Chukas – Echoes of “The Snakey Thing”

It’s commonly, but erroneously, assumed that the symbol commonly used for the medical profession, a snake, or a pair of them, wrapped upon a pole, is meant as a depiction of the nachash hanechoshes...

Korach – Monkeys in the Crowd

The model for all subsequent demagogues in history, Korach told the people that his grievance was really their grievance, that he was standing up not for himself but for them. And he used snideness...

Shelach — Memento Mitzvah

It might seem peculiar, even morbid, to suggest that looking at tzitzis evokes the specter of death. But, at least for me, it does. That might be because of photographs I saw in a...

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Sefaria and Koren – A Concerned Look

I write the following without any agenda other than to share information that has already been made public voluntarily by the parties under discussion. It pains me to write anything that can hinder people’s...

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The Company We Keep

Former Prime Minister Ehud Barak, billionaire Bill Gates, former Harvard President Lawrence Summers, ex-presidents Clinton and Trump, filmmaker Woody Allen, international lawyer Alan Dershowitz, leading left-winger Noam Chomsky, Bard College president Leon Botstein: a...

Shavuos — The Matter of Meaning

The average price paid to climb Mt. Everest – for permits, equipment and guides –  is between $35,000 and $45,000. And hundreds have died in that exploit. What impels people to undertake so expensive...

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