A Quick Torah Thought

Many are the opinions as to what exactly happened in the Tower of Babel that so irked Hashem.  The Medrash spotlights a narrative in which man was less significant than brick, a human being than mere mortar.  The story in the Torah itself is prefaced by the comment that the peoples of the land had taken on one language; one opinion in the Talmud is that they all spoke lashon ha'kodesh  - Hashem's divine language - and the other, that the seventy languages were all extant, having already spread through the sons of Noach, and becoming the dialects of the world. ' Thus, we are left with the very difficult question, what exactly happened in Babel? And why was it that in the biblical narrative of Breishit, Hashem is constantly intervening in such overt ways? From the flood, to the Tower of Babel, to the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, Hashem is constantly involved, tweaking his world, re-writing the script, and redefining humanity's role as He goes along. The second qu...

It struck me, as I was reading the first of the parshot of the new book of Breishit. What practical information, or inspirational lesson could we glean from the names, and qualities of the rivers which circumscribed the land where the first man was situated? It seemed to me a little bit academic, or even immaterial. This river flew this way, this one that way, and that one had gold deposits, and was suitable for the formation of diamonds, or other precious jewels. A river issues from Eden to water the garden, and it then divides and becomes four branches.  The name of the first is Pishon, the one that winds through the whole land of Havilah, where the gold is. (The gold of that land is good; bdellium is there, and lapis lazuli. )  The name of the second river is Gihon, the one that winds through the whole land of Cush.  The name of the third river is Tigris, the one that flows east of Asshur. And the fourth river is the Euphrates. It would seem that Hashem's intent in rec...

When one reads the final verses of the Torah, something very subtle becomes immediately apparent. In Moshe's waning breaths, he is described by Hashem as the prophet sine qua non, the only one who would know God, "face to face." No mention is made of the giving of the Torah. What is mentioned is Moshe's historic mission to free the Jews from Egypt, one he was uniquely apt to fulfill, cultivated to perform from the moment he was conceived. Yet, as the simple meaning of the text would have it, the giving of the Torah was not an act uniquely reserved for Moshe. Rashi does interpret the words, "the strong hand" -  in the final verse of the Torah - as referring to the strong hand that held the tablets, but the simple meaning, or pshat  would seemingly be more in keeping with the Ramban. Moshe precipitated the revelation of Hashem's "strong hand and outstretched arm" in Egypt.  Thus, the question remains, why doesn't the Torah explicitly proclaim...

One of the most powerful messages in this week's parsha is that of the mighty eagle, which can catch prey mid-swoop, gently waking its young, beating its wings so they don't wake suddenly.  I think about that image in the mornings when I'm running late to take my daughters; the alarm has long ceased to work, maybe, my wife's still dealing with our baby, and the kids just don't want to get up. And then the eagle stirs in my mind, the proverbial eagle, so forceful, get gentle, waking its young so as not to alarm them or fear from threat.  The eagle, likewise, teach Chazal, places its young on its back, so, if any arrow is shot, first it - the eagle - will take the hit, and be struck by the dart, rather than endangering its young from the hunter in wait down below.  In a certain sense, the protective veil, and shield God offers us is exemplified by the clouds of glory, the anthropomorphism or spiritual representation of the sukkah in the desert, where Hashem enshrouded...

There's something about Yom Kippur that evokes joy year in and year out, a feeling of purity as we return to our roots. It's not just that erev Yom Kippur is the most lucrative day of the year for bike stores, people en masse turning off their engines the following day, as the whole nation relives the service of the Cohen Gadol in the Beit Hamikdash. A feeling truly overcomes, seemingly, each and every person, a sense that the year behind us was as good as it could have been, and the year ahead, with Sukkot around the corner, bringing in a reconnection to nature, organic growth, and the world around us.  That, in essence, is the meaning of Sukkot, to return to nature, and to realize that Hashem is the only one who can envelop us in the plenty the world has to offer. The rain is the source of life itself, and without it, no life, neither here, nor on Mars, could survive. Sukkot is the time when we are judged for water, the symbolic embodiment of livelihood; everything around us ...