Once we used to celebrate Shavuot as the harvest festival that linked the first barley crop, which was dedicated on Pesach, with the wheat harvest 49 days later. I often hear people say pejoratively that our festivals and laws are based on earlier, primitive systems and are therefore somehow inauthentic. They may be, in the way that a modern automobile…
More on Shechita
It comes as no surprise to me that more European countries are trying to make life difficult for Jews in various ways. But how should we react? Is it worth fighting prejudice? Should this be an issue of freedom of religious practice? But then what are the boundaries? The increasing attempts to restrict Shechita (Jewish ritual slaughter) and ban circumcision…
How To Be Good
When I was a kid, I used to wonder why it was that some children in my circles seemed naturally better and sweeter than others, who seemed naturally evil and nasty. Why did some seem to be so much more religious and obedient than others? I found discipline hard to endure, rituals difficult to observe. I was a natural-born rebel,…
Independence Day
Israel’s Independence Day, Yom Ha’atzmaut, brings out the best and the worst in us. We cannot agree on what it means, and we cannot agree on how to celebrate or recognize it. For all the biblical miracles, after 2,000 years of exile and oppression, the reconstitution of a Jewish independent state strikes me as the most miraculous of events that…
The Hebrew Language
Where did the Hebrew language come from? When did it begin? What language does God speak? And for that matter what language did the snake use to converse with Eve in the Garden of Eden? Is Modern Hebrew a development out of Biblical Hebrew, or is it really a new and different language? Questions such as these have challenged us…
Eliyahu
This is a sad story. For obvious reasons, I am changing names and certain details to protect the memory of a brilliant, flawed person. Eliyahu was one of the most amazing and talented people I have ever met. It was in 1968. I was a young rabbi appointed to the largest synagogue in Scotland and something of a celebrity in…