It’s nearly impossible to read Parshat Ha’azinu without connecting it to the final verses of the preceding parshah, VaYeilekh, in which Moshe paves the way for the doom and gloom that is to follow in his farewell message:  “Gather to me all the elders of your tribes, and your officers, that I may speak these words in their ears, and call heaven and earth to witness against them. For I know that after my death, you will surely become corrupted, and turn aside from the way which I have commanded you. In the end, evil will befall you...”  Read more...

During 5773 (aka the 2012-13 academic year), I wrote as a blogger for the journal Sh'ma. I and the other participants in this endeavor would receive the up-coming issue of the journal a bit in advance of its publication, and then write a short piece on our own thoughts and reactions to the theme and/or individual essays in the issue, which were then posted on the Sh'ma website. Read more...

As part of a month long effort leading up to Yom Kippur, Rabbi Feinstein asks Ayekah – Where are You? In this special edition, Rabbi Ed Feinstein shares these important words about sharing letters with each other, with our families, our communities, our past and our future. To watch and listen, click below: Read more...

The synagogue Torah service is typically an auditory experience. We sit in our seats and listen to the words being conveyed to us by our Ba’al/Ba’alat Koreh. There are however, certain moments in the annual Torah cycle that are best observed visually, and standing at the bima is really the prime real estate to experience them from. Read more...

Dear Friends, The great Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel once wrote: "To pray is to pull ourselves together, to pour out our perception, volition, memory, thought, hope, feeling, dreams, all that is moving in us, into one tone. Not the words we utter, the service of the lips, but the way in which the devotion of the heart corresponds to what the words contain, the consciousness of speaking under God's eyes, is the pith of prayer." (Man's Quest For God, 15) Read more...