The Ninth of Av is nearly upon us -- the saddest day on the Jewish calendar, the date when both Temples were destroyed and many other tragedies occurred. The Rabbis teach that while the First Temple was destroyed because of immorality, the Second Temple was destroyed...

During the 3 weeks from 17 Tammuz leading up to Tisha B'Av, the 9th of Av, the Jewish people mourn the loss of the Holy Temple. The Talmud attributes this loss to the prevalence of Sinas Chinam, baseless hatred, among the Jewish people. While hatred towards others is...

In this week's reading, Pinchas was rewarded for taking action on behalf of Israel. One of the Princes of the Jewish People had "disturbed the peace" between Israel and G-d, and Pinchas restored that peace. This week, our peace was again shattered, this time by a...

How many can look in the mirror and smile at themselves? Babies have no problem doing this. Is this what maturity brings? Rashi in his Torah commentary compares the process of the Red Heifer, used to cleanse one of the spiritual impurity of contact with a corpse, to a...

Like every part of the Torah, the story of Korach, who led a Levite rebellion against the authority of Moshe and the Kohanim, is filled with multiple layers of meaning and message. One lesson that has always spoken to me is about the nature of arguments. In the...

Rabbi Eliezer Silver zt"l was a leader and acitivist who saved thousands of Jewish lives during the Holocaust. After the liberation of the Nazi death camps, he tried to revive the spirit of Judaism among the survivors. One of his many activities was organizing prayer...