Weekly Torah Reading, July 20, 2019
Weekly Torah Reading, July 20, 2019 In Israel: Pinehas The Priest Who Never Died Last week’s Torah reading ended with Pineḥas (known in English as Phineas) slaying a flagrantly offending couple, thereby turning aside God’s wrath. For his …
Weekly Torah Reading, July 13, 2019
In Israel: Balak Just Leave Us Alone In this week’s Torah reading, the pagan seer Balaam is hired to curse the people of Israel, but every time he tries, he ends up blessing them instead. In the first of these …
Weekly Torah Reading, July, 2019
In Israel, Hukkat: A Bit Too Confident This week’s reading relates that, toward the end of their forty years of wandering in the wilderness, the Israelites ran out of water. They complained bitterly to their leaders, Moses and Aaron: …
Weekly Torah Reading, June 29, 2019
Weekly Torah Reading, June 29, 2019 In Israel: Koraḥ Ganging Up on Moses This week’s Torah reading recounts the attempted revolt of Koraḥ and his allies. According to Num 16:3, the rebels “assembled” (vayyiqqahalu) against Moses and …
Weekly Torah Reading, June 22, 2019
Weekly Torah Reading, in Israel: Shelaḥ Lekha Memorable Threads This week’s Torah reading ends with the law of “fringes” or “tassels” (tzitzit). In pre-modern times, weavers used different means to finish off a piece of cloth so that it would …
Weekly Torah Reading, Beha‘alotekha, June 15, 2019
The Good Old Days In the book of Ecclesiastes, the author advises, “Don’t say, ‘How has it come about that things were better in earlier times than now?’ for you are not asking about this out of wisdom” (7:10). …
Weekly Torah Reading: Shavu‘ot, June 9, 2019
The Giving of the Rest of the Torah As everyone knows, the festival of Shavu‘ot commemorates the giving of the Torah. Year in and year out, we mark the day with special celebrations and readings in synagogue; some …
Weekly Torah Reading, June 1, 2019
In Israel: BeMidbar Don’t Look! This week’s Torah reading begins with a detailed census of Israel’s tribes. However, the Levites are not included in the census; they are listed separately afterwards. The Torah says that there were …