From the Rabbi's Desk

We have arrived at the final newsletter of the civil year 2023 and thus my last article of the year. As Jews in the modern world, we live in two distinct times at once. We live the Jewish Calendar, happy 16th of Tevet everyone, and we also live in the secular/Gregorian one at the same time. We harmonize the two and make it a point to allow for the Jewish one to set the tone and flow of our lives and the secular one to navigate our business...Read more...

In 1991, I was called to the Torah as a Bar Mitzvah for Parshat Miketz, and this Shabbat I’ll be reading Haftara at services for the anniversary of my Bar Mitzvah. I’ll spare all of you the math; I’m turning 45 years old today. When I was a kid, we belonged to a non-traditional synagogue that identified as Reform and as such I didn’t chant my haftara, I read it in English. My Torah reading consisted of a few sentences that were not...Read more...

Ya’akov stood in his father’s room giving him food that his mother, Rivkah, had prepared. Ya’akov was wearing his brother’s clothing and had fur on his arms to mimic his brother’s hairiness. The scent, the feel and the food all seemed to be from Esav but the voice was the voice of Ya’akov. Yitzchak said that “the voice was the voice of Ya’akov and the hands were the hands of Esav.” (Bereshit 27:22)  This scene is the...Read more...