Weekly Torah Reading, Vayyetze, December 3, 2022

(Genesis 28:10-32:3) None of the Former Jacob left Beer-sheba bound for Haran. Stopping for the night at a certain place, he fell asleep and had a strange dream. “And behold, a ladder was set in the ground, and its top …

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Weekly Torah Reading, Toledot, November 26, 2022

Genesis 25:19-28:9 A Common Thread   The three encounters between Jacob and Esau in this week’s reading seem to contain a common message. Their first meeting takes place even before they come out of their mother’s womb (Genesis 25:22). There, …

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Weekly Torah Reading, Vayyera’, November 12, 2022

(Genesis 18:1-22:24) “Ambiguous…”   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. Surely, He must …

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Weekly Torah Reading, Lekh-lekha, November 5, 2022

Genesis 12:1-17:27   Departure to Places Unknown   This week’s Torah reading records the moment when the Holy One commanded Abraham to “set out from your homeland, your relatives, and your immediate family and go on to the land that …

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Weekly Torah Reading, Noaḥ, October 29, 2022

Weekly Torah Reading Noaḥ October 29, 2022   Minor Mysteries After the great flood had subsided, Noah planted a vineyard. In due time it bore fruit, and Noah made some wine from it. Perhaps because he had not consumed any …

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Weekly Torah Reading, Shemini Atzeret, October 17, 2022

Weekly Torah Reading, Shemini Atzeret, October 17, 2022   Un-Parallelism   One subject that biblical scholars have explored is the stylistic feature called parallelism. Especially in biblical poetry, word X, or phrase X, in one clause is paralleled by a …

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Weekly Torah Reading Vayyelekh, October 1, 2022

Moses Didn’t Want to Die In this week’s Torah reading, God instructs Moses that the time has come for him to die—in fact, He says this more than once. The reading opens with Moses relating that “the Lord said to …

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A Rosh ha-Shanah Card

  “A day on which the horn is sounded” (Num 29:1)—was this really the best description the Torah could use to refer to Rosh ha-Shanah? Apparently, it was simply all that was needed in biblical times. After all, the entrance of a …

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