Building Beloved Community…Creating Rewarding Conclusions

In Parashat VaYechi, Jacob is reaching the end of his life, yet the opening words quantify his life. “Jacob lived seventeen years in the land of Egypt, so that the span of Jacob’s life came to one hundred and forty-seven years.” (Genesis 47:28) Most commentators see this statement as a recognition that finally, Jacob is...
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Your Joy Is Your Sorrow Unmasked

A week ago Sunday, marked by the new moon of the Jewish month of Adar, I spent the day at the Mount Carmel Cemetery in Northeast Philadelphia, bearing witness to the desecration of 539 gravestones. Joining with Muslim, Quaker and Christian neighbors, people of faith and conscience, our hands in the earth restoring headstones, as...
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May Your Clothes Never Wear Out

This d’var Torah is sponsored by Bob Rottenberg in honor of his good friend and sofer, Rabbi Kevin Hale of Western Massachusetts, for above-and-beyond work reconstructing his aging tefillin.  It was torture wandering in the desert, those forty years, and the Israelites let everyone know it. Over and over, throughout the books of Exodus and Numbers,...
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A Meditation on Voting

Download and print out this prayer, in both Hebrew and English. It may be used by individuals or in a communal setting during election season or on Election Day itself. If Version 1 prints badly for you, try Version 2, which has a plainer layout. Or simply read the English text below: A Meditation on...
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True Shalom for Planet Earth

“‘Shalom! Shalom!’ (They say.) But there is no Shalom.” (Jeremiah 6:14) The prophet Jeremiah lambasted the leaders of Jerusalem for declaring that everything was well and for making light of the very real dangers he perceived. Of course, they didn’t listen. The role of prophet seems designed for frustration. A prophet (1) calls out foreseeable disaster;...
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Blowback and Other Surprising Consequences

US government policies have consequences—both foreseen and unforeseen. Thirty years ago, we armed Afghani rebels, the mujahedeen, in their fight against the Soviet Union, the so-called “evil empire.” One of those rebels was named Osama bin Laden, and you know the rest of that story. The CIA has a term for this kind of operation gone...
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Technicalities, Flames, and Democracy

Before I was a rabbi, I was a lawyer. Most of my legal career was spent assessing almost-inevitably doomed appeals. These were often criminal cases based upon what are popularly called “technicalities.” That work came back to me when I read the story of Nadav and Avihu, to which we return again this week in parshat...
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