Category: Dvar Torah

Our Cities of Refuge (P. Matot-Masei)

7/5/2026

It's summer travel season, which aligns with the approaching spiritual season nine weeks ahead.

Wonderful as travel can be, travelers can tire from traveling – the need to get somewhere, the hurry up and wait, the grip of the wheel. Travelers get bumped and bruised, hot and bothered.

We all are travelers – whether vacationers or journeyers on the road of life. We all need refuge from things that go sideways on our way.

Maybe to our surprise, this refuge isn't a rest stop, or community – but something else entirely.

(Don't) Sound the Alarm (P. Pinhas)

6/28/2026

This week marks 10 weeks until Rosh Hashanah. Torah, always uncannily on time, reminds us this week about Rosh Hashanah and the shofar.

For a practice so symbolic, so core, so cellular in resonance and impact, it's odd that Torah does not tell us why we connect Rosh Hashanah with shofar. And Torah also left it to tradition, 2,000 years ago, to not blow shofar on Shabbat.

Why? The answers have to do with alarms.

When We Lose It (P. Hukkat-Balak)

6/21/2026

Just about all humans have the propensity to lose it. Something gets our goat. Something rubs us wrong. Something deep inside ferments and bubbles over. A slow burn suddenly flames out.

When we judge harshly, or lose our temper, or lash out, it can seem like we are responding first and foremost to whatever "something" has our immediate attention – whatever offense, real or imagined, might provoke us in the moment.

In those moments, however, the emotional and spiritual reality can be hidden from us – unless we seek it with all our integrity and courage.

Jews in Space, and Where We Came From (P. Korach)

6/14/2026

As a comic, Mel Brooks has been cutting edge for decades. As a Jewish comic, Mel Brooks has been as traditional as they come. Amidst all his antics, Mel Brooks and his comedy transmit a core truth: a secret of Jewish continuity and strength always has been remembering where we come from.

Modern Jewish astronauts, unfathomable decades ago, have remembered what this week's Torah characters tragically forgot.

One Hundred Days of . . . (P. Shlah Lekha)

6/7/2026

We've begun the 100-day countdown to Rosh Hashanah. (Yes, it feels too early.)

So it's especially fitting that this week's Torah portion provides tradition's words for the Great Forgiveness attached to the end of Kol Nidre.

But forgiveness for what? What awesome and terrible thing needed divine forgiveness back then? What most needs it now?

"Let All God's People Be Prophets" (P. Beha'alotekha)

5/31/2026

Maybe we imagine that the ideal of Jewish spirituality turns most on a spiritual leader.

Throughout history, rank-and-file Jews often deferred to spiritual leaders – from Moses to modern professional rabbis. Often they imagined that heightened spiritual connectivity was the special calling and province of the few.

This week's Torah portion underscores that this pattern was wrong from the start.

Every Day, A Voice Comes Forth (Shavuot)

5/17/2026

Where does our "belly barometer" come from? How do we know what is just and right?

This week, the Torah cycle suspends for Shavuot, our festival anniversary of the revelation at Sinai, and our collective communion with the One we call God.

Though our community opted not to schedule a Shavuot celebration this year due to Memorial Day weekend (we'll have a mini-Yizkor online), it's still an important important chance to consider our source of revelation, justice and rightness.

Redeeming Life's Wilderness (P. Bamidbar)

5/10/2026

I intend my weekly Torah writings to be about more than the Torah portion. I tend to see in nearly every portion both the flow of spirit and community far more than myself, and universal values that transcend any particular time, place and context.

But right now, for personal reasons I see Torah reflecting back at me my own situation. – and in particular my own personal wilderness, what I might learn there, and how I might redeem it.

Even so, I sense that my present experience isn't much different than most everyone's at one time or another. As for me, perhaps also for you.

Our Greatest Interests of All (P. Behar-Behukotai)

5/3/2026

Money can be a sensitive subject, which is one reason Torah bans charging interest among our people. (The Qur'an does the same for Muslims.)

Torah and Qur'an are aiming at far more than money: after all, most of us don't lend money.

This mitzvah is really about relationships and right use of power, which spiritually are far more important than money. This mitzvah aims at the heart of our greatest interest of all.

Counting Our Days for Spiritual Healing (P. Emor)

4/26/2026

On Torah's sacred calendar, most every holiday begins either at the new moon or the full moon. Our calendar is in the sky, shining down on us every day.

There are two exceptions to this new moon / full moon calendar. One is Yom Kippur, for which we count days since Rosh Hashanah. The other is the forthcoming Shavuot, for which we count days since Passover.

Now we have printed (and digital) calendars, but we still count our days – for an important reason.

<<Previous

Our Cities of Refuge (P. Matot-Masei)

(Don't) Sound the Alarm (P. Pinhas)

When We Lose It (P. Hukkat-Balak)

Jews in Space, and Where We Came From (P. Korach)

One Hundred Days of . . . (P. Shlah Lekha)

"Let All God's People Be Prophets" (P. Beha'alotekha)

Every Day, A Voice Comes Forth (Shavuot)

Redeeming Life's Wilderness (P. Bamidbar)

Our Greatest Interests of All (P. Behar-Behukotai)

Counting Our Days for Spiritual Healing (P. Emor)

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