Last week I was back in Alabama, with a group of teens from Temple Israel Boston. I hadn’t been down there since 2014, when I used to run these sorts of trips regularly as a youth educator. I love these journeys–they are full of incredible learning, insights, connections, cultural exchanges, and storytelling. Young people are sponges–they soak up so much of what’s happening around them and, with very little ego, are able to analyze it with incredible clarity.  This time in Mo

“We are living in biblical times, there is Pharaoh, and I am afraid of him.” These words were said during this week’s Thursday morning Torah study.  In the Torah, the world is made and remade again and again. Parshat Bo comes after generations of enslavement under an authoritarian regime. God sends Moshe to Pharaoh, and what follows is a series of negotiations. Moshe and Aaron demand freedom. Pharaoh asks: who will go? And Moshe answers: everyone - young and old, sons and dau

“And Jacob lived seventeen years in the land of Egypt.  “47:28 And Jacob died and was gathered to his people…” 50:1 My topic today is “what is a life,?” taking as my text, the account of Jacob’s life, and using the text to scrutinize his character. The lenses through which I am viewing these matters are exemplified in the following three epigrams: 1)Socrates, “The unexamined life is not liveable for a human being” (38a, 5-6, Plato’s Apology) 2)Chassidic tale:Reb Zusha was lay

Good shabbos. It is so good to be here. Some of you might know that for most of the last month and a half, I was in Ithaca, NY, caring for my mother, who was unexpectedly ill. In addition to some underlying medical issues, she developed progressive muscle weakness that stumped her doctors, and led her to require assistance with most daily tasks. I left Boston for what I thought might be a few days or a week, and it turned into 5 weeks. I am so grateful that my mom is doing mu

How Do Dreams Come True?  Mikeitz, literally “at the end of” introduces us to Pharaoh : At the end of 2 years Pharaoh the ruler of Egypt had a dream—- standing by the Egyptian god, the Nile river , the source of abundance in that fertile land, 7 fat handsome cows come out of the river to graze on the reeds, followed by 7 repulsive emaciated cows who proceed to eat up the fat cows; he fell back asleep and had a second similar/ reinforcing but puzzling dream with 7 ears of heal