One of my favourite recurring queries about the Jewish holidays is “How do you spell [the holiday that falls on the 25th of the Jewish month of kislev]?” It’s a favourite because it invariably leads to wonderfully informative and often entertaining stories of folks’ encounters with this festival, whether in their family of origin, or […]
As an undergraduate, I contemplated a career in journalism and was involved with the student newspapers. I wanted to live in the beguiling shadow of those female film icons with their trench coats and snappy rejoinders, working on the W5 — the who, what, when, where and why of a story. OrH is settling into […]
Jacob said to his kin: Gather stones. They took stones, made a mound, and ate there by the mound. Laban called it Yegar-Sahaduta, but Jacob called it Gal-Ed. (Gen 31:46-47) Two different languages, the same name. Witness-mound. Laban’s name for the site of this peace treaty is in Aramaic; Jacob’s is in Hebrew. How did […]
“The ground is talking,” says the young commander of the Binyamin Brigade, responsible for the area in the territories between Jerusalem and Nablus, a poignant reference to the unique place the area plays in our Biblical heritage. Two days before, the former security advisor to the government and Underground fighter, opined that “Real peace needs […]
Toward the end of the Torah portion Hayyei Sarah, which is read this week in synagogues, we encounter the adult Isaac, who “went out meditating [lasu’ah] in the field towards the evening” (Genesis 24:63). Rashi, an early medieval commentator, interprets the verb lasu’ah as implying prayer, drawing also from the rabbinic tradition that identifies Isaac […]
The Jewish year cycle can be understood as an object lesson in extremes, at least at the beginning of the calendar year. We start in joy, celebrating a new year, and wishes for sweetness, but shaded in the colors of teshuvah throughout the days of repentance. Ten days later, we are at our most abject, […]
Have you ever said, out loud, “I have no time to rest?” We think that resting is something to do, to do later, that resting is a waste of time, or a frivolous indulgence. And how about that frivolous indulgence thing? Hosting lovely dinners, trying new places – among many others – I mean, who […]
Eating inside a sukkah and at the Shabbat table – different or the same? Voices for different call out: the sukkah is outside! It’s shaky and flimsy and open to the cold or the rain! You can see the stars through the leafy roof, for heaven’s sake! The Shabbat table is lovely and cozy and […]
What do we do with ourselves during these ordinary-yet-distinctive days between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur? Tradition offers a few liturgical hints: the recitation of Psalm 27, designated for the penitential season; the selihot/confessional prayers; a repeated word in the Mourner’s Kaddish (l’elah/higher); the insertion of “remember us for life” and other Days of Awe […]
Repetition, translation, meaning. Length! Obligation! Yearning! Hope. Renewal. Connection. We careen among these rubrics during these High and Holy Days. Particular passages may be both anticipated and dreaded. Two alphabetical acrostics take us through an aleph-bet of transgressions, the Ashamnu and Al Het prayers. This device may signal “what we already know of our daily […]
