Remember the famous Chamushim Midrash? The way it was taught to us only one-fifth of the Jewish people left Egypt. But there is much more to the story... Found in the Mechilta, the midrash hinges on the word "chamushim" in Exodus 13:18. Literally meaning "armed," it appears throughout the Tanakh in reference to weaponry. Even the modern Hebrew word for ammunition stems from the same root (tachmoshet). The Mechilta itself acknowledges this, and tells us at the start that this is real meaning of the word. But based on the word play, the Sage suggest "chamushim" could also mean "one-fifth." Ma ..read more

I'm pleased to report that I had an excellent Yom Kippur. Here are the details: Start: 8:00 AM Finish: 3:00 PM Break: 90 minutes Neillah: Ended late Break Fast: Cake, then soup, followed by pasta Quality of the music: better than ever. Quality of the introspection was not bad but MYOB Quality of the Koren: Amazing. Burn your Artscrolls, and don't look back! Big discovery: There was a hot shot German philosopher named Franz Rosenzweig who decided at the age of 27 to convert to Christianity. This wasn't a big deal, because he had never been much of a Jew. But he wanted to be a Jew before conv ..read more

Observation: The Torah stipulates capital punishment for a child displaying gluttony and disobedience to parents. However, Chazal, in their interpretation, adopted an exceptionally hyper-literal reading of the text – a method they applied in few other situations – in order to render the directive nearly impossible to execute. Question: What prompted them to do this? Answer: According to their own sense of morality it was unacceptable to kill children for trivial crimes. So they re-read the verse. However, I do not think they viewed their reinterpretation of the Torah as a case of their mora ..read more

Rabbi Akiva said, "Israel, how fortunate you are! Whose presence sanctifies you? It is your Heavenly Father, as it is written, 'I will sprinkle clean water upon you and you shall be holy.' And further, 'The Lord is the hope (mikva) of Israel.' Just as the mikva purifies the impure, so does the Holy One, blessed be He, sanctify Israel." This teaching by Rabbi Akiva evokes curiosity and invites numerous questions. Why did Rabbi Akiva choose to convey his message through a pun? What inspired him to impart this particular wisdom? And ultimately, what is the fundamental lesson he wished to impart ..read more

Rabbi Ysoscher Katz is a talented Rabbi and a fine person, however he tends to rely too much on the contrasting stereotype of litvaks as cold and hasidim as warm, which can sometimes result in questionable biblical interpretations. An example of this can be seen in the dvar torah he wrote on Bshalach. You can see his post here, and my response below:   https://www.facebook.com/ysoscher/posts/pfbid02fahY6Ac4eP6anSCuX5LfFGkBwsokLrnABZiKrHzxv1ZJCPT32NaKEvgP2f1GuvRxl?notif_id=1675433740035427&notif_t=comment_mention&ref=notif I have several disagreements with his approach: First, th ..read more

Pessach is the right time to discuss the most anti-Zionistic midrash of them all, which is based on a verse that appears three times (with slight variations) in the Song of Songs Young women of Jerusalem, I charge you by the gazelles and the wild does of the field: do not stir up or awaken love until the appropriate time. According to Rav Yehuda (Ketubot 111a) this means that no act of redemption should be performed until a time arrives when it pleases God to bring about the redemption. We also see from elsewhere that Rav Yehuda thought that it was forbidden to return to Israel.  Other ..read more

If Rambam is right about Divine Providence it is only available for those who have True ideas about God. If he's right about God, nothing we can do can change him. Therefore, this popular notion that our prayers can compel God to do something is not only a false idea, but also, ironically, likely to PREVENT us from getting the thing we want as believing it works disqualifies us from receiving divine providence ..read more

Trends I do not like: Everyone doing a siyum during the 9 days and using it as an opportunity for partying  Organizations having meat fundraisers during the 9 days Resteraunts having siyums on the hour so they can sell meat  Tisha Bav being a day for "inspiration" rather than a day or mourning (related: Yom Kippur davening becoming a kumzitz as if we think that the decree can be averted via repentance, charity and humming lalala ..read more

Hilel Fuld, a legit public figure, who is therefore fair game, has posted something about antisemitism that seems to me to be full of mistakes. I shall point a few out below, but let's start with the piece's fundemental problem. His article's main argument is that Jews must abandon America where they are allegedly being murdered in the streets in favor of Israel where they are actually being murdered in the streets. I'm not making this up. He wants us all to jump directly from the pan into the fire. And he supports this recommendation by outright lying about the current situation in America. I ..read more

Who says the world was created? Aristotle didn't think it was created. Rambam thought it was, but acknowledged Aristoteles argument had force and that he couldn't prove creation was true. All he could do was show the flaws in Aristotle's argument, one of which is this:   Aristotle's underlying assumption was that "will" is evidence of imperfection and therefore a perfect God couldn't have suddenly willed the creation of the world. However, while its true that human will is aroused by a lack or a need or some external factor, divine will might be different. Divine will might be inde ..read more