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Beshalach: Scarcity and Sustenance — What Is Enough?
In a time when manna no longer falls from the sky, its ethic becomes our responsibility. By rejecting the culture of excess, using Shabbat as a tool of resistance, and fostering communities of care, we can work toward building the society that our parshah invites us to imagine.
Rabbi Jill Jacobs’ prayer for Minnesota, National Prayer Call for Minnesota 1.23.26
Words of prayer from Rabbi Jill Jacobs in support of Minnesota.
The Trials and Tribulations of Paying Attention
Recently, I was with a group of students on an early morning nature walk. I tried to create a moment that I was hoping would be a different kind of prayer experience. Rather than read or chant through the prayers, we tried to experience them with the benefit of Mother Nature. It soon became clear...
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Cleaning up the mess together
One of my favorite programs at my synagogue is our B’nei Mitzvah family retreat. At the beginning of the summer, we take our incoming seventh grade families to camp for the weekend. It’s remarkable: relationships between kids change, parents get to know each other, and, after the Bar or Bat Mitzvah, we keep most of...
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Power and Transformation
The intersection of Parshat Miketz and Hanukah invites us to reflect on two different ways in which transformational impact can be effected, and the importance of understanding the nuances of each. We see two drastically different models of power and change in these stories. In Miketz, Joseph—an Israelite foreigner in Egypt who, by happenstance, is granted an...
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The Coming Flood
Last week’s parshah, Breshit, shows God feeling a bit of buyer’s remorse. The brand new world that was tov me’od, very good, in Genesis 1:31 suddenly appeared, by the opening verses of chapter 6, to be ra, evil. We were left on a cliffhanger—all the people are evil, God wants to blot them out, and...
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Starting Again, and Again
Once again, all over again, we are beginning at the beginning of the Torah this week. Bereshit bara Elokim et hashamayim v’et ha’aretz, “In the beginning G-d created heaven and earth”, at least according to one translation. Haven’t we done this already? Do we really have to go back and consider the beginning again, and...
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