Food From Above

”Looking up, Abraham saw three men standing near him. As soon as he saw them, he ran from the entrance of his tent to greet them and, bowing to the ground, he said, “My lords, if it please you, do not go past your servant” (Genesis 18:2-3).   When I was 17 I learned about...
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Repetition, Compulsion, and Night Vision

Many of us are war-weary and disheartened this week as we open the final book of Torah—Devarim or Deuteronomy. The Rambam called this book Mishneh Torah (repetition of Torah), because so much of it contains Moshe’s retelling of the stories that our ancestors lived out in the 40 years’ walk through the Wilderness. The aged...
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At Our Season of Liberation, Black Lives Matter

Change in the air. Sugar-flecked red, yellow, orange, and green jelled semi-circle slices; macaroons; pounds of nuts; Barton’s tin can almond kisses; overflowing grocery bags. My mother and I shop among the street carts and small shops that dot Blake Avenue in East New York, Brooklyn. Although my family is not observant, the white gold-rimmed...
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“Mishpat Echad”

At the end of parashat Emor, our rabbis focus on a single phrase, “You shall have one justice for the stranger and the citizen alike, I am the Eternal.” (Leviticus 24: 22) We have to ask ourselves: how are we doing upholding the principle of equal justice? Let us begin with the great scholar who...
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The Times They Are Not A-Changing

Our Torah is a unique holy book and it is like none other. The torah takes us on a journey towards the Promised Land, but we never get there. The people who are in charge of our journey fail in their attempts at leadership. Our Torah portrays our leaders as fallible, mortal, and prone to...
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Rabbi Margo Hughes-Robinson

Beshalach: No More Solitary Confinement in NYC

There is a deep and abiding power in saying to those who have died as a result of solitary confinement. We cannot bring back those we lost, but we can sanctify their memories by continuing to fight for a city that is dedicated to human rights for all.
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Rabbi Jeremy Kridel

Chayei Sara: Calling Politicians to the City Gate this Election Day

“All politics is local.” That phrase was associated with the late U.S. Congressman and former Speaker of the House Tip O’Neill. This week features an Election Day. With so much of our attention focused on Israel and Gaza, we might be tempted to miss all the local and state elections happening this week. As if...
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Hope and a Listening Ear

I have now heard the moaning of the Israelites because the Egyptians are holding them in bondage, and I have remembered My covenant. (Exodus 6:5) It seems these days I have an endless array of guest speakers in my congregation: about the Syrian refugee crisis, about the death penalty, about homelessness, about the violence fraying...
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From Furious to Curious

I wonder how the story would have unfolded if God had been curious rather than furious, and if when Moses came down from the mountain and witnessed the dancing, he had been able to pause and observe, noticing the feelings arising and waiting to respond until his anger had quieted down. Was it reasonable to expect these newly freed slaves, who were just beginning to experiment with their sense of autonomy, to simply wait patiently for Moses to return? 
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No More Sarahs

Last April, I traveled to Washington D.C. to visit my son at college. Georgetown University is a great place and, by all accounts, safe. We were in the bookstore when, suddenly, the entire student center was on lockdown. A policeman explained that the night before two students had been robbed at gunpoint outside the business...
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