Weekly Torah Reading, Vayyera’, November 16, 2024
(Genesis chapters 18-22) “Abraham and Job” The Torah’s account of Abraham’s near-sacrifice of his son Isaac has raised questions among readers since ancient times. Among other things, commentators wondered why God needed to test Abraham in the first place. …
Weekly Torah Reading, Lekh-Lekha, November 9, 2024
This week’s reading contains one particularly puzzling episode. After Abraham has arrived in Canaan, a famine strikes the land, and he and his wife Sarah are forced to travel down to Egypt in search of food. (Egypt, with the …
Weekly Torah Reading, Noaḥ, November 2, 2024
Genesis 6:9 – 11:32 The Broken Tower This week’s Torah reading ends with a brief incident, the building of the Tower of Babel. According to the biblical text, the ragtag band of humanity (apparently all of it) arrived at some …
Weekly Torah Reading, Rosh ha-Shanah, October 3-4, 2024
It’s an interesting fact that the Hebrew name for the Jewish New Year, Rosh ha-Shanah, never occurs in the Torah, In fact, this name for the New Year’s festival never occurs anywhere in the whole Bible. Rather, the Torah refers …
Weekly Torah Reading, Shofetim, September 7, 2024
Deuteronomy 16:18 – 21:9 Holding Out for Fairness This week’s reading opens with the subject of courts and the proper administration of justice. Judges and other officials are to be appointed in all your [city] gates, that is, in …
Weekly Torah Reading, Re’eh, August 31, 2024
Deuteronomy 11:26-16:17 Don’t Form Groups This week’s reading contains an odd interdiction: “You are children of the Lord your God,” God says. “You shall not gash yourselves or shave the front of your heads for the dead” (Deut 14:1). Ancient …
Weekly Torah Reading, Ekev, August 24, 2024
Deuteronomy 7:12 – 11:25 Good Tastes and Bad The expression “Not by bread alone” has certainly gotten around. It is, among other things, the name of various bakeries, restaurants, diet books, as well as the title of numerous sermons and …
Weekly Torah Reading, Devarim, August 10, 2024
Deuteronomy 1:1 – 3:22 Man of Constant Sorrow The biblical book of Lamentations recounts in painful detail the events leading up to the fall of the Jerusalem Temple, including the gruesome account of the inhabitants’ starvation during the great siege …