Tzav – The Import of the Ashes

An interesting Midrash is cited by Rav Yosef Nechemia Kornitzer (1880-1933), a great-grandson of the Chasam Sofer who served as the av beis din of  Cracow before World War II. The Midrash is found...

Vayikra – A Phenomenal “Fat”

Among the eimorim, the portions of non-olah animal korbanos that are burned on the mizbe’ach, in contrast to the animal’s meat, which is eaten, is the cheilev she’al hak’layos – the “fat atop the...

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The Moetzes At A Crossroads

The kol korei by the American Agudah Moetzes regarding the WZO election has the makings of a huge make-it-or-break-it gamble. The guy in the street is not being asked whether he is with the...

Pekudei – One Thing Leads to Another

It’s intriguing that, just as Chazal place importance on being masmich geulah litfillah – placing a reference to redemption immediately before prayer, i.e. the amidah (Berachos 4b, 9b) – we find something similar in...

Two Purim Pieces

My Ami column for the Purim issue can be read here. And a piece I wrote for Religion News Service is here. A happy and meaningful Purim to all! AS

Parshas Ki Sisa – Wealth Recycles

A famous palindromic word in the Torah is venasnu, in the second pasuk in the parsha. It means “and each man must give,” in the context of contributing the machatzis hashekel, which the Torah...

Tetzaveh – When Obscenity is Apt

The imperatives of civility and refined speech are strongly stressed in the Talmud and in halacha. Yet, like all ideals, even those have their limits. An exception – the only one – to the...

Terumah – Sanctifiers

The word mikdash in the pasuk “They shall make for Me a mikdash so that I may dwell among them” (Shemos 25:8) should, by reason, be mishkan, as various meforshim point out. It is,...

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