A new study by Barclays Wealth released this week reveals that more than a third of “high-net-worth” people have serious reservations about the ability of their beneficiaries to handle their inheritance. Some are ambivalent, and others just plain don’t trust their children or stepchildren to protect their fortune. After burying his wife, Avraham turns his Continue Reading »
We’ve had hints of the depths of evil of the residents of Sodom. Last week’s Torah reading had plenty of foreshadowing. This week, in Parashat Vayera, God decides to destroy the city–all five of its boroughs. But before carrying out this comprehensive punishment, God does something interesting. God consults with Avraham. “Now the LORD had Continue Reading »
No sooner does Avram arrive in Canaan at God’s instruction that he has to leave. “There was a famine in the land, and Avram went down to Egypt to sojourn there, for the famine was severe in the land” (Genesis 12:10). The man who later becomes the model of hospitality, entertaining guests with a lavish feast Continue Reading »
How difficult was it to be Noah? He had to have felt rather lonely both before and after the Flood. Before it, the Torah tells us, he stood out as the one righteous person worthy of saving, since the rest of humanity “had corrupted its ways on the earth.” Even in the opinion of the Continue Reading »
Is there such thing as “gone too far?” It’s a pertinent question for this time of year, and for this Shabbat, known as Shabbat Shuvah, the Shabbat on which we read the words of the prophet Hosea: “Shuvah, Yisrael, ‘ad Adonai Elohekha–come back, Israel, to the LORD your God,” he implores his listeners, in his Continue Reading »
Several weeks ago, in Parshat Re-eh, the Torah lays out a clear choice: a blessing or a curse (Deuteronomy 11:26). Coming full circle, after hearing last week all of the blessed and cursed details on the mountains of Gerizim and Eival, the choice is summarized concisely in this week’s Torah reading: “I call heaven and Continue Reading »
In our urban environment, it’s not easy for us to relate to the Torah’s agriculturally-based laws. But although we are not farmers, there is still much to learn from passages that spoke directly to those who did work the land. Our parashah begins with a first law for a people who will first enter the Continue Reading »
“If, along the the road, you chance upon a bird’s nest, in any tree or on the ground, with fledglings or eggs and the mother sitting over the fledglings or on the eggs, do not take the mother together with her young. Let the mother go, and take only the young, in order that you Continue Reading »
Parshat Shoftim provides advance guidance in anticipation of the inevitable request of the Israelites to be like other nations and establish a monarchy. The Torah provides a number of limitations on kings, including a restriction on foreigners and limits on royal wealth and excess. Two particular rules catch my attention. The first is a warning Continue Reading »
The Torah doesn’t much like idolatry. And it’s even more concerned with idolatry’s PR machine. Chapter 13 of Deuteronomy gives instructions for dealing with those who might instigate the larger community to turn away from God and cast their lots with false gods. Three different scenarios are presented. In the first, a prophet advocates for Continue Reading »
