The Torah, Rambam insists, is based on the idea of human freedom – were we not free to choose our future, to determine our own actions, then the idea of giving us commandments would make no sense, and rewarding or punishing us for our fidelity to God’s ideals would be morally and logically preposterous. For the great Medieval rabbi, human freedom is woven into the very fabric of creation.
Jews understand that ours is a religion that celebrates life. Our toast at a simcha, L’Hayim! means “To Life!”, and it expresses the love of this life that our faith inculcates. God said that creation is tov me’od, very good, and we Jews affirm God’s judgment by celebrating the gift of life each day and every moment.
One of the canards leveled against Judaism is that it holds Jewish people to be superior to all others. From early antiquity, in the writings of Josephus, we read of Antisemites who accuse Judaism of cultivating a disdain for the rest of humanity. Because we claim that God has singled us out from among all the peoples of the earth by giving us the Torah, the charge goes, we also believe that we are better than the rest of humanity. Hence we try to keep separate from everybody else. Hence we only use other people for our own benefits and our own purposes.
One of the most famous of ancient Israel’s symbols of God’s presence is the bush that was aflame yet would not be consumed. That startling image has been taken both as a representation of a living faith and of the unquenchable spirit of the Jewish people. The burning bush has become the logo for countless Jewish institutions (such as the Jewish Theological Seminary, for example) and adorns innumerable Torah mantles in synagogues all over the world.
One of the most troubling facets of the Torah is its apparent acceptance of the dominant patriarchy that pervaded the ancient world (and much of the modern world too). The Ten Commandments are clearly addressed specifically to the men (“Don’t covet your neighbor’s wife”) as are many of the mitzvot, the preponderance of heroes are men, and even God is addressed primarily in masculine terms. Of late, that male perspective and focus has become a bit of a stumbling block for those who would look to the Torah for vindication of the notion of the equal worth of men and women. In
This is the first episode in the charge series podcast with Rabbi Artson. In this podcast, Rabbi Artson discusses topics such as making the Torah your delight.
With Parashat B’Hukkotai, the Book of Leviticus comes to an end. The central book of the Torah, Leviticus is the book of priestly holiness, enjoining the people Israel to become a nation of priests and a holy people. Laws pertaining to ritual purity and impurity, to sexual ethics, as well as a magnificent summation of torah itself, in the Holiness Code, give this book its abiding value and depth.
One of the defining features of traditional Judaism is its careful attention to matters of halakhah (Jewish law). While broader issues of theology and ethics form a significant backdrop to Jewish thought, primary attention is paid to the mitzvot, the sacred commanded deeds of Judaism, and to the kinds of debates which lawyers enjoy. Is something muttar (permissible) or assur (prohibited)? Is something hayyav (obligatory) or reshut (optional)?
Modern men and women like to pretend that we have a direct pipeline into reality that we know, in an absolute and ultimate way, about ourselves, about the world around us, about true wisdom. Forgetting that previous generations were equally sure about the truths they “knew”, that the earth was flat, that the universe was a few thousand years old, that women were inferior to men, and that we now view their certainties with scorn, we presume that our most cherished verities will last forever.
With Parashat K’doshim, we begin what the rabbis of the Midrash recognized to be a distinct section of the Torah, "the section dealing with holiness". In this estimation, they anticipated modern scholarship, which also recognizes a distinct "Holiness Code" within the various strands that comprise our Torah. Characteristic of this portion of Scripture is the repeated injunction, "You shall be holy, for I, the Lord your God, am holy.
