Ours is a society that glorifies youth as a sign of vitality, vigor, strength, and beauty. Television and pop cultural images are full of Hollywood celebrities and sports figures whose fame and fortune is based in their youthful look and/or talent, establishing themselves, for many, as national heroes. Lucky are the ones amongst them who continue into their later years gaining ongoing recognition and accolades as they mature and age. Read more...

Several years ago, at the end of Sukkot, I cut open one of our etrogim and extracted a number of seeds. These I planted in pots and in several places around our yard. Thanks to the help of our friend, Ruth, who has the greenest thumb of anyone I know - and no intervention of my own, my thumb being not at all green - several of the potted seeds sprouted and began to grow. This spring, again under Ruth's guidance, the gardeners replanted the two tallest trees, one in our backyard and one out front of our house. So far, both seem to be happy in their new locations. Read more...

Reb Elimelech of Lizensk (d.1787) would teach that the holiness of the week to come is contained in the Shabbat that precedes it. Often I think about this teaching in the manner that I was taught of Winnicott's interpretation of parental containment. The parent contains the child in a way that then gives a child the freedom to seek and search, to be independent and free. In the same way, the Shabbat before a holiday 'holds' the holiday within it, it holds all the aspirations and intentions that one carries in regard to the upcoming holiday. Read more...

If you tell a child, "don't move an inch," what do they do? They move, an inch. Why? Because they know you don't literally mean, "an inch" and, most children enjoy proving you wrong! Jewish tradition rarely suffices itself with literal reading. Even those with distaste for more mystical, esoteric readings of the Torah understand that the literal understanding of a verse is rarely its simple, plain (p'shat) meaning. Read more...

If you tell a child, "don't move an inch," what do they do? They move, an inch. Why? Because they know you don't literally mean, "an inch" and, most children enjoy proving you wrong! Jewish tradition rarely suffices itself with literal reading. Even those with distaste for more mystical, esoteric readings of the Torah understand that the literal understanding of a verse is rarely its simple, plain (p'shat) meaning. Read more...