Matir Asurim

Today at Yom Kippur services, I heard the story of the Scape-Goat through a new lens. Aaron shall take the two he-goats and let them sta...

Organized religion gets a bad rap these days. "I'm spiritual, not religious" is a common refrain.  Much evil is done in the ...

Thinking about things that are going on in my life made me change my Facebook profile picture to this: An old friend responded by pointin...

The previous post touched on the futility of blame, whether directed towards others or to oneself.  More thinking and talking about self-bl...

Yesterday was the Jewish fast day of Tisha B'Av .   Traditionally , this fast commemorates the destruction of both the first and second ...

By now this is really old news.  So many other scandals, of far greater significance, have made headlines since the bigoted bakers refused t...

Although the details are not specified in the article, I am pretty sure that this is a kid in my congregation: http://www.kveller.com/what...

Although I am not doing any weekly parsha blogging this year, I still follow the cycle as always.  Many other bloggers put out weekly essa...

Although I am not blogging the entire cycle this year (still waiting for suggestions on a good theme), I am still going to synagogue regul...

Many Jewish organizations have been slow to take up the cause of special needs inclusion, especially intellectual/developmental special need...

Well, I've succeeded in doing a year of Torah Connection , and a year of Haftorah Beam .  I've gone through the Amidah and Pirkei A...

5774 What is Haftorah? Occasionally, the Sabbath falls on the first day of the Jewish month, and the Rosh Hodesh haftorah is substitute...

This parsha is read, not on Shabbat, but on Simchat Torah -- the "Great Rewind".  We finish reading the five books of Moses, and ...

Well, Sukkot is half-over, but here is our new Sukkah for this year:

As this Parsha is read during the 10 Days of Awe (between Rosh HaShana and Yom Kippur), the usual Haftorah is replaced with the Shabat Shuva...

Almost done with the cycle!  As in last year , this is a double parsha, but uses the Haftorah for Nitzavim . Finishing off the month of El...

The Torah portion is all about being aware of the blessings which surround us.  The Haftorah reading , likewise, is about vision: 1  Ari...

Just a few weeks left to finish Haftorah Beam!

In comparison with the Torah portion , this Haftorah is simplicity itself:  It is G*d's proclamation of eternal love for the people of ...

This week's Torah portion is famous for the phrase  צֶדֶק צֶדֶק תִּרְדֹּף  -  Justice, justice shalt thou  pursue.   This phrase , with...