The person in modern times who most deeply experienced and expressed what Kohelet felt was Tolstoy.
Korach and Chukat are about the leadership G-d wants. It’s not about striking the rock. It’s about speaking truth to power.
Intellectual commandments and auditory commandments - and the differences between them.
The Reform Movement, like the Left, talks about equality until it is in a position of power.
3 Tammuz, is the Lubavitcher Rebbe's 26th Yom Hillula: "It is forbidden to relinquish any part of Israel to a Gentile, no matter how small."
No one, not Orthodox nor Reform, will win this battle, while our common enemy, assimilation and intermarriage, will continue to destroy.
“There is nothing more whole than a broken heart” -Rabbi Menachem Mendel of Kotzk.
The Tanya compacts four millennia of Jewish wisdom to answer the great personal and existential questions of life.
One can inherit something and not use it, but in this case, Hashem commands us to possess the land in our hearts and then with our actions.
Torah and Jewish mentality see disagreement as the ideal state of things, precisely because Judaism isn’t a religion of dogma and conflict.
No one knows when the proverbial roof will fall in on the galut, but the walls are shaking, the floor is rattling, and the roof is leaking.
If we can just look around us and enjoy the fruits of our land – “ha-Aretz”.- we will find the courage to see the good and be grrateful.
Two Torah ideas for two parasha readings: Shlach (Diaspora) and Korach (Israel)
Torah from Israel's first Chief Rabbi, the iconic leader of Religious Zionism.
Instituting a boycott against representatives of a Jewish movement is a grave and terrible method that endangers the nation
The great medieval commentator Ibn Ezra says that the entire nation of Israel carried with them through the wilderness a slave mentality.
Korach asked a good question: If the whole nation is holy, why are only priests allowed in the Temple? The answer has implications today.
One can define Korach's camp as an ideological group, except that it was tainted by the faults that bring down many failed ideologies.
Rabbi Eliezer Melamed's meeting with a Reform "Rabba" elicited critical responses from many of Israel's Zionist rabbis, such as this one.
The King's legion was designated to spread Torah throughout the land.
Divrei Torah for reading in Diaspora (Shlach) and Israel (Korach). Both speak about men who failed to live up to expectations.
Korach and his cohorts wanted power, not truth, not for the sake of heaven. Today Korachs are to be found when power silences other truths.
A Jew doesn't kneel before a president or a king. He certainly doesn't kneel before an activist for crimes he didn't commit.
Instead of just waiting, let’s make Mashiach's job easier!
Drivng a car is more dangerous than gong to shul if you keep the rules. So why are the shuls still closed?
The Tanya compacts four millennia of Jewish wisdom to answer the great personal and existential questions of life.
Our Sages see this mitzva as a pre-condition’ to entering the Land,a contra to the spies who should have kissed its stones and thanked G-d.
It doesn’t matter how angry you are there is nothing that can justify crime. And it is the government's job to protect us, not stand aside.
What is it that gave these very different men, Joshua and Calev, the strength to perceive what the others missed?
The “Deal of the Century” is basically positive, but must not include concessions on Eretz Yisrael and creating a Palestinian state.
The very fact that so many gentile countries are opposed to our annexation is an indication that we should annex now!
One little word betrayed the spies' motives in Parashat Shlach (Israel), and one letter shows the place of Eretz Yisrael in Judaism.
The symbolism in the trumpets of Parashat Beha'alotcha (Diaspora).
Thoughts on the parsha from Israel's first Ashkenazic Chief Rabbi, the iconic leader of Religious Zionism.
For much of Jewish history, the Jews were absent from the Land of Israel. Because of this, it became an imagined place of perfection.
Even the Patriarch Abraham's homeland was not Israel, so what was his connection with the land - and ours today?
Two divrei Torah for the two readings this week, one in the Diaspora and the other in Israel.
Teaching in the age of coronavirus. What is a teacher to do? What would Aaron do? (For Beha'alotcha.)
In any critical situation, we need to ask: “What is happening? Of what story is this a part?" (For Shlach)
Mayor of New York, David Dinkins visited the Rebbe after the 1991 race riots that victimized Jews. Here is their conversation.
The Tanya compacts four millennia of Jewish wisdom to answer the great personal and existential questions of life.
An earthquake does not mean the world is coming to an end.
There are things that are simply not abrogated at any price: Torah, loyalty, love, one's spouse, famly, and Eretz Yisrael.
The inmates were so comfortable in prison that they refused to leave when the walls came down. What is the parable telling us?
The life of Rabbi Meshulam Rata (Roth) is not well known, though Rabbi Tzvi Yehuda called him the Gadol HaDor after his father's generation.
A parable in Mendele Mocher Seforim, the "grandfather of Yiddish literature," that takes place in an old-time shtetl, tells it all.
Sharing an outlook from Rav Yitzchok Hutner in these troubling times.
As we journey through this age of corona, we must remind ourselves of an opportunity even during tragedy to renew our relationship with God.
Israel is a land where the miraculous and the natural are indistinguishable .That was true in the time of Joshua and even more in our days.
The uncertainty of the future that is descending upon us can make us anxious but we have to live with the fact that the world has changed.
Torah from Israel's first Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi, Torah Luminary and iconic leader of Religious Zionism.
Remembering Hashem in tmes of trouble and rejoicing, remembering that we are one nation.
The Torah's thoughts on childrearing are all to be found in the name of this week's (Diaspora) Torah reading.
Things seem to be piling up just now - corona, riots in the USA, economic difficulties and more, but in the long term, they are improving..
Life in the US may change drastically for young adults in the wake off local law enforcement's failure to deal effectively with the riots.
When we are alone, He is with us. Great heroes of the human spirit met God in the silence of the lonely soul and felt His embrace.
Why didn’t Moshe rebuke Miriam and Aharon? It is a mitzva to rebuke a fellow Jew in a way that will make him realize his error.
How do you know you really love someone? When you stop caring what they think of you. The love is stronger than fear of what they may think.
Is He punishing those who most oppressed the Jewish people, throughout the ages?
