![](https://truah.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/Torah-2020-square-1024x1024.jpg)
![](https://truah.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/Torah-2020-square-1024x1024.jpg)
![](https://truah.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/1-AASC_2901-2-1024x682.jpg)
Loving Israel with all of my Jewishness: A Photo Essay
In words and photographs, activist Gili Getz explores his complex relationship with the State of Israel. A d'var Torah for Parshat Kedoshim and Yom HaAtzma'ut.
read more
![](https://truah.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/liberty-bell.png)
It’s Not Enough to “Proclaim Liberty.” We Have to Do the Work.
In this d'var Torah for Behar-Bechukotai, Rabbi Sally Priesand draws connections between the Liberty Bell and other symbols and ensuring liberty in civic life.
read more
![](https://truah.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/Rachel_Gartner.jpg)
Balak and Solitary: Dealing With Our Desire To Curse Those Who Harm Us
"In this reorientation from one way of doing things to a better one lies the relevance, power, and teaching for our broken criminal justice system today."
read more
![](https://truah.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/Monica-Headshot2-263x300.jpg)
Envisioning a Just Society
In parshat Ki Tetze we encounter the case of the ben sorer u’moreh, the wayward and rebellious son. We read in Devarim 21:18-21 that if a child does not obey his mother and father they should bring him out to the gates of the city before a council of elders, publicly declare him a glutton...
read more
![](https://truah.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/Danya-Ruttenberg-e1482104000409.jpg)
Sent Out of the Camp
This week’s parashah deals with a somewhat puzzling disease, called tzara’at, often translated as “leprosy.” As the Torah describes it, it’s an affliction that could appear on human skin, on clothes, or even infect houses. It’s not clear if the affliction is truly physical, as Leviticus seems to indicate, or if it’s a physical manifestation of...
read more
![](https://truah.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/Annie-Tucker-2-682x1024.jpg)
Safe Homes. Healthy Relationships. Strong Women.
A number of years ago, my good friend Shira and I dressed up for Purim festivities on the Upper West Side of Manhattan. My costume consisted of platform sandals, bell-bottoms, and a bohemian tunic, my hair parted down the middle and secured with a colorful head-band. Shira wore blue jeans, a tiara, and a black...
read more
![](https://truah.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/MimiMicner_sq.jpg)
Holy Disruption
You could imagine the look on people’s faces when a group of rabbis, donned in kippot and talitot, walked into their Publix Supermarket in Florida this past December. On a delegation to support the Coalition of Immokalee Workers (CIW) in their fight for dignity and human rights for Florida tomato farmers, we went to the...
read more
![](https://truah.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/steven-chester-cropped.jpg)
Interest Free
It was not what one might call a typical Jewish family. She was a single mother with three children. One was a teenager and two were under five years old. Each child had a different father and the woman was living on SSI. The teenager had gone through our religious school and was now attending...
read more
![](https://truah.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/Kim-Blumenthal-e1482094596421.jpg)
Opening the Narrow Straits with Advance Care Planning
We have come to the end of Genesis, and with it the conclusion of the stories of our matriarchs and patriarchs. For the last several weeks we have been engaged with the stories of the children of Jacob, focusing mainly on his favored son, Joseph. Now Joseph is on his deathbed. We are privy to...
read more