What and Whom Are You Letting In? In this week’s Parsha, the Jewish people stand at the edge of a new chapter. They’re about to enter the Land of Israel after 40 years of wandering in the desert. Just before G-d commands them to go in, He gives them a very specific warning:You will drive […]
Messages from 2025
From Routine to Radiance: When Small Acts Become Sacred This week’s parsha introduces the laws of inheritance—because of five remarkable women: the daughters of Tzelafchad. Here’s the claim they presented to Moshe: “Our father died in the desert. He was not among Korach’s faction, who protested against G-d, but died because of his own sin. […]
:Lessons from a 90-Year-Old Skydiver and Parshas Balak This week in Salisbury, North Carolina, a 90-year-old man did something extraordinary: he jumped out of a plane at 14,000 feet. But that wasn’t even the most daring part—Ray Schehr later admitted he hadn’t told his wife he was going skydiving. Let’s pause for a moment and admire this […]
Look Up and Wake Up: The Snake, the Soul, and the Gaze That Heals In one of the more surprising episodes in the Torah, G-d instructs Moses to craft a copper snake and place it on a pole. When the Jewish people, suffering from deadly snake bites after complaining about the manna, looked at it—they […]
Hold On to Your Staff: Hold On to Your Dreams Life happens; we get busy, tired, distracted—and many times discouraged. Dreams that we once felt were in our reach slowly fade until, sometimes, we forget we ever had it at all. But in Jewish consciousness there’s a surprising lesson this week about holding on to […]
Israel at War—And the Inner War We Must Win First וַנְּהִ֤י בְעֵינֵ֙ינוּ֙ כַּֽחֲגָבִ֔ים וְכֵ֥ן הָיִ֖ינוּ בְּעֵינֵיהֶֽם and we were like grasshoppers in our eyes, and so we appeared in their eyes. (Num. 13:33) Sometimes the hardest thing isn’t believing in G-d—it’s believing in ourselves. That’s exactly what went wrong in one of the darkest moments of […]
Because You Matter: What Leviim Teach Us About Community In the 1920s, an electric company called Hawthorne Works in Illinois ran a series of experiments to see how they could help their workers be more productive. First, they tried changing the lighting in the factory—and productivity went up. But after the experiment ended, the improvements […]
You’re Not a Failure — You’re in the Middle of Becoming You In this week’s parsha, the Jewish people complete the Mishkan — a sacred, beautiful space they carried with them through the desert to connect with G-d. But here’s something surprising: for seven days, Moses built the Mishkan each morning — and then took […]
How a Snack Made History: Boaz, Ruth, and the Original Viral Moment In 2007, an employee of a New Jersey Dunkin Donuts named Dustin Hoffmann (not that one) made news when the store was nearly robbed by a serial robber who jumped on the counter grabbing the cash out of the cashiers’ register. The twenty-something Hoffmann fought […]
Breakdown to Breakthrough: Finding Purpose in the PainOver the past few years, psychologists have been exploring how people respond to crisis — whether it’s a personal loss, a war, or a global challenge. One study from 2023, published in the International Journal of Applied Positive Psychology — interestingly from Israel, just months before the war — found […]
Qatar’s Cyber trucks and the Menorah’s Flame: A Lesson in Authenticity This week was a major moment on the world stage. One of the Israeli hostages, Edan Alexander, was finally released. But while that should have been cause for unity, something strange happened: Israel wasn’t even involved in the negotiations. President Trump traveled to Qatar, a […]
Rabbi O’s Weekly Parsha: Acharei Mot-Kedoshim (Leviticus 16-20)Empathy Without Order: Judaism’s Response to Animal Rights ExtremesIn 2003, a terrorist attack in Israel was narrowly averted. A donkey, strapped with explosives, was sent toward an Israeli bus. Thankfully, the bomb went off too early — no human lives were lost, only the donkey was killed. Shortly afterward, PETA […]
The $41 Million Wakeup Call: What Shedeur Sanders and the Torah Teach About U-Turns Sometimes, the most powerful lessons about life don’t come from a holy book or a spiritual teacher—they come from unexpected places—like a football field or a skin condition described in an ancient Torah portion. At first glance, these two stories […]
A New Pair of Glasses There is a non-kosher bird mentioned in the Torah called the Ra’ah. Scholars are not certain exactly which bird it is; many think it’s a buzzard or vulture. It is called Ra’ah (literally to see) because it can see very far and can spot a carcass from an incredible distance. Rav Meir Shapiro (1887-1933) […]
The Sea Didn’t Just Drown the Egyptians, it Drowned Their Power Over Our MindsImmediately after the Jews walked through the Red Sea, they reacted in a peculiar way. And on that day, G-d saved Israel from the hand of Egypt, and Israel saw Egypt dead on the seashore. (Exodus 14:30)But wait a second—weren’t the Israelites already […]
Kintsugi Judaism: Honoring the Breaks, Celebrating the Repair This morning, I ran into a friend who is a collector of fine art. He mentioned his interest in Kintsugi, the Japanese art of reassembling broken ceramic vessels and sealing the cracks with gold. Two central ideas emerge from this: don’t discard something just because it’s broken, […]
The Call Your Didn’t ExpectIf you’ve ever looked closely at a Torah scroll, even if you can’t read Hebrew, you’ll notice that every letter is carefully written—but, in this week’s Parsha, something surprising jumps out; the last letter of the first word is an aleph, but it’s written smaller than all the other letters. Why?The small […]
From Dunkin to Divine: What We Really Make“And they brought the Mishkan to Moses…”After the construction of the Mishkan (Tabernacle) was complete, the people brought all its components to Moses. He then stood up the walls and erected the structure. But there’s a striking Midrash, quoted by Rashi, that raises a question: The materials were too […]
The Women Who Carried Us This week’s parsha introduces what is arguably the first recorded fundraising campaign in Jewish history: Moses said to the entire assembly of the Children of Israel: This is the word that G-d has commanded, saying: Take from yourselves a portion for G-d… everyone whose heart motivates him shall bring it… (Ex. […]
Purim 5785-2025 A Sister Who Wouldn’t One of the puzzling aspects of the Purim story is Esther’s decision to invite Haman—the arch-enemy of the Jews—to a banquet with King Achashverosh. Ostensibly, she did this to plead with the king to rescind the decree against the Jews, but why invite the very person responsible for their […]
When Flaws Become Features”You shall place both stones on the shoulder straps of the ephod, remembrancestones for the Children of Israel.” (Exodus 28:12)Moses was commanded to make special garments for the Kohen Gadol—the High Priest. Among these was a garment resembling an apron, called the ephod. On its shoulder straps were two precious stones engraved with the names […]
The Gift You Were Born to Give Anyone with familiarity with Jewish communities knows that capital campaigns are par for the course. The first Jewish fund-raising drive in history is when Moses asks the people to contribute to the Tabernacle, the portable synagogue accompanying the Jews throughout the desert and even when they first entered […]
Consider the Possibility that You Are a ThiefAnd these are the ordinances that you will place before them. (ibid. 21:1)A sizeable quantity of this week’s Torah portion deals with the laws of theft and damage. What significance is there in giving these laws immediately after the Ten Commandments and revelation at Sinai (last week’s Torah portion)? Here’s […]
Email and Mt. Sinai An article in the Wall Street Journal mentions a new way for companies to reach their customers: email. Yes, the medium that many deem as archaic and, on its way out, is actually making a comeback for certain purposes. In fact, recent studies have shown that money spent on email marketing is more effective […]
If Only I Saw a Miracle (Then I Would Change) This week’s parsha introduces us to the concept of manna, the heavenly bread that nourished the Israelites in the wilderness. We refer to manna as a concept because it is more than just food—it is an ideology. Many struggle with the idea that millions of people were fed […]
Before inflicting the final plague, death of the firstborn, Moses warned Pharaoh that “your servants, will come down to me and prostrate themselves” and beg the Israelites to leave Egypt. (Exodus 11:8). Why didn’t Moses say that Pharoah would also come and plead for the Jews to leave; why only his servants? (Especially considering that after the plague, Pharaoh himself […]
Starbucks and Pharaoh Imagine if you were miraculously given superhuman power and had the ability to confront an evil monarch, someone who has persecuted, oppressed and murdered tens of thousands of people. How would you approach him? Would you address him in a respectful way or would speak in an insulting and degrading fashion? Whether […]
The Hostage Deal and Moses’ Patience The announcement of the hostage deal brings with it a whole host of emotions. We are, of course, overjoyed that the hostages will be coming home, yet anxious about the prospect that many terrorists are being released and that the situation in Gaza is fluid. Frustrated that Israel […]
Discovering Your Inner Youth It is the end of an era. Jacob has finally been reunited with his beloved Joseph and he lives the final seventeen years of his life in peace, surrounded by children and grandchildren. Joseph had two sons in Egypt and now Jacob, soon to die, talks to Joseph about them. Now, […]
Ad Vingerhoets is a professor of psychology at Tilburg University in the Netherlands. The thing that makes him unique is that he is an expert on crying and has spent over twenty years “studying when and why we cry, and how the study of crying may help us obtain better insight into human nature.” According […]