What does Naftali Herstik, a pre-eminent cantor at the Great Synagogue in Jerusalem for 30 years, have in common with Bobby Allison, who was one of the greatest race car drivers in American history, who won 85 NASCAR races over 30 years? One is an all-time great cantor. The other is an all-time great race car driver. They both recently passed away. But they share something important in common in how they lived which speaks to one of the greatest mysteries of the Torah—the meaning of the...

We are plumb in the middle of two of the hardest stories in the Torah. Genesis 16:1-16 tells of Sarai’s continued inability to get pregnant, which leads her to assign her servant Hagar (literally the stranger) to Abram so that she might conceive a child with Abram who would somehow be reckoned as Sarai’s child. When Abram and Hagar have relations, she gets pregnant right away. It does not go well. The two women hurt one another. “Abraham cohabited with Hagar and she conceived; and when she...

I have a friend who is a therapist.  She tells the story that once, she had someone in her office who was really struggling.  As he shared story after story of misfortune and sorrow, she found herself thinking, “oy, he really needs a therapist.”  Then, the patient paused and asked her for her wisdom.  “Oh no,” she thought, “I am that therapist.” I’ve never felt this story more deeply.  This week, I looked at the sermon schedule and thought, “oh no…I am supposed to be the rabbi.”  How do you...

A consequential week, in America and in Israel. How can Torah help us become better versions of ourselves? How can Torah help us become better citizens here and better lovers and supporters of Israel? This week we begin the Abraham story. Why Abraham? Why did God pick him? We know that God picked him, but we have no idea as to why. In his essay A Palace in Flames, the late Rabbi Jonathan Sacks offers three explanations based on three different midrashic traditions. One, Abraham was an...

On the morning of Kol Nidrei—Friday, October 11 to be exact—my colleagues and I were doing a Kabbalat Shabbat service with our youngest learners, our preschool children who range in age from 15 months to 5 years old.  Yom Kippur was in the air. Kol Nidrei with all its solemnity, was in 9 hours.  How to convey Kol Nidrei intensity to our youngest learners? So I asked them: what is your favorite Jewish holiday?  One hand after another shot up.  The first young child answered:  Halloween!  The...

The biblical character Lot presents a unique challenge. He appears in three portions, Noach this week, Lekh L’kha next week, and Va-yera two weeks from now. He is a supporting actor in multiple chapters in Genesis: chapters 11, 12, 13, 14, and 19. And yet no one ever talks about him. We don’t mine his story. We avoid him. There is good reason why we stay away from Lot. The end of his story is gross, in fact doubly gross. Incomprehensibly, he offers his two virgin daughters to the rapists of...

The question always is, what’s next? And the answer is, let’s be together. What’s next? This is a question that weighs on me in every facet of my life. My son Avishai, who many of you know well after his many years at Hebrew school here and around at services, for a long time would have the same question for us when we first woke up. “What’s for dinner?” And, truthfully, we hardly ever knew. It’s hard enough to keep of track of who is getting who to where they need to be when. So the...

How are we to understand the death of the leader of Hamas, and the mastermind and architect of October 7, Yahya Sinwar? Does his death mean that an end to the war, and the beginning of the day after, is closer? Or should Israel’s military continue the fight? What will Sinwar’s death mean for our hostages? These questions are hugely important and above my pay grade. Our question this morning is how do Jewish values help us interpret this moment?

Sukkot October 18, 2024

When I was growing up, we spent a lot of time with my Grandpa Gene feeding the geese. My Mom kept a 50 lb. bag of birdseed in the car, and, even when Sir Grandfather, as he liked to be called, was not feeling well, we would drive to the pond, and he would sit and watch from the front seat as we tossed out birdseed to grateful honks. My grandfather also had this superpower. He could spot any flock of birds in the sky and would just know exactly the number of birds in an instant. He would look...

October 12, 2024

One quiet Shabbat morning in August, a long-time member comes in and says, Rabbi, I turn 93 today.  Can I have an Aliyah?  I said of course. We’d love to give you an Aliyah.   Just want you to know one thing. You are a youngster. A youngster?  I’m turning 93 today.  How is that a youngster? I pointed in the direction of a woman who was sitting with her children, grandchildren and extended mishpacha.  I said we are doing an Aliyah today for that woman surrounded by her family because she...

October 11, 2024

Rabbi David Wolpe tells a classic story of speaking to a group of American Jews  in Tulsa, Oklahoma at their JCC about God.  He was trying to make the case that God loves them.  But he could see that his words were not resonating.  Being the seasoned speaker that he is, he decided to take a bit of a gamble.  He stopped his prepared remarks and said:  If you think God loves you, please rise.  In the entire large amphitheater which sat hundreds of people, exactly one person stood up.  So Rabbi...

As the horrors of October 7th were unfolding, a common reaction was “ein milim,” no words. But it is not surprising that Hebrew poetry soon appeared that gave expression to the nation’s raw feelings and emotions. Our teacher Rachel Korazim, our member Michael Bohnen and Heather Silverman of California have recently published a moving anthology of those poems which they have translated to English. Their book, Shiva: Poems of October 7, is available on Amazon, and all royalties go to the...

Years ago, I was talking with our preschool learners, 3- and 4-year-olds, about God. Not sure what I was thinking that day. I was a young rabbi, fresh out of the Seminary. So I turned to very young learners and asked: have you ever seen God? As you might predict, it did not go well. There was a long, awkward silence. Nobody raised their hand. Nobody said a word. I did not know how to get out of this jam. And then mercifully one child at last, sheepishly, raised her hand. I have seen God,...

October 3, 2024

One fine August night, after I got home from evening minyan, I picked up the phone and called my sister Beth, who lives in Los Angeles, just to check in.  Beth shared that one of her summer projects was to feng shui their house that she and her family had lived in for 50 years.  Just that afternoon she was working on the closet in her bedroom, one bag for goodwill, one bag for garbage, when she came upon a box in the bottom of her closet that she had not seen in years.  She did not even...

What do we do when the way we feel on the inside doesn’t match what we feel we have to project on the outside? Or even more generally, what do we do when our insides don’t match our outsides? I was thinking about this recently as I was reading a fascinating New York Times interview with Steve Burns, the actor on Blue’s Clues. If you weren’t tuned into preschool television in the late 90s and early 2000s, Blues Clues was a show on Nickelodeon wherein the host, Steve Burns, invited little kids...

“The unexamined life, a philosopher said, is not worth living. No one who has genuinely experienced Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur lives an unexamined life.” Rabbi Jonathan Sacks, Introduction to The Koren Rosh Hashanah Mahzor (2011) This coming Shabbat is our last Shabbat before Rosh Hashanah. Our tradition bids us that we prepare ourselves for the Days of Awe by hearing the shofar every weekday morning, by reciting Psalm 27 every morning and every evening, and by attending Selikhot Saturday...

In late August Joshua Leifer, author of Tablets Shattered, was going to be in dialogue about his new book with a local Brooklyn rabbi. They were infamously banned from the bookstore because they are Zionists. While the employee who tossed them was fired, it is sobering that in America, in New York, in August of 2024, an author could get banned for believing that the Jewish people have a right to a homeland. The day that Josh Leifer was banned by the bookstore I called him. His mother and...

This morning has been so beautiful. And an example of life imitating art. The prophet Isaiah talks about a great light shining. Ari and Zoe talked about that light. And they embody that light. Our bride and groom, Beth and Adam, and their parents Marlene and Errol, may he rest in peace, and Cindy and Jon, embody that light. We know what to do with this light and this simcha: savor it, feel it deeply, do not let it go unappreciated. This morning reminds me of a conversation I recently had...

In How to Know a Person, David Brooks devotes an entire chapter to what he calls life stories. https://files.constantcontact.com/d3875897501/1021ea46-026b-4259-9de3-6f87a6cefd69.pdf?rdr=true "Coming up with a personal story is centrally important to leading a meaningful life. You can’t know who you are unless you know how to tell your story. You can’t have a stable identity unless you take the inchoate events of your life and give your life meaning by turning the events into a coherent...

Last Sunday evening Shira and I were in Lakewood, New Jersey for a wedding.  Lakewood is the capital of the charedi, or ultra-Orthodox, world in America.  Lakewood boasts a world-famous charedi yeshiva called Beth Medrash Govoha which is the second largest yeshiva in the world, second only to the Mir Yeshiva in Jerusalem.  The wedding was charedi.  Men and women sat separately during the wedding.  Men and women danced separately after the wedding. There was a thick wall separating the men and...