When looking at this week's Torah portion and thinking about the relevance of the Yovel – the jubilee year where all land returns to its original owner and slaves are set free – to my life and reality, my mind weaves a web with a Chassidic story, a Chassidic teaching and a personal experience fifteen years old as the answer. Read more...

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. Read more...

With Parashat Be-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. Read more...

Tick, tick, tick – each day, the clock chimes, counting the twenty four hours, one thousand four hundred forty minutes, eighty six thousand four hundred seconds.  The days pass and suddenly we awake wondering where all the time has gone and how it passed so quickly.  I am reminded in this of the lyrics of the famous Steve Miller Band song which speaks of the passing of time: Time keeps on slipping Into the future; Time keeps on slipping, slipping, slipping Into the future Read more...

In the famous description of the Woman of Valor, the Book of Proverbs praises her by saying that “she opens her mouth with wisdom, and on her tongue is a Torah of love.” High praise indeed, but it raises a curious dilemma. If she speaks a Torah of hesed, of steadfast love or of lovingkindness, does that imply that there is a Torah that is not a Torah of love. Is there a Torah of hate? Read more...