When writing about the yetzer hara, the “evil inclination,” rabbis have grappled with the exalted algebra that if God created everything, then God must have also created this inclination. Thus, even this “evil” part of us must have some essence of the divine.
My issue with the climate movement is that in focusing on small individual responsibilities like paper straws and meatless Mondays, we fail to address bigger, systemic issues like animal agriculture, food deserts, and how billionaires can but are electing to not end hunger in America.
Sukkot is a holiday to celebrate the harvest, and though I was three stories above the earth, I celebrated my own harvest: a place to live, groceries in my fridge, a job, quiet neighbors, a laundromat down the street.
One of my favorite sweets for as long as I can remember is baklava – flakey layers of buttery filo and crunchy nuts, all soaked through with a special honey-sugar syrup until each piece is heavy with gooey goodness. I think there must be some genetic imprinting from my Sephardic ancestors who spent centuries in the Ottoman Empire for me to love it as much as I do.
Today, I am listening for what this chapter has to teach us about healing from an ancient Jewish perspective, because I want to understand how we, as Jews, have learned to heal.
The texts with which we pray, I have come to believe, should serve as a verbal technology for spiritual connection, allowing us to enter into them with relative ease so that they can be used to encounter the divine. To alter the text of the liturgy is not to censor it, it is to refine its power as a tool of worship in a particular time and place.
Looking at the mountains before us, I find that spiritual place I longed for on one of the highest of holy days. Reciting the Shema brings tears to my eyes.
Not only could women solve some of the most intractable problems around the globe, but that more attention – and funds – must be designated to make these efforts successful.
We wanted Jewish communities to demonstrate this solidarity with immigrants, refugees, and asylum seekers on Tisha B’Av, a Jewish day of mourning. As we remembered the catastrophes that have befallen the Jewish people, we pointed to the current catastrophe of immigration policy unfolding before us.
