Human Rights In Progress (Slowly)
Rabbi J. Fred Schwalb traces the history of women's rights in the Torah and offers a prayer for the continued evolution of our ideas.
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Not Striking the Rock Again (Parshat Chukat)
For Parshat Chukat, Rabbi Benjamin Barnett writes about the challenges facing Israel's Bedouin.
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Vayigash: Can We Dream Bigger?
What I think is needed in Israel and the occupied Palestinian territories today is the will to break the chain of the blame-game. We need a new generation of dreamers — those who can imagine a future of peace and prosperity for both Palestinians and Israelis together.
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Inescapable Face
“There is a commandment in the appearance of the face, as if a master spoke to me. However, at the same time, the face of the Other is destitute; it is the poor for whom I can do all, and to whom I owe all. “ —Emmanuel Levinas Rabbi Joshua, the son of Levi, said: at...
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Heart of a Stranger: The Jewish Historical Memory of Torture
You shall not oppress a stranger, for you know the heart of the stranger, having yourselves been strangers in the land of Egypt. -Ex. 23:9 You were strangers in the land of Egypt reminds us that we have experienced the great suffering that one in a foreign land feels. By remembering the pain which we...
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Embodying “Never Again”: Learning the Lessons of Pesach in time for Yom HaShoah
The horror stories we’re hearing about Uyghur people taken in the night, being separated from their families, having their heads shaved, put on trains, interned, forced into slave labor, and systematically murdered are all too familiar to the Jewish community.
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