13 Nov Murder in a Shul
I. DESECRATION Over the past few decades, the Jewish people has experienced an extraordinary number of terrorist attacks. While all evoke great pain over the loss, two stand out as carrying...
I. DESECRATION Over the past few decades, the Jewish people has experienced an extraordinary number of terrorist attacks. While all evoke great pain over the loss, two stand out as carrying...
A child‘s obligation to honor his parents necessarily infringes on that child’s freedom. Choosing a spouse is one of the most important decisions of a person’s life. On the one...
A charitable pledge constitutes a vow that must be fulfilled. However, like many vows, it can be nullified if proper regret is presented to a religious court, if it is...
The biblical lists of generations include descriptions of very long lives. For example, Adam lived 930 years (Gen. 5:5), Noach 950 (9:29), and the longest — Mesushelach 969 (5:27). How...
I. DAYS WITHOUT MALEI The Mishnah (Mo’ed Katan 27a) discusses when we eulogize someone before burial and when refrain from doing so. On days of communal happiness, a sad eulogy evokes...
I. ANGER IS BAD Anger is a destructive force. It does not just cloud judgment, which would imply reliance on instinct. Anger overwhelms judgment, taking you in directions to which your...
Can a ba’al teshuvah, someone who grew up non-observant, be appointed to a communal position, such as a pulpit rabbi? In the old days, the rabbi’s job was simply to...
Who wrote Koheles, the biblical book of Ecclesiastes? The traditional answer to the question of Koheles’ authorship is Shlomo Ha-Melekh, King Solomon, who according to tradition wrote Shir Ha-Shirim, Koheles...
We live in times of plenty, in a where the basic standard of living would have been considered a mere few decades ago to be a life of wealth and...
I. TESHUVAH AND NINEVEH Conventional wisdom has it that the book of Yonah is about power of teshuvah, repentance. But if that is the case, why is teshuvah barely mentioned? Of...