Thursday, April 18th 2024 |
By RABBI TZVI HERSH WEINREB
“CREATURE-HOOD”
For the past several weeks, this column has addressed a challenge that we all face during Passover, Pesach, which is now barely two months away. The challenge is posed in a passage in the Haggadah, which ultimately derives from a Mishna in the tractate of Pesachim. The text reads, “In each and every...
By RABBI DAVID WOLPE
In figuring out our own identities, we both distinguish ourselves by deciding internally who we are as well as comparing ourselves with others. For the Jewish people, we often wonder what makes us different from any other nation? How are we alike and how are we different?
One answer is in an often asked question in Jewish legal literature: Why, for many mitzvot like charity or...
By RABBI TZVI HERSH WEINREB
“THE STATUS OF OUR FOREFATHERS”
This week’s column follows up a thought that I shared with you last week. I suggested that one of our most difficult religious tasks is to “see ourselves as if we had personally left Egypt.” I stated that it required a skill of imagination which most of us lack.
I...
By RABBI DAVID WOLPE
When I was in school we learned about a supposed difference between the Greek and Jewish conception of time. The Greeks, we were told, thought of time in a circular fashion, that it repeated itself. The Jews, pointing to the Messiah, thought of time as linear, headed to a destination.
Ecclesiastes which talks about the sun rising and setting and returning to where it rose, is...
By RABBI TZVI HERSH WEINREB
“IMAGINING REDEMPTION”
Passover, Pesach, is approaching. Fast approaching.
Now you may argue that it is still almost a full three months away, and you’d be right. But those who study Daf Yomi, the daily study of a page of Talmud, are already several weeks into their in-depth reading of the tractate of Pesachim and are already...
By RABBI DAVID WOLPE
When I was in college people would tell me that it was not ‘real life.’ Everyone had a definition of ‘real life’ – it began when one was married, or had a job, or had children.
We promote this idea of provisional living – during the pandemic we say we aren’t living ‘real life.’ Someone told me we should now wish one another “until 121” instead of...
By RABBI TZVI HERSH WEINREB
“THE YOKE’S ON US!“
We all have received blessings at one time or another. We have certainly received compliments. Over the course of time, we learn that sometimes the compliments are clearly flattering. But occasionally, ambiguous statements are made to us, leaving us confused and unable to determine with certainty whether we are being complimented or insulted.
There are statements which leave us...
By RABBI DAVID WOLPE
There is a Talmudic teaching that one should do something and the reason will follow – mitoch shelo l’shma, bah l’shma. Part of this counsel is the understanding that often emotion follows action, rather than preceding it. Act joyously and you will feel joy.
It is easy to get caught in theory and propose ways to live without living. The ancient Greek philosopher Epictetus critiques those too enmeshed...
By RABBI DAVID WOLPE
When a family returns from a funeral in the Jewish tradition, there is a meal, seudat havra’ah, the meal of consolation. It is the first step in returning to life after loss. At the end of shiva, the seven days of mourning, the mourners rise and walk around the block. After grieving at home for a week, one must rejoin the outside world.
Shiva is not...
By RABBI TZVI HERSH WEINREB
“FORGIVENESS: A JEWISH VALUE“
This has got to be one of the oldest “rabbi” jokes in the entire repertoire of American Jewish humor.
It tells us of a young rabbi, fresh from rabbinical school, who addresses his first several sermons to his new congregation on the varied subjects of meticulous Sabbath observance, refraining...
