It is noted in Midrash Rabbah to Eichah, the Book of Lamentations, that three prophets each made a statement to Israel that begins with the word “Eichah,” “how.” What is more, we will encounter each of those verses this week: Read more...

He awoke from the nightmare with a scream, as he did every night for almost forty years. His heart was racing, his body drenched in sweat, the taste of ashes upon his tongue. His mind was reeling with vivid images of fiery destruction. His ears were filled with shrieking and wailing. He saw the streets of Jerusalem running with rivulets of blood, the Holy Temple ground into the earth, the lifeless bodies of the priests scattered about the Temple Mount, their vestments torn and desecrated.    Read more...

It may be (at least for me writing this in Los Angeles, in the Northern Hemisphere) the middle of summer when the days are at their longest and brightest, but it is a dark time on the Jewish calendar. Parashat Devarim is always read on the Shabbat immediately preceding the 9th of Av (or sometimes on the 9th itself, while the fast is postponed to the 10th, on Sunday), the occasion on which Jews mark the destruction of the First and Second Temples in Jerusalem, and in many communities, other tragedies that have befallen our people over history as well. Read more...

Dear Mr. Feinstein, Let me be the first to welcome you to the wonderful world of AARP. Attached you will find your provisional membership card. Soon, the world of AARP benefits will be yours. So begin my sunset years. Read more...

American Ecological-Anthropologist Roy Rappaport (1926-1997) taught me today that "The linguistic capacity that is central to human adaptation makes it possible to give birth to concepts that come to possess those who have conceived them, concepts like… heaven and hell." This understanding made me smile and gave academic language to that which I heard years ago from my teacher, Reb Shlomo Carlebach (1925-1994; hard not to see the close parallels the years they were both granted life). Read more...