Torah

Love and Awe

Love can purify awe of both an impulse toward paralysis and an impulse toward self-hatred. Continue Reading »

16 Aug 2019

The Spirit of Speech

Speech, especially vows, allows man to follow in the ways of God by creating something out of nothing. Continue Reading »

8 Aug 2019

Modern spokesmen for traditional Judaism have consistently expressed reservations about capital punishment. While the biblical texts seem to provide many opportunities for the death penalty, the normative Talmudic interpretations in effect make these punishments inapplicable. For example, the bar of . . . . Continue Reading »

1 Jan 2019

“Teach Torah and Fight for Justice”

by Shalom Carmy

In Jewish law, tikkun olam means improving the world. It refers to several rabbinic enactments of the first and second centuries of the Common Era intended to improve the functioning of certain social institutions. The ancient Aleinu prayer, originating in the Rosh Hashanah . . . . Continue Reading »

1 Dec 2018

The Proper Business of Mankind

by Shalom Carmy

Elijah, the great scholar (Gaon) of Vilna in the eighteenth century, is synonymous with total devotion to Torah study above all other pursuits. Paradoxically, because he held that deficiency in mundane wisdom leads to deficient understanding of God’s word, he has also become an emblem for . . . . Continue Reading »

1 Nov 2018

The Rav

by Mark Gottlieb

Twenty-five years ago this past April (20 Nisan 5753), thousands of Jews, their affiliations ranging across and beyond denominational lines, boarded buses for the Maimonides School in Brookline, Massachusetts. There, they paid their final respects to a figure known to his students and . . . . Continue Reading »

1 Nov 2018

What Are You Looking For?

by Marc Gellman

In Genesis 37:15 we read the story of how Joseph arrived in the town of Shechem in search of his brothers and his father’s flocks that they were pasturing. Joseph had been sent by his father Jacob to Shechem, not just to bring back word about his sheep and goats, but, primarily, to give Joseph a . . . . Continue Reading »

1 Mar 1997

The Unmodern Jew

by David Singer

Iwould like to have an answer. . . . If someone will be good enough to provide the answer I will gladly take his change of garments to the bathhouse for him.” The bit about the change of garments and the bathhouse is talmudic phraseology from tractate Eruvin (27b), indicating a matter . . . . Continue Reading »

1 Jun 1991