Am I a Seasoned Chicken?
Our Torah portion begins with an instruction for soldiers going out to war. Throughout the ages, soldiers often regarded the most primitive and bestial conduct as legitimate with regards to the citizens of conquered territory. The Jewish soldier was, perhaps...
PG Tweets
We're "Tweeting" for Torah! Twitter is a rapidly-growing phenomenon in the area of "social networking," which people use to provide brief updates to others on what they are doing, "deeds great and small." Given its positive uses, we've begun to post to Twitter so that...
A Nation’s Heroes
I believe that you learn a lot about a culture from its heroes. If you need evidence that the European High Middle Ages were murderous, brutal and primitive, look at the heroes of the age -- they were warriors, not scientists, and so murderous that a healthy dose of...
Make a Best Effort, and With G-d’s Help…
At my son's eighth grade Seudas Preida (lit. "departure meal," or graduation dinner), each graduate was asked to say a brief thought. My wife gets the credit for finding a very apt thought on this week's reading. The Torah tells us that the spies went into the Land of...
Shabbos Rally and Feedback from our Readers
This May 29-30 will be Shavuot, the Holiday that celebrates the acceptance of the Torah. Our Shavuos section features many articles about this important, yet somewhat neglected holiday -- please have a look! Speaking of which, my apologies for "getting ahead of...
The Message of the Tablets
This Shabbos, Jewish congregations around the world read Parshas Yisro, which describes our receiving the Torah at Mt. Sinai. G-d made Ten Dibros, or Declarations (commonly referred to as the Ten Commandments, but by all accounts there are more than ten Mitzvos...
Hidden Miracles
Our Sages teach that Moshe's father, Amram, withdrew from his wife because of Pharoah's cruel decree that the midwives should kill any male Jewish child. His daughter Miriam protested, saying that because of him there would be no Jewish girls, either -- and he...
Mourning the Destruction of the Temples and Exile
During this month, on the seventeenth day of Tammuz, we begin the period of mourning for the destruction of the Temples and the Jewish exile. In the Ashkenazic world, there are no weddings until after Tisha B’Av and enjoyable occasions and trips are minimized. The...
The True Nature of Humility & Mazel Tov Wishes
"And the man, Moshe, was extremely humble, more than any man on the face of the earth." [12:3] Some people think that to be humble means to think nothing of yourself. But obviously, Moshe could not be quite so self-effacing. He was able to face the entire Nation of...
Daily Omer Reminders
Shavuos is the only holiday on the Jewish calendar without a set date. This is because it is always 51 days after the beginning of Passover, regardless of whether the Hebrew months in between have 29 or 30 days. After the beginning of Passover, the date of the Exodus,...
So Much to Study, When Do I Sleep?
It's unfair. Passover is almost upon us and we're offering you so much material to prepare for this sensational holiday... when is there even time to sleep?? Fortunately, this year Passover follows the Sabbath, known as the Day of Rest. If you pull an all-nighter...
Connect to Judaism with TorahMedia.com
By now, I'm sure you are familiar with our TorahMedia system, which provides thousands of hours of classes from an incredibly diverse array of teachers, digitally recorded and available for download. Recently we launched our new TorahMedia.com Newsletter, and your...
