"Why does Abbah (Dad) want to listen to Israeli radio so much?" My eight year old son Jeremy asked me as I was tucking my five year old daughter Hannah into bed. Oh no, I thought. I had hoped to avoid this conversation. I had hoped to spare my children from worrying about our family in Israel and my daughter's best friend who is in Jerusalem for the semester. But the kids could tell something was up. "There are some problems in Israel now." I began gently. "What kind of problems?" Jeremy asked. Read more...

He is our first forefather, the progenitor of the Covenant, and yet we do not call ourselves "Bnai Avraham", the children of Abraham. We invoke the memory of the Akeda when we beg God's forgiveness, but we do not call ourselves "Bnai Yitzchak", the children of Isaac. We are "Bnai Yisrael", the children of Israel, the descendants of Jacob. Jacob? Why Jacob? Of the three, Jacob is our least likely spiritual ancestor. He is manipulative, conniving, and entirely amoral. He exploits his brother's weakness to purloin his birthright. He uses his father's blindness to steal his blessing. Read more...

Rather than speak directly about this week's parashah, I'd like to tell you something about each of my last two Shabbatot: Read more...

Angels, it seems, are everywhere. From contemporary popular culture (TV's Saving Grace with its beer chugging angel Earl) to the classic Christmas movie Its a Wonderful Life with its slightly shlemiel-like angel Clarence. In the literary world Anne Rice's new series of books is called Songs of the Seraphim and Tony Kushner's Angels in America was played out on both stage and screen. Read more...

This commentary on Va'yetzei is dedicated to the memory of my beloved father, Sol Ervin Dorff, Shelomo ben Hayyim v'Hannah, z"l, whose Bar Mitzvah portion was Va'Yetzei and who was born and, as it happened, died during this week. He died 22 years ago, but it seems as if it was yesterday. I cannot believe that so much time has elapsed since my father passed away, that he did not get to see all that has happened during those years for my wife and me, our children, and now our grandchildren. Read more...