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Shabbat Weekly Dvar Torah

Idolatry of a Different Kind

Nov 15, 2024

Idolatry of a Different Kind

Idolatry is the practice of treating something of relative importance as though it were of ultimate significance. In our idolatrous age, we often act as though money, careers, sex appeal or prestige are of ultimate importance, when in fact, they are only worthwhile to the degree that they can contribute to our becoming better, more compassionate and more responsible people. Today's Torah reading highlights another source of idolatry. It is altogether common to treat honesty as the highest value possible.
Transitions Are Hard

Nov 8, 2024

Transitions Are Hard

Imagine that you are Abraham, 75 years old, living ~4000 years ago in northern Mesopotamia in the city of Haran, which means “crossroads.” Suddenly, you undergo an epiphany—a moment of Divine revelation that calls to you: “Lech Lecha-Go forth from your country, from your native land, from your father's house to the land that I will show you." In other words - Leave your entire civilization, your culture, your city and almost everyone you know in the world and go to a place you don’t know but will be shown to you. Jaw drop.
The First Covenant: A Model for Us All

Nov 1, 2024

The First Covenant: A Model for Us All

Of the many profound lessons that Parashat Noah teaches us about relationships, I’d like to focus on the one we learn from the covenant, the berit, that God makes with Noah in the wake of the flood. A covenant is, fundamentally, a record of the terms of a relationship. Reading the terms of a covenant can teach us about the components and terms of that relationship. This is the first covenant that appears in Tanakh (Jewish Bible) and its function is self-restraint in the name of sustaining and preserving relationship.
The Faith to Be Held: Some Thoughts for Simchat Torah

Oct 23, 2024

The Faith to Be Held: Some Thoughts for Simchat Torah

I am experiencing such a panoply of emotions as we approach Simchat Torah this year: sadness, despair, and rage, at the memories of last year’s Simchat Torah massacre, but also giddy triumph, hope, and faith. I feel differently than I did a week ago… God pulls the strings behind the curtain, where we cannot see His interventions on our behalf until lo! we are saved.
The Courage to Rejoice

Oct 16, 2024

The Courage to Rejoice

What is truly remarkable is that Sukkot is called, by tradition zeman simḥateinu / our time of joy. That, to me, is the wonder at the heart of the Jewish experience: that Jews throughout the ages were able to experience risk and uncertainty at every level of their existence and yet they were still able to rejoice. That is spiritual courage of a high order. Faith is not certainty; faith is the courage to live with uncertainty.
A Thought for Yom Kippur

Oct 11, 2024

A Thought for Yom Kippur

May we all embrace the majesty of what praying toהמלך can potentially provide for us as we work toward self-transformation & renewal (בריאה חדשה), reconnect to our own power to do good, and reconnect with our innate value and innate value of all others. We are living through a moment in history where the choices of today will have enormous implications for the future. This is a time for us to be humbled but also find our moral clarity…
The Shofar Is Calling

Sep 27, 2024

The Shofar Is Calling

The sound of the shofar is primal & ancient. It produces a strange sense of awe and reverence. Think back to that moment before the first blast is sounded; a hushed expectancy fills the synagogue. At the moment we hear the first piercing note, we are struck with an almost childlike wonderment. And for most of us, it is one of our earliest childhood memories. The notes of the shofar are not beautiful by any musical standard, but somehow, we find in their thin piercing blasts something that calls to us.
The Meaning of Hurricanes

Sep 27, 2024

The Meaning of Hurricanes

Here are my feelings on the matter. First, gratitude and joy that we haven’t had a direct and devastating hit so far! Second, sadness and some survivor guilt because some other community(ies) got hit. Third, the realization that hurricanes and other natural disasters are only disasters if human beings live in their path… Think about it. Hurricanes have probably been battering our fair peninsula for thousands of years. But until human beings lived here, no one assigned a “good/bad” label to them.
Happiness is a Choice

Sep 20, 2024

Happiness is a Choice

This week I came across something called the World Happiness Report, which ranks the overall sense of population happiness in 143 countries… Here are their top five countries as ranked by happiness for 2024: 1) Finland 2) Denmark 3) Iceland 4) Sweden and (drumroll please…) 5) Israel! The rest of the top ten are rounded out by 6) Netherlands 7) Norway 8) Luxembourg 9) Australia and 10) Switzerland. Aside from the overwhelming domination of Northern European countries, I was more than a little surprised to see that Israel ranked so highly. Here is what they had to say about Israel…
Making Progress

Sep 13, 2024

Making Progress

Years ago, I was invited to speak on a panel about the role of women in religion alongside three other women religious leaders: a protestant pastor, a Muslim scholar and a very involved practitioner of the Bahai faith. I happily agreed to be on the panel, and then I received in my inbox the details of the event including its title: “Women in Religion: Have We Come Far Enough?” And I said aloud to my computer: “No!” To my mind, if we were asking the question, we already had the answer. What could truly be “far enough?”