Our Torah portion talks of the 50 days between Passover and Shavuot commonly known as Sefirat Ha-omer. From a biblical perspective, these days relate to the barley offering brought on the second day ...

For the uninitiated, Rabbi Aharon Chaim Zimmerman is known as an eccentric rosh yeshiva and Jewish intellectual who flourished in the second half of the 20 th century. Rabbi Zimmerman was born in 1914 ...

I do believe in my heart of hearts that all Torah portions are awesome, but if I had to pick a favorite, it would be the Torah portion we read this past Shabbat, Yitro (Exodus 18:1–20:23). There is so ...

The prerequisite to understanding any story is answering the question: What is its genre? This might seem like an easy task, but it’s really not. Let’s say that someone gets offended by a joke. The ...

A famous rabbinic principle of interpretation holds, “There is no such thing as early or late in the Torah.” At first glance, this is rather mysterious, because the Torah seems to tell a story that, ...

As we begin the new Torah cycle, let’s take a moment to contemplate the deeper purpose of Torah. Some may refer to the Torah as a history book; others may think of it as a book of law or a source of ...

A week or so ago, some leftist organizations, nominally “Jewish,” held a demonstration advocating for abortion on demand. Surely, our First Amendment encourages people to rally, associate publicly, ...