Mindful Torah...and more

As we prepare to enter Yom Kippur , the holiest day of the year, I would like to look at one of themost common texts of comfort in our tradition, Psalm 23, as a way to face the world in which we live moment to moment, and to help us in our task of Teshuvah (return or repentance). Though usually associated with funerals or the Yizkor (Memorial) service, Psalm 23 is a piece of biblical poetry that can speak to us in many different circumstances. In his book The Lord is My Shepherd Rabbi Harold Kushner analyzes the psalm line by line. I would like instead to break it into passages and analyze each of them with an eye towards understanding what the author might have meant when writing these words, what the words mean to me, and how I believe they can help us in our work of Teshuvah . I begin with the familiar opening passage: The Lord is My Shepherd, I shall not want. God makes me to lie down in green pastures, God leads me beside the still waters, and God restores my soul. God g...

This is a reworking of a Rosh Hashanah sermon I wrote a few years ago. I hope you find it meaningful. May you have a Shanah Tovah u'metukah-a good and sweet year! Shalom/Salaam, Rabbi Steve Nathan As this first day of the New Year begins and you sit in synagogue you may well ask yourself, "why on earth are we here?" You may think I’m joking, or perhaps just trying to wake you up from your slumber. Well, in part perhaps I am. But seriously I am asking you the question: “Why on earth are we here?” Are we here because it’s what we’ve always done? Are we here because it’s expected of us? Are we here because our parents, our spouse or children forced us to be? Are we here so we can be seen? Are we here so we can see? Or are we here because we feel like our life and soul are on the line and we need to pray with everything we’ve got? I would guess that most of us are here for a number of these reasons – if not all of them. But my hunch is that most of us ...

This week's Torah portion is Nitzavim-Vayelekh ( Devarim /Deuteronomy 29:9 - 31:30). It is one of seven parashiot /portions that is read as a double portion in a non-leap year order to assure that the entire Torah is read in the course of a single year. The parashah /portion is near the end of Moses' speeches to the people before he is to die. Nitzavim begins with Moses telling the people that he is addressing his remarks to all those who "stand this day, before the Eternal your God. To enter into the covenant God swore to your ancestors. I make this covenant, both with those who are standing here with us this day and with those who are not with us here this day." In the beginning of Vayelekh , Moses warns them that God has revealed to him that, after his death, "the people will go astray and worship alien gods. They will break the covenant that God had made with them. Many evils will then befall them, at which point they will say to themselves, "`surely it...

This week's parashah/portion is Ki Tavo (Devarim/Deuteronomy 26:1 - 29:8). The opening words, from which the parashah takes it's name (as always) mean "when you enter," and refers to the ritual that the people are meant to enact when they enter the Promised Land in the future and bring their first fruits to the priest. When the people bring the basket of first fruits to the priest we read (translation by Richard Elliot Friedman): "And the priest shall take the basket from your hand and set it down in front of the altar of YHWH, your God. And you shall answer and say in front of YHWH, your God: My father was a perishing Aramean, so he went down to Egypt and resided there with few persons and became a big, powerful and numerous nation there. And the Egyptians were bad to us and degraded us and imposed hard work on us. And we cried out to YHWH ... And YHWH brought us out from Egypt ... to this place and gave us this land ... and now, here, I've brought the first...

This week's parashah/portion Ki Tetzei (Devarim/Deuteronomy 21:10 – 25:19) contains one of the most disturbing, and frequently commented upon passages in the Torah: "If a man has a stubborn or rebellious son, who will nothearken to the voice of his father, or the voice of his mother, and though they discipline him, he will not listen to them; then his father and his mother shall take hold of him, and bring him out tothe elders of his city, and into the gate of his place; and they shall say to the elders of his city: `This son of ours is stubborn and rebellious, he does not listen to our voice; he is a glutton and a drunkard. And all the men of his city shall stone him with stones, that he die; so shall you put away the evil from your midst; and all Israel shall hear and fear." (21: 18-21)." The rabbis of the Talmud claim that this practice did not take place. Rather, they believe (or claimed) that these verses were included in the Torah in order to teach us. Or...

This week's Torah portion is Re'eh ( Devarim /Deuteronomy 11:26 - 16:17). This is a continuation of Moses' speech to the people before ascending Mt. Nebo to die. In this portion he warns the people that they face the choice between a life of blessings and a life of curses. He also urges them to follow God's commandments once they settle in the land. One of the most fascinating passages of the parashah /portion is when Moses describes the ritual that the people are to enact upon entering the Promised Land. The people are to stand between Mount Gerizim and Mount Ebal , both of which are on the "other side" of the Jordan. A series of curses are then to be pronounced from Mount Ebal and a series of blessings from Mount Gerizim . The blessings represent what will happen if they follow God's mitzvot /commandments and the curses will follow if they turn away from "the path that I enjoin upon you and follow other gods." This is followed immediat...

This week we read a double parasha/portion from the Torah, Hukat-Balak (Numbers/Be'midbar 19:1-25:9). This week I will focus only on the portion of Balak. In this narrative, Balak king of Midian, hires the magician Bilaam to curse the Israelites. However, no matter how hard he might try, he may only utter words of praise. On his way to Balak, Bilaam encounters a fiery angel on the path. However, Bilaam does not see the angel. Only his donkey, who stops in his tracks and refuses to move, see it. Finally, after Bilaam begins to beat the donkey in order to get him to move, the donkey miraculously begins to speak. To paraphrase, he says "you've known me all these years! Doesn't the fact that I stopped dead in my tracks tell you that something is wrong? Open your eyes!" In reading this section, the old adage "never assume" came to mind. And so, this midrashic poem on the parashah. Shabbat Shalom, Steve Nathan Never assume Never assume For when you do...