Posts Tagged: Chayei Sarah
In an Era of Con Artists, the Torah Instructs Us to Hold Onto Our Integrity
The year was 1820, and London’s high society was abuzz with the arrival of a dashing new personality. General Gregor MacGregor, a Scottish war hero with a...
How a Close Reading of the Torah Helps Us Understand Human Nature
Narratives are subjective. We say things that often don’t tell the whole story, and even disguise our true intentions. Sometimes, the discrepancy is intentional. Sometimes...
Clashes in West Bank’s Hebron During Jewish Celebration
i24 News - The West Bank city of Hebron saw violent clashes on Saturday as Jewish Israelis spent the weekend in the city for an...
Parshat Chayei Sarah and the Wisdom of Old Age
Earlier this week, The New York Times carried a fascinating article. It had nothing to do with the disputed presidential election results, so you will...
Finding the ‘Why’ of Life Will Ease Your Suffering
The name of our parsha this week seems to embody a paradox. It is called Chayei Sarah, “the life of Sarah,” but it begins with...
Parshat Chayei Sarah: On Judaism and Islam
The language of the Torah is, in Erich Auerbach’s famous phrase, “fraught with background.” Behind the events that are openly told are shadowy stories left...
First Build the Future — Then Remember the Past
On August 11, 2017, the world’s oldest man passed away, just a month short of his 114th birthday -- making him one of the ten oldest men...
Our Children’s Legacy Is Ours, Too
Our parsha this week contains the most serene description of old age and dying of anywhere in the Torah: “Then Abraham breathed his last and...
We Must Look to the Future, and Move on From the Past
He was 137 years old. He had been through two traumatic events involving the people most precious to him in the world. The first involved...
The Kindness of Strangers, and the Origin of ‘Loving-Kindness’
In 1966 an 11-year-old black boy moved with his parents and family to a white neighbourhood in Washington. Sitting with his two brothers and two sisters...
Sometimes True Change Takes Generations, Even With Great Leaders
Pinhas contains a mini-essay on leadership, as Moses confronts his own mortality and asks God to appoint a successor. The great leaders care about succession....
Beginning the Journey
A while back, a British newspaper, The Times, interviewed a prominent member of the Jewish community - let's call him Lord X - on his 92nd...
