Rabbi’s Torah Thoughts

Tell me if you’ve heard this one before:  a righteous person goes on top of their roof to escape the waters of a flood, all the time praying to God for assistance.  When a small boat comes by, he brushes…

Asser Levy was one of the original 23 Jews who arrived in America in 1654.  These brave pioneers fleeing the Inquisition found refuge in the shores of New Amsterdam.  Asser Levy was a fierce freedom fighter, who had to fight…

As a teenager, Michael Jackson was top on my list of favorite artists.  His album Thriller came out when I was in grade school and I remember listening to the songs play over and over at the roller-skating rink.  So,…

I remember when I first caught the World Cup bug.  It was back in 1994, and I had just completed my Junior year at Hebrew University.  Walking around Jerusalem every screen in every home and every bar was turned to…

Bein Hashmashot, or between the suns, is Hebrew for twilight, the thin layer of light between night and day.  On a recent “For Heaven’s Sake” podcast, the host Doniel Hartman declared the entire State of Israel to be caught in…

As a child I always hated packing up my sleeping bag.  It was big and fluffy and somehow had to be shoved into a bag so small it could barely carry crackers.  I would roll it and reroll it and…

In a recent post on “My Jewish Learning,” by Rabbi Sara Laufer about the Book of Numbers (Thanks Bob Kanner!) she describes a comic strip by Mari Andrew featuring “two identical drawings of a woman, holding a suitcase, staring at…

Fruit in Israel is different than the fruit we are used to in Western New York.  Instead of apples and oranges, there are thick, yellow pomelos that look from the outside like giant grapefruits, but inside are sweet and juicy. …

Synagogues of the past had clear hierarchies.  The wealthy and the powerful had assigned seats up front, everyone else were relegated to the back.  I felt this growing up, as our Jewish community in Philadelphia often made those who didn’t…