דברים - שבת חזון
חזון ישראל ישנם חזיונות וישנם סיוטים. בפרשת השבוע ובהפטרה שלה אנחנו מקבלים קצת משניהם. כשמשה מתחיל את הנאום האחרון הגדול שהוא נושא בפני עמו האהוב, הוא מזהיר את העם מפני סכנות עתידיות ומזכיר לו את השגיאות...
DVARIM – CHAZON
There are visions and there are nightmares. This week’s parsha and haftorah provides us with a little of both. As Moshe begins his final great oration to his beloved people he warns of the dangerous future and reminds the people of the tragic and costly errors of the past. Moshe is the person of vision. He is shown the entire story of the Jewish people throughout all...
MENACHEM AV
Though the month of Av carries with a title – menachem – meaning comfort and consolation, it nevertheless remains the saddest and most disturbing month of the Jewish calendar. Comfort is a great and necessary word but as a true concept and reality it is very difficult to obtain. This is particularly true for individuals reeling from the loss of a beloved one but it is...
MATOT – MASEI
The reading of the book of Bamidbar concludes this week with the parshiyot of Matot and Masei. Jews are inveterate travelers. The long exile that we have suffered has of necessity forced us to travel a great deal. There is almost no place in the world that we have not visited, settled and eventually moved from to a different location. Thus the recording of all of the travels and...
THE THREE WEEKS
Jews are good at mourning. We have had a lot of practice doing so over the many past centuries and certainly over this last past one. Jewish suffering, many times accepted with stoicism, nevertheless was immortalized in the rituals and traditions of the liturgy and practices of Jewish life. This week marked the beginning of a three week period of mourning which will culminate on...
PINCHAS
The Jewish people go to war against Midian in this week’s parsha. This war can be described as a preventive war – striking before the enemy strikes again against you – and even as a war of revenge and punishment over the culpability of Midian in the death of twenty four thousand Jews due to their willful planned seduction by the women of Midian. In this war the...
BOREDOM
The most dreaded words that a parent, teacher or guardian can here from one’s child, student or ward is “I am bored.” The rabbis of the Talmud long ago cautioned us against boredom as a state of mind that brings one to desolation, depression and even anti-social behavior. Now that the schools are out for the summer vacation the question of what to do with the young is a...
BALAK
There is an old adage in both the Jewish and non-Jewish world which states something like this: “I can deal with my enemies but Lord please help me with my friends.” The problem figure in this week’s parsha is not so much Balak, who is easily identified as the enemy of the Jewish people, as it is Bilaam whose mouth utters soaring blessings and compliments to the Jews. ...
TRUTH
The Torah extols the value of truth as an absolute virtue. The Torah teaches us to stand firmly away from falsehood. Even though the technical application of this value in halacha is apparently limited to legal and evidentiary matters the value of truth in Judaism as a general axiom is unquestioned. Yet the Torah itself allows for the situations when ultimate truth can be...
CHUKAT
The sad story of Moshe’s fate in not being able to reach the Land of Israel is detailed in this week’s parsha. The commentators to the Torah have spent a great deal of effort and clarity in attempting to explain Moshe’s seeming sin and its attendant punishment of exclusion from accompanying the people of Israel into the Land of Israel. What does emerge...
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