By Naomi Gurt Lind Parashat Eikev (Deuteronomy 7:12-11:25) I suppose it was bound to happen. More than three years into the pandemic, I tested positive for Covid-19 for the first time last Friday. I feel ok, a little droopy, a sicker version of myself. Having little energy, I am finding myself looking out the window a lot. It’s a good pastime when you can’t muster the zest for much else. I’m incredibly fortunate: what I see out my window is gorgeous.... Read more
By Rabbi Justin David As we greet Tisha B’Av tonight, I am preoccupied by questions underlying all the conversations I’ve had around Israel in recent days: will the current government gut Israel’s commitment to prophetic and humanistic justice as enshrined in the Megilat ha-Atzma’ut (Scroll of Independence)? Can we dare to hope that Israel’s democratic protest movement can work? And do we have any other choice? This year, I am choosing to see Tisha B’Av as a day of Jewish... Read more
Parashat Vaetchanan (Deuteronomy 3:23-7:11) I have a tendency to think of all the worst case scenarios that might come up in any given situation. Going beyond protectiveness and anxiety, my precautions tend to veer onto the side of severe. Once a troubling thought grips me, I find it difficult to be rid of its grasp—even for a moment. Once, while listening to me express my fears over a given situation, a friend responded with the simple words: “But what if everything... Read more
By Jayce Koester Parashat Devarim (Deuteronomy 1:1-3:22) It is the first day of the eleventh month of the fortieth year in the desert. We have stopped on the edge of the river, and on the other side is the land G!d has promised us. Instead of shouldering our packs and making bittersweet goodbyes between those who will stay and those who will go, we stop. We gather around Moshe and he begins to tell us a story. It’s familiar in many... Read more
By Naomi Gurt Lind, 70 Faces Blog Editor Parashat Mattot-Masei (Numbers 30:2-36:13) With our double portion this week, Mattot-Masei, we find ourselves at the end of Sefer Bamidbar, the Book of Numbers. For all intents and purposes, it is also the narrative end of the Torah. Sefer Dvarim, the Book of Deuteronomy, is mainly a retelling of the previous four books, punctuated by Moses’s long goodbye. Here, as we conclude Parashat Mattot-Masei, the Israelites are poised to enter the land of Israel. This is the... Read more
Parashat Pinchas (Numbers 25:10-30:1) By Rev. Tom Reid In a world where random violence seems increasingly routine, and in the wake of a horrific and inexplicable triple homicide that has shaken Newton, Massachusetts (the community where I work and serve as a Protestant Christian pastor), Parashat Pinchas landed heavily on me. I could not shift my attention away from the disturbing passage that opens the parashah. The text continues the story of Pinchas and the apparent reward he receives from God for taking... Read more
Parashat Chukat-Balak (Numbers 19:1-25:9) Rabbi Shani Rosenbaum The sequence of parashiyot that follows us through early summer—Korach, Chukat, Balak—is saturated in disappointment and its aftermath. One by one, we watch our heroes succumb to a plot thread so common it feels like TV: character experiences significant loss; then, in predictable yet always cringe-inducing fashion, said character proceeds to lose it about something totally trivial at an unsuspecting innocent. See the rebels in our previous parashah, Korach. Their complaint to Moses... Read more
By Rabbi Or Rose Earlier this week, approximately 150 people—from over 20 countries—gathered in Boston for the annual conference of the International Council of Christians and Jews (ICCJ). The meeting was hosted by Boston College and my institution, Hebrew College. The conference theme was “Negotiating Multiple Identities: Implications for Interreligious Relations,” and our meeting coincided with the national holiday of Juneteenth. One highlight of the ICCJ conference for me was our visit to the Howard Thurman Center for Common Ground of Boston University (BU). There, we... Read more
By Rabbi David Maayan Parashat Shelach L’cha (Numbers 13:1-15:41) “Who lit the wonder before our eyes and the wonder of our eyes?” With these words, R. Abraham Joshua Heschel evokes the profound sense of wonder at the world that we see as well as the wonder of the experience of our seeing itself. This week’s parashah opens with the story of the twelve spies whom Moses sends to scout out the Land of Israel. What Jewish tradition refers to as “the sin of... Read more
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Child of God, Holy and Treasured
By Rabbi Becky Silverstein Parashat Re’eh (Deuteronomy 11:26-16:17) Figuring out how to be an adult who is also my parent’s child is one of the most challenging aspects of this season of my life. I find myself at once holding the vision of children as being young people, playing with bubbles or playing in a playground, while also acknowledging the journeys of self-actualization, boundary-setting, and intimacy that come with being someone’s child. Given this current reality, it is unsurprising that I... Read more