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To put our trust in the gods of militarism and brute strength, to conflate the presence of God with armed combat, is to succumb to idolatry, to assimilate into a culture that conflates might and morality, violence and virtue.

But whether or not the Sinai wilderness was ever ownerless as the midrash suggests, in North America, the so-called wildernesses never have been. Those places — and indeed every square mile of North America — have always been, and continue to be, the home of specific tribes of Indigenous peoples.

That’s how I found myself chanting and marching, yelling to children that they were not forgotten, that they were loved – while holding the hand of my youngest son, whom I love so much it hurts. Having a child is like letting your heart walk around outside of your body.

This week's Torah reading of Parshat Kedoshim questions us about our human relationships, how we treat our siblings, and how we relate to our neighbors to make this world a better place to live. So here I go back to the beginning. When I read in Kedoshim, "Do not stand before the blood of your neighbor" (Leviticus 19:16), I feel the moral obligation to shout that it is not nationality that makes a life something sacred and that we have the responsibility to watch over our neighbors.

The experiences of those returning from incarceration recall the Torah’s description of someone with tzara’at, an infectious and highly stigmatized skin disease. 

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.

I wonder if, this year, the lachma anya, the matzah that represents deprivation, can help us bring some meaning to the wait. While for many months our deprivation has been uncontrolled, now it is controlled, in that we can realistically hope and pray and plan for a future of abundance. 

"If we want our vaunted “Temple of Democracy” to contain actual holiness, it means we all must be able to build it up." A d'var Torah for Parshat Vayakhel-Pekudei by Amelia Wolf.

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? 

A D’var Torah for Purim by Rabbi Micah Buck-Yael As a Queer and Trans Jew, Purim has long held a special place in my heart as a holiday that envisions a world in which oppression can be turned upside down, in which coming out can be liberatory and world-changing, and miracles come to life through...