything, the man of faith often feels alone in a world in which religious beliefs are often looked down on.
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The Sanctification and Importance of Time
July 7, 2004"This is the burnt offering of the shabbath on its shabbath"
(Bamidbar 28:10)With this verse the Torah commands us to bring a special sacrifice on shabbath in the Temple. Rashi inquiries into the reason why there is a need to state that this shabbath offering needs to be brought on shabbath. If it is a shabbath offering then it is implicit that it needs to be sacrificed on shabbath!
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The Successful Failure
July 7, 2004Throughout history some of the greatest people often failed time after time before they really made it to the top. Others thought that they had failed but realized at a later stage in life that what they believed to be failure was in fact a grand success. Still others never succeeded in the conventional sense of the word, but became the hallmark of marvelous accomplishments, sometimes, without ever being aware of it.
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Educating Cohanim
July 7, 2004And the Lord spoke to Moshe:" Tell the cohanim (priests), the children of Aaron and say to them: "For a corpse among his people, he shall not defile himself." (Vayikra 21:1) With these words the Torah introduces a complex set of laws which apply to those who are instructed to serve in the Temple as priests. The most notable law is the one which tells the cohanim not to defile themselves (with some exceptions) by coming into contact with the dead. This means that they are not allowed to touch a dead corpse, to come too close to it or be involved in its burial.
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Efron and Arafat- Two of a kind
July 7, 2004In trying to obtain a piece of land to bury Sara, Avraham gets heavily involved in lengthy negotiations (Bereshith, chapter 23). After he has turned to the children of Chet, he asks them to speak to Efron the son of Tzohar who is the owner of the Cave of Machpela. It is in this cave that he would like to bury his dear wife Sara.
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Revolution through one word
July 7, 2004When studying the life of Avraham, we often wonder what made him into the first Jew in all of history. Without any doubt he must be seen as the progenitor of all that Judaism had to offer throughout the ages. As such he laid the foundations of nearly all religious thinking in the west. Not only did Judaism give birth to two other world religions, Christianity and Islam, but it also became the foundation of several legal systems, the concept of justice and western morality. What was Avraham's secret?
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A “Brenn” or “Familiarity breeds contempt”
July 7, 2004Chassidic Rebbe was once asked: "If you could save one thing from your burning home, what would it be?" "The fire" answered the Rebbe, "because it is the "brenn*" which makes life worth living." Indeed, without an inner fire burning in the soul of man, there is no real life. Life becomes meaningful only when man "burns from within" for his ideals and his determination in life. The art is to live a life as if every moment is new, a challenge and an encounter with the Divine.
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Succoth and the Twin Towers
May 12, 2004
When contemplating the festival of Succoth, we are confronted with a remarkable paradox. As is well known, the Succah visualizes our life span in the world. For what is a Succah? It is a frail structure in which we need to dwell for seven days. Many commentators remind us that these seven days represent man's average life span which is about seventy years. This is well stated by King David when he wrote: "The span of his years is seventy and with strength eighty years." (Tehilim 90:10) Indeed under favorable circumstances, we may prolong our stay in this world into our eighth day which is symbolized by Shemini Chag Atzereth, (a separate festival immediately following the seven days of Succoth).
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What will you say to your children?
July 7, 2004
An open letter to my friends and students in Chutz La'aretz:
As the Jewish year 5761 is coming to a close, it is most appropriate to remind ourselves that it has been nearly twelve months since Israel found itself in a guerrilla war with deadly terrorists whose main goal is to kill as many Jews as possible. The Palestinian Authority and the Arab world have indoctrinated the world with their lies and manipulations and created a global atmosphere of anti-Semitism which has turned governments and media against the State of Israel and its citizens.
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Why I am proud to be a Jew
July 7, 2004In these unusual days in which Jews are once more condemned for being Jews and some of our own brothers try to deny or even abhor their Jewishness, I believe, paradoxically, that the Jewish people will soon experience the most glorious opportunity of all time.
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An Angel called Chaya Schijveschuurder
July 7, 2004My hands are shaking and my body is trembling
As I hear of the tragedy which befell my dear friends
Mordechai Rafael ben Joseph Schijveschuurder z.l.
His wife and three children
Who came up to the land
To join their people and to fulfill
The commandment to settle
From the land of exile
The country of Holland
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The Destructionist Synagogues
June 27, 2004.......The Ceremonial Hall, the Nostalgia Center And the Davening Club - In his exiting book, "On Being a Jew," Professor James Kugel warns his readers about three kinds of synagogues that have done great damage to Jewish life. He calls them the "Ceremonial Hall Synagogues," the "Nostalgia Centers" and the "Davening Clubs." (1)
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“Es Past Nicht” and Jewish Pride
June 27, 2004Benjamin Disraeli, the Earl of Beaconsfield (1804-1881) was once confronted by a political opponent who chided him about being Jewish. "Indeed," he responded "I am a Jew, and when the ancestors of the right honorable gentleman were brutal savages on an unknown island, mine were priests in the Temple of Solomon"
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Religious Hypocrisy
March 27, 2011We all have urges that make us do things we are ashamed of. That is only human. But “the true hypocrite is the one who ceases to perceive his deception, the one who lies with sincerity.” (Andre Gide) Hypocrisy is a state of constant self-deception. Similarly, hiding one’s vices behind religious texts or garments, talmudic knowledge and frequent visits to houses of prayer desecrates the name of God and disparages genuine religion.
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Lashon Hara About the World
June 27, 2004.......And the Fly in the Bottle
Woody Allen, a keen but unusual observer of our world, once remarked: "More than at any time in history, mankind faces a crossroads. One path leads to despair and utter hopelessness, the other to total extinction. Let us pray that we have the wisdom to choose correctly."
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The Tabernacle and Bach’s Compositions
June 27, 2004When studying the last chapters of Shemoth (Exodus), we are puzzled by the great amount of detail and repetition in the instructions relating to the building and the architecture of the Mishkan (Tabernacle). While the Torah is normally very parsimonious in its words, here we find an overflow of seemingly repetitious words and an unusual emphasis on detail. Not the smallest nuance is left out, and nothing is left to human imagination. Preciseness stands out, and every pin and string is mentioned.
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The Courage to Admit a Mistake
February 17, 2005Nothing is more difficult than admitting a mistake, yet nothing is more human than making one.
In several places, the Torah deals with the need for and the merit of admitting one's mistakes. After all, a life spent making mistakes is not only much more honorable, but the alternative is much worse: The man who makes no mistakes is usually the man who accomplishes nothing. Only those who spend their time in total vanity are faultless. There is no road in between, and there is no escape. To own up to one's errors is greater than merely knowing how to avoid making them. It is wisdom that is gained.
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Revelations of a Committed Alcoholic
June 20, 2004am sure that it will come as a great shock, but I can no longer keep quiet. No doubt, it will cause the death of several of my readers and severe trauma to others, but how long can one continue to stick with a lie? Most of my readers believe that I am a rabbi. Not true.
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Megillath Esther: The Story of Human Importance
June 20, 2004From a subjective point of view it seems that the existence and behavior of a single human being is of little importance. Except for those leaders, thinkers and scientists who really make a contribution towards the advancement (or devastation) of mankind, the vast majority of people, numbering in the billions, do not seem to make any difference in terms of the future and wellbeing of our society. If not for the fact of their numbers, they would have stayed unnoticed and the world would not have missed them if they would not have been born.
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The Sensitivity of the Torah and the Power of Language
June 20, 2004When carefully studying the commandments of the Torah, it is most important to note the emotional sensitivity used by the text not to offend any of its readers. When discussing the "Eved Ivri" "the Hebrew Servant," the text states: "When you buy a Hebrew servant, six years he shall serve, and in the seventh year he shall go out into freedom for nothing" (Shemoth 21:1).
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To Roast or to Boil, That is the Question
June 20, 2004The Torah does not often give instructions related to food. Besides the Kashruth laws and some Pesach laws there are no instructions how to prepare food or how to eat it. The only remarkable exception to this is the law concerning the Korban Pesach, the Passover lamb.
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The Blessings of Ephraim and Menashe
June 17, 2004"Man always dies before he is fully born." Erich Fromm
The certainty that one has succeeded in the education of one's children can only be established when one watches the conduct of one's grandchildren. And even then one cannot be sure.
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Finding One’s Neshomeh
June 17, 2004We suggested in a previous essay that Israeli leaders, academicians and the Israeli public should find their way back to the synagogue and re-discover their neshomehs. But this is easier said than done. Many have entered and left without sensing any spiritual significance. In fact, many have entered and have been discouraged.
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It is Time to go to Synagogue
June 17, 2004.............The Wisdom of an Apikores
In my younger days, I knew a man who was a convinced and committed apikores (heretic). I used to meet him every Shabbath morning in synagogue where he was a frequent worshipper. He often would walk into the sanctuary, tell people that they were wasting their time coming to the morning service "since there is no God," and then he would proceed to his seat. Thereupon, he would cover himself with his talith, open his prayer book and join the service with great fervor.
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The Future of the Miraculous State of Israel
June 17, 2004" If the nations of the world accuse Israel of banditry by conquering the land of Israel…then the people of Israel will answer and say: "In the beginning God created heaven and earth. The entire universe belongs to Him. He created it and He gave it to whomever He deemed fit. It was His desire to give [the land] to the Caananites first and it was His desire to take it from them and to grant it to us."
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On the Israeli-Arab Conflict
June 17, 2004An impartial observer of the Middle East will realize that these are unusual times. Tens of thousands of Jews, from many different countries, are returning to their national and historic homeland after thousands of years. Arab states are beginning to reconsider their attitudes towards Israel now that they realize that after more than 50 years the Jewish State is here to stay.
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Prayer of the Jewish Soldier
June 17, 2004Lord of the Universe
We, the soldiers of the people of Israel
Come to You in humility
And pray for your help
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The Dimensions of Prophecy and the Eternity of the Torah
June 17, 2004Two main expressions used for prophecy are "Zeh Hadavar," "This is the word," and "Koh Amar Hashem," "Thus says God." Why these two different expresssions?
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Rosh Hashana Teshuva
June 3, 2004Teshuva, the art of repentance, is far from easy. Not only is it difficult to confront oneself with one's own shortcomings, it is even more difficult to actually internalize the need to repent and transform this into action. How many of us are really capable of reaching this lofty goal?
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Surround Yourself with Cleanliness
June 3, 2004A Project of Common Interest
"Cleanliness is not next to godliness nowadays, for cleanliness is made an essential and godliness is regarded as an offence." C.K Chesterton, On Lying in Bed, Tremendous Trifles, 1909.
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Surround Yourself with Art and Beauty
June 3, 2004A problem in some religious circles is the neglect of recognizing the importance of natural beauty and the need to appreciate its profound impact on life. There is increasing evidence that many devoted religious communities with their impressive commitment to Torah and Mitzvoth no longer stress the need to educate their children about the elegance and grace of beautiful surroundings such as impressive mountains, lakes and forests, flowers, beautiful birds or other creatures.
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Changes in Jewish Education
May 12, 2004As has been constantly stressed by our sages, the contents of the Torah are not open to innovations through which people try to update the Torah to sound more progressive. While progress is no doubt a matter of great value without which society can not function, one is reminded of G.K. Chesterton's famous observation that many people believe that progress is "leaving things behind us, which has utterly obscured the real idea of growth which means leaving things inside us." (The Romance of Rhyme, Fancies versus Fads, 1923)
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There is no Mashiach Without a Song
May 12, 2004When joining synagogues around the world for prayer, one is often confronted with a lack of religious enthusiasm. In many synagogues, services are heavy and often a little depressing. It is not always the lack of concentration by the worshippers which makes synagogue services unattractive but the absence of song and smile.
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Tisha B’Av/The Ninth of Av
July 23, 2009
The Sacrifices, a Foretaste and the Eye of a Needle: One of the most puzzling dimensions of Jewish Tradition is the institution of the sacrificial rites in the
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Yom Yerushalayim
May 16, 2010I stand at the Kotel, the Wailing Wall.
I see the Wall with her frozen tears
And her passing clouds with many sighs.
I read secret books and hundreds of thousands of names.
Names from Egypt, Babylon, Rome, Poland, Spain, Hungary, America and South Africa.
Names from Auschwitz, Buchenwald and Dachau.
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The Holocaust: Divine Retribution?
May 12, 2004For some years now there has been a major debate among religious thinkers if the Holocaust should be seen as a divine punishment. Pointing to the Torah's warnings (Vayikra 26, Devarim 28) that the divine curses would come true if a widespread violation of the laws of the Torah would occur, some thinkers maintain that the Holocaust is clearly the result of the Jewish people transgressing the laws of the Torah.
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Palestinian’s Claim to Israel
May 12, 2004In Tractate Sanhedrin (91a), we read about a most relevant story which took place in the days of Alexander of Macedonia, known as Alexander the Great (4th century before the common era.) Just after Moshe' death, when Yehoshua entered the land of Israel together with his people, there were seven tribes, hostile to the Jews, occupying the land.
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The Danger of Holiness & Future of Israel
May 12, 2004No word in the Torah is as central to Judaism as the word, "kedusha," holiness. But no word in the Jewish Tradition is so open to misunderstanding.
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Kreplach & Bisli: Revelation of Language
October 10, 2010"Words, in their primary or immediate signification, stand for nothing but the ideas in the mind of him that uses them."
(John Locke. An Essay Concerning Human Understanding. 1690, 3.2.2)
Language is the most revealing aspect of the inner thoughts and attitudes of man. Freud made us aware of this when he discussed the "slip of the tongue" phenomenon. It is through language that man reveals his inner life. His subconscious overflows and before he knows it he has already exposed his inner self.
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Shavuoth and Combustibility
May 12, 2004One of the most challenging aspects of religious life is how to relate to the concept of revelation. The uncompromising claim by Judaism that the Torah is not a book which was written by man but the result of a revelation of God's will to man requires a formidable amount of faith in the face of so much skepticism and secularity.
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Dershowitz, Klotz Kashes & Chozrim B’she’ela
May 12, 2004Lately, the State of Israel is experiencing a new phenomenon. As is well known, the Ba'al Teshuva movement, which includes thousands of secular Jews who have turned to Judaism, has made a major impact on Israeli society. Many young people who were once involved in extreme secularity felt that they had to re-connect with their own heritage and found their way back to Torah and Tradition. This gave rise to a great amount of highly successful institutions such as Aish haTorah, Ohr Somayach, Machon Meir and Neve Yerushalaim.
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Satisfaction and the Art of Being
May 12, 2004"And the time of threshing shall reach until the vintage and the vintage shall reach the sowing time. You shall eat your bread to satiety and you shall dwell in your land without worry." (Vayikra 26:5)
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The Mystery of the Second Day Yom Tov
May 12, 2004One of the most puzzling laws in Halacha (Jewish Law) is the requirement to observe a second day Yom Tov (festival) in all Jewish Communities outside the land of Israel.
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Tolerance and Dialogue
May 12, 2004In a previous essay on Tolerance, attention was drawn to the fact that personal conscience is of prime value and that one should not confuse tolerance with apathy. For this reason, Orthodoxy's refusal to compromise on its own principles so as to appease the Reform and Conservative movements should only be honored and respected. Even unity cannot always be the final arbiter.
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Tolerance and Personal Conscience
May 12, 2004In our days, the word, tolerance, has become a highly popular word together with such terms as pluralism and democracy. These words are by now so often used that one would hope that most people have a proper understanding of their meanings. This is, however, far from true. In fact, it seems that the more these words appear in our papers, books or in conversations, the less they seem to be comprehended. Often they are used in ways which oppose the very values they stand for.
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Religious and Secular Morality
May 12, 2004When discussing matters related to the ethical or religious foundation of sexual behavior, human beings tend to have severe differences of opinion. While up till the second half of the 20th century a more conservative approach was still prevailing, a radical change took place in the second half of the last century. Well established norms were suddenly challenged and often replaced by radical approaches which demanded more "liberty" and "broadmindedness." This provoked a major confrontation between the conservatives and those who claimed that they were "modern-minded."
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Weariness and Gentile Advice
May 12, 2004
Rabbi Samson Rafael Hirsch, one of the great Jewish leaders and thinkers of modern times, asks us to take notice of a strange incident in the days of Moshe. After Moshe left Egypt with a multitude of people, his father-in-law, Yitro, criticized him for the way he was administrating the Israelites. "'What is this that you are doing to the people? Why do you sit alone and all the people stand around you from morning until evening? And Moshe responded to his father-in-law: 'It is because the people come to me to inquire of God. When they are solicitous about any matter they come before me, and I decide between one person and another, and I make known the laws and the teachings of God.' But Moshe's father-in-law said to him: 'What you are doing is not right, you will surely wear yourself out and these people as well.'" (Shemoth 18:13-21) |
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The Birth of Amalek
May 12, 2004Judaism's major enemy is the nation of Amalek. This nation is the personification of all evil, racism and Antisemitism. Amalek was seared into the Jewish consciousness as the first enemy the people of Israel encountered after the crossing of the Red Sea. The Amalekites attacked the Jews several times and brought much disaster and destruction. It was not only the fact that Amalek dared to fight the Israelites, but also the strategy which Amalek used which showed Amalek's moral bankruptcy.
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Thoughts on Dolls & Other Toys
May 12, 2004One of the most unique talents which human beings are blessed with is the faculty of imagination. Unlike any other creature in the world, human beings have a nearly unlimited potential for constructive fantasy.
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On Dolls and Other Toys
January 16, 2011One of the most unique talents that human beings are blessed with is the faculty of imagination. Unlike any other creature, the human has nearly unlimited potential for constructive fantasy.
In fact, our civilization is built on imagination. Without this capacity, no progress could ever be made, whether in science, literature, philosophy, art, music or commerce. Our world would not be able to sustain itself and develop properly if human beings did not continuously explore new and uncharted paths. It is for this reason that every generation must make sure that its youngsters are provided with enough opportunities to develop a healthy imagination.
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The Holiness of Man
May 12, 2004It has been our conviction, as stated in many of our other essays, that an unfaltering commitment towards human dignity is the foundation stone of Judaism. This is normally understood to mean that since Judaism includes many commandments in which man is asked to uphold and guarantee the dignity of his fellowman, it emphasizes God's love and respect for man as one of the highest values.
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Asterix & Obelix: Rabbinic View
May 12, 2004One of the great advantages which many of us enjoy is that we often do not know what we have missed out on. Ignoti nulla cupido, "There is no desire for what is not known," said Ovid in his Ars Amatoria. (111, i.397) This may sound rather strange, but when we look into our lives we realize that many people are able to be satisfied with their material lives because they do not fully realize or refuse to realize that they could have had more.
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Johann Sebastian Bach & Halacha
May 12, 2004Arnold Toynbee, the great, though slightly anti-Semitic historian of this century is quoted as saying that "history is the tragedy of what could otherwise have been." When contemplating this comment, we wonder what would have happened if Johann Sebastian Bach, (1685-1750), genius musician and composer would have met Benedictus (Baruch) Spinoza (1632-1677), world renowned philosopher, a Jew by birth and foremost critic of Judaism.
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Some Perspectives on Mortality
May 12, 2004In Devarim (14.1), the Torah warns against excessive mourning, expressing itself in a most unusual way: "You are the children of God, your God, you shall not cut yourself, nor make a bald patch between your eyes for the dead." This prohibition teaches man the correct approach towards death.
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The Quest for Denial
May 12, 2004One of the most common psychological conditions human beings find themselves in is denial. All men repress unpleasant experiences and do not want to be confronted with reality when it is not to their liking. Sigmund Freud was the first authority in the secular world to give full attention to this phenomenon. Still there is plenty of evidence that this problem existed since the earliest moments in human history.
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Adar, Pesach, and the Month of Nisan
March 8, 2007In Devarim (16.1) we find a verse which requires our special attention due to its far reaching implications for Jewish life and the meaning of religion in general:
"Take care of the month of the early ripening (Nissan) and bring the Pesach offering unto the Lord your God, for in the month of the early ripening, the Lord your God took you out of Egypt at night-time".
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The Number of Generations Before Him
October 14, 2004The Mishna in Eduyoth (2:9) makes the following observation in the name of Rabbi Akiva: "A father endows his son with comely appearance, strength, riches, wisdom, longevity and "mispar hadoroth lefanav" (the number of generations before him) And this is the secret of redemption, as it says, 'He proclaimed the generations from the beginning.' (Isaiah 41.1)."
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The Mystery of Revelation
May 12, 2004If anyone would ever argue that traditional Judaism is guilty of too much dogma and too little imaginative thought, a closer look into the world of rabbinical insight into the idea of revelation would cure him of such ideas.
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Freedom of Will and Determinism
May 12, 2004"We must believe in freedom of will, we have no choice." This observation made by Isaac Bashevis Singer introduces one of the greatest problems in Jewish and general philosophy, freedom of will versus determinism. Many have attempted to solve the problem, but not one philosopher has been able to come up with a completely satisfactory response.
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Rabbi Yacov Emden, Bilaam & Yeshu
December 27, 2006It is extremely difficult to know whether the stories and observations about Jeshu in the Talmud actually refer to the Jeshu of the New Testament. Several dates do not correspond, and many other problems exist. Scholars have made the important observation that there is also a very great discrepancy between the picture which emerges from the actual text of the NT and the one developed by the church. Even in the NT itself there are several readings which do not appear consistent, possibly because of later interpolations. The observations in the Talmud may therefore quiet well refer to the Jeshu as projected by the Church and not to those which appear in the NT (notwithstanding the inconsistency related to the dating of these stories.)
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Freud and Belief in God
January 3, 2011
Sigmund Freud (1856-1939), the father of psychoanalysis and a figure as important as Galileo and Einstein, devoted a great deal of attention to religion. His works, such as Totem and Taboo (1913), The Future of an Illusion (1927) and Moses and Monotheism (1939), reveal his unusual interest in religion, specifically in the psychology behind religious belief.
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Sport and its Problems
May 12, 2004The need to engage in sport is self-understood. To exercise and to make sure that one keeps one's body in good condition is considered a mitzva of the highest priority.
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Mitzvoth, Minhagim and Their Dangers
May 12, 2004Last week we mentioned the danger to use chumroth (stringencies) to hide shortcomings and other discrepancies. In a different sense we are also confronted with similar problems when we consider how some people observe some well-established minhagim (customs) or even mitzvoth.
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Religious Stringencies, Good or Bad?
May 12, 2004Chumroth: Self-imposed severities have become part and parcel of the religious Jewish community of today. Many people feel the need to express their religious devotion to God through the acceptance of stringencies which conventional Jewish Law does not require. They observe Shabbath more strictly; they make sure that they only eat "glatt" kosher, use the largest measurements for their kiddush cup or, in the case of some married women, cover their hair not once but twice.
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Educating Towards Enjoyment
May 12, 2004Rabbi Meir Simcha of Dvinsk, author of Meshech Chochma draws our attention to one of the most powerful messages Jewish education has to offer. When discussing the failure of Adam and Chava to abstain from the tree of knowledge, this commentary points out one of the most common mistakes made in Jewish education.
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Boredom and the Elderly
August 24, 2009
Boredom is a multi-faceted phenomenon in our days and we may well be justified in considering another dimension of this destructive force. (See last weeks' Thoughts to Ponder.) In the "olden days," it was a privilege to be mature. It was something people would strive for. It meant maturity of attitude, a great amount of experience and knowledge of how to deal with the problems of life. It also meant well-considered opinions. This is no longer the case. Most of the time this is not due to the fact that younger people have become more experienced or knowledgeable, but because the older generation, i.e. those who used to be considered mature, have suddenly shown signs of immaturity. This is shown in the way our older generation deals with free time. W
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The Problem of Boredom
August 9, 2009 How beautiful it is to do nothing and afterwards to rest a little!
(With tongue in cheek)
Note: This essay was originally written in 1999.
Although the examples are somehow outdated much of the content is still true!
***
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Shavuot, Revelation and Learning
April 29, 2007In the Pirke Avoth (Ethics of the Fathers 3:10), we find a rather exorbitant statement by one of the Sages: "Rabbi Dostai ben Yanai said in the name of Rabbi Meir:" Whoever forgets even one thing of his Torah learning, Scripture regards him as though he is guilty to pay with his life, for it is said: "Be careful and guard your life greatly, lest you forget the things you saw (at the time of the revelation at Sinai) with your own eyes, and lest they be removed from your heart your entire lifetime, and you shall inform your children and grandchildren of them, the day you stood before God, your God at Chorev…. " (Devarim 4,9-10)
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The Chosen People?
May 11, 2004The Art of Moral Irritation - One of the most disturbing claims ever made by any group of people is the one Jews make when, quoting the Bible, they insist upon being called the "Chosen People." For nearly four thousand years, Jews have upheld the belief that they are God's elect, the "apple of His eye," His most beloved and favored nation. This claim sounds like prejudice of the highest order, making the vast majority of mankind into second-class citizens.
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Introduction to God
May 11, 2004Introducing God Introducing God is one of the most difficult things to do. It is like presenting a three-dimensional reality on a flat surface. Still God is the most captivating figure in human history and His track record is most unusual. His deeds are unprecedented, yet very disturbing. He is to be loved but often irritates. He is above all human limitation but He gets angry and outright emotional. He is beyond criticism but is judged by the strictest criteria of justice. Religious people and thinkers believe that He is the only One who really has it all together and knows what He is doing.
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Human Autonomy and Divine Commandment – Part 2
November 11, 2010In Part 1 we discussed the issue of human autonomy versus divine commandment. Which is of higher religious value: serving God in a spontaneous outpouring of religious devotion, or obeying the divine imperative? We concluded that it is the divine imperative that makes an ordinary act into a religious one. In the words of Professor Yeshayahu Leibowitz: "Faith is expressed in the act which man does due to his awareness of his obligation to do it and not because of an internal urge".
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Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur
September 6, 2009
As we approach Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, we are confronted with the problem of human vulnerability and the difficulties involved in overcoming our weaknesses. Every year we take it upon ourselves to defeat our selfish inclinations, begin a new chapter and accomplish, once and for all, complete teshuvah (repentance). But every year, especially in the days just before the High Holidays, we realize that we were once again unsuccessful in accomplishing this task during the previous year, and our repentance did not bear much fruit.
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Rosh Hashana
May 11, 2004The Torah reading of the second day of Rosh Hashana is the well-known story of Akedath Yitschak (the offering of Isaac by Avraham). Many explanations have been given as to why this portion should be read on Rosh Hashana. (See: Sefer HaToda'ah by Rabbi Eliyiahu Kitov for an overview. Book of Our Heritage, Feldheim, NY pp: 30-33) There is, however, a problem.
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Human Autonomy and Divine Commandment – Part 1
November 7, 2010One of the most discussed issues in today's world of religious thought is the question of human autonomy versus man's obligation to carry out God's command. Which is the higher religious value: to serve God in a spontaneous outpouring of religious devotion (autonomy), or to obey the divine imperative (obedience)?
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Idol Worship
October 14, 2004As it well known, Judaism considers Avodah Zarah (idol worship) as its main enemy. According to the view of many thinkers, all evil is rooted in idol worship, and therefore the Torah goes out of its way to condemn this practice. Jewish law has taken extreme steps to root out any affiliation with this kind of worship. It is therefore most surprising that the commentators seem to have a major difference of opinion what idol worship is all about and why it is forbidden.
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The King
June 29, 2005A parable on the future of Israel
(Based on a fairy tale by Godfried Bomans adapted by Nathan Lopes Cardozo)
Once upon a time, in a large, gloomy palace high on a mountain, where the night wind groaned outside the massive walls, there lived a king, a real one. He had a long beard like a silver waterfall, and a voice like thunder. More a king does not need.
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Yom Kippur: A Day Like Purim
May 11, 2004The Ba'ale Ha-Kabbalah discovered mystical associations between Purim and Yom Kippurim, the only difference in Hebrew spelling between the two names being an initial kaf in Kippurim. Yom Kippurim then, would signify "a day like Purim." This is no doubt a strange association. To suggest that Yom Kippur is like Purim is a most unusual way of looking to this awesome day. What is the possible meaning behind this observation?
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Sukkot and the Paradox of Life – Judaism’s Realistic Joy
September 22, 2010When contemplating the festival of Sukkot, we are confronted with a remarkable paradox. As is well known, the sukka symbolizes our life-span in the world. For what is a Sukka? It is a frail structure in which we need to dwell for seven days. Many commentators remind us that these seven days represent Man's average life-span, which is about seventy years. This was well stated by King David when he wrote: "The span of his years are seventy and with strength eighty years" (Tehillim 90:10). Indeed under favorable circumstances, we may prolong our stay in this world into our eighth day which is symbolized by Shemini Chag Atzeret (a separate festival immediately following the seven days of Sukkot).
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The Enduring Preciousness of the “Secular” Jew *
August 26, 2011We are living in an age of flaunting irreverence. Debunking has become the norm and at every turn we experience a need to expose the clay feet of even the greatest. Human dignity, a phrase often mentioned, has become a farce in real life. Instead of deliberately looking for opportunities to love our fellow men […]
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Thoughts to Reject – For the Early Connoisseur
March 2, 2017Some appropriately irreverent thoughts to...well, no, not to ponder on the occasion of Purim.
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Megillath Esther: Purim and Human Importance
March 20, 2011From a subjective point of view it seems that the existence and behavior of a single human being is of little importance. Except for those leaders, thinkers and scientists who really make a contribution towards the advancement or devastation of mankind, the vast majority of people, numbering in the billions, do not seem to make any difference in terms of the future and well-being of our society. If not for the fact of their numbers, they would have remained unnoticed and the world would not have missed them had they not been born.
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O Jerusalem!
December 7, 2017A poem in praise of the holy city of Jerusalem, in the wake of the American announcement to designate Jerusalem as Israel's capital.
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Orthodox Rabbi Teaching Halakha Beyond the Shulkhan Arukh, Judaism Beyond the Commandments
June 2, 2016The Beauty of the Jewish tradition is that it is not always precise and consistent," says Rabbi Dr. Nathan Lopes Cardozo. "And that is a very wise thing. You have to have flexibility, because life is not clear-cut or coherent. Moving here, moving there, you work out the different opinions somehow, and you let it be. As such Jewish Law and beliefs stay fresh and thriving. A musical symphony. But the moment we codify or dogmatize it all, we are basically destroying it”.