“When You’re Smilin’…” – Happy Purim!
"Rejoice on Purim till you can no longer distinguish between 'Cursed is Haman' and 'Blessed is Mordechai'." - Talmud Megillah 7b. The popular contemporary work, Nesivos Shalom, by the late Rebbe (Grand Rabbi) of the Slonim Hasidic sect, Rav Shalom Barzovsky ob"m,...
Give Project Genesis $1, and it won’t cost you a penny!
I have something unusual to share with you this week. Just in time for our Purim appeal, iGive.com sent us a challenge. We've been members of iGive for years, since they started as "eyeGive" and provided donations in return for clicks alone. Now they help us when you...
Clemency for Martin Grossman
I am very reluctant to get involved with an obviously parochial political matter. But I feel it is important to encourage everyone to participate in a plea for clemency for a mentally-impaired individual due to be killed by lethal injection early next week. 25 years...
Voices You Can See
This week, the Torah reading talks about the gathering at Mount Sinai, and receiving the Torah. And the Torah says that the people "saw" the voices, when Mount Sinai was covered with a cloud of smoke. Many commentaries speak about what this means, whether literally or...
“Let My People Go!”
This quotation, from this week's Torah reading, is surely one of the most well-known phrases in the Bible. And I have often pointed out that it's really a half-quote, distorted, read as a cry for freedom. In actuality, G-d is telling Pharaoh to give the Jews a new,...
A Jew is Immediate Family
In this week's reading, Moshe sees an Egyptian beating another Jew, and comes to his rescue -- killing the Egyptian taskmaster, and putting his own life in danger. Why did Moshe take such a terrible risk? The Jewish man is never identified by name. We never hear from...
