“Mar Ukva said: I am, with regard to this matter, like vinegar, son of wine, with respect to Father. Father, if he were to eat meat…
“Moshe then inquired, darosh darash, about the goat of the sin offering, and it had been burned” (Vayikra 10:16). Judaism has always…
Excitement and consistency: We tend to view these terms as contradictory. Man gets excited over discovering new things and views variety as the spice…
Purim celebrates the eternity of the Jewish people. Despite exile and dispersion, genocidal enemies and those willing to turn a blind eye to such,…
“Because of this the children of Israel, to this day, do not eat the thigh muscle that is on the socket of the hip, since Jacob’s hip…
"These are the accounts, pekudei, of the tabernacle, the tabernacle of testimony, as they were pukad, rendered, according…
Rabbinic debates are not for the faint-hearted. They can be most intense, and sadly, can lead to tragic consequences. One of the most famous of…
In our last post, we spoke about geneivat da’at, generating false goodwill, in the context of gid hanasheh. I imagine very few people…
“The laws of Shabbat…are like a mountain being held up by a thread” (Chagigah 10a). Shabbat is the pivot around which Jewish life…
One would not normally associate the prohibition to eat the gid hanashe, the sciatic nerve, with issues of business ethics. But related…
“G-d declared to Moshe, Go down [from the mountain] for the people whom you brought out of Egypt have become corrupt” (Shemot 32:7…
One of most famous mitzvot of the Torah is that of shiluach haken, the obligation to send away the mother bird before taking her little chicks…
One of the teachings that is ingrained in us from a young age is that every letter, and surely every verse and story, found in the Torah is of great…
The least observed of biblical holidays is undoubtedly Rosh Chodesh. As a holiday based in the Temple, with no home or synagogue based rituals,…
Symbols play a crucial role in self and group identification and affect almost everything we do. Be they roses or a diamond ring, symbols can…
Dan Arielly begins his best-selling book, Predictably Irrational, by noting that for we humans it’s all relative. We do not by evaluate A…
"An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, a hand for a hand, a foot for a foot” (Shemot 21:24). Perhaps no Biblical verse has generated as…
That the “Orthodox” community is more careful about kosher food than kosher money is sadly obvious, and demonstrated all too often.…
Vayedaber Hashem el Moshe lei'mor is the most commonly occurring verse of the Bible. While it is usually translated as, “G-d spoke to…
Throughout the Exodus story, the Jewish people are silent. We do not know what they were thinking or doing during the plagues. We hear them rejoicing…
In the introduction to his responsa, Rav Moshe Feinstein writes that the Sages of each generation are permitted and obligated to issue halachic…
“And it will be, when the Lord, your G-d, brings you to the land He swore to your fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, to give you,…
In a beautiful teshuva (Orach Chaim 4 #89) written during Chanukah 1960, Rav Moshe Feinstein was asked (by Rabbi Leo Yung, rabbi of the Jewish Centre…
“It is a sign between Me and the Jewish people that in ‘six days’ G-d created the heavens and the earth” (Shemot 31:17).…
The initial meeting between Moshe and Pharaoh did not go well. The workload placed on the poor Jewish slaves was increased, and more importantly, the…
That one must be Jewish to shecht an animal is not necessarily obvious. One might have argued that as long as the meat is slaughtered…
“And Moshe was frightened and he said, behold the incident is known. And Pharaoh heard about the affair and he sought to kill Moshe…
When I mention to people that it is likely worse to smoke than to eat pork, I often get strange looks. And usually the more observant the person, the…
There are few, if any, semicha programs that require their students to learn shechita or safrut, and even fewer that require good…
One of the questions I am often asked by those of my students who do not keep kosher, is have you really never eaten non-kosher food? I generally…
Over and over again the Torah warns us not to allow avodah zara, idolatry, in the Land of Israel. Yet, as is often the case, things are not always…
"It was for this reason that man was first created as one person [Adam]…to teach that no man is the same as another; therefore, every…
In the fall of 1860, Rav Yaakov Ettlinger penned what is likely the most revolutionary responsa of modern times; one that opened the door to allowing…
Some years back I attended a talk by Rabbi Dr. M.D. Tendler who spoke about the most important teshuvot written by his father-in-law, Rav Moshe…
That the role of a modern rabbi in the Western World is far different than that of the rabbi of Eastern Europe is rather obvious. The typical 19th…
One of the painful realities of Jewish life is that the Jewish people are often judged by a double standard. What in other cultures is done with…
Masechet Chulin, a derivative of the word chol, translates as “The Secular Tractate”, and stands in contrast to the first two…
“And Yaakov ripped his garments and put sackcloth on his loins, and he mourned for his son many days” (Breisheet 37:34). Thinking—…
“It is said of the olah sacrifice of cattle, ‘rei’ach nichoach, an offering made by fire of pleasing odor’ (Vayikra 1:9); and…
The Sochochover Rebbe, in the introduction to his classic work on the laws of Shabbat, Eglei Tal, explains that Torah study is meant to be…
“And you shall place on the table showbread before Me tamid, at all times” (Shemot 25:30). The lechem hapanim …
“Therefore, the Jewish people will not eat the gid hanasheh, sciatic nerve, that is on the hip joint, to this day” (Breisheet…
“At that time, the Lord said to me, ‘Hew for yourself two stone tablets like the first ones and come up to Me onto the mountain, and make…
The opening Mishna of masechet Megillah teaches that those living in small rural communities could fulfill the obligation to hear the Megillah…
“And there was a famine in the land, aside from the first famine that was in the days of Avraham...And G-d appeared to him [Yitzchak] and said…
The Jewish people are a most contentious one. We argue about (almost?) everything and then some. Debate is most healthy and part and parcel of…
"All korbanot mincha, flour offerings, are to be made of matza with the exception of the chametz of the korban todah,…
“And the people of Sedom were evil and sinners towards G-d beyond all measure” (Breisheet 13:13). Despite their depravity, Avraham Avinu…
It is well known that the mitzvah of tzitzit is a classic case of a mitzvah aseh shehazman grama, a time-bound positive mitzvah…
"And there was an argument between the herdsmen of Abram's livestock and the herdsmen of Lot's livestock, and the Canaanite and the…