To be a Jew is to believe in impossible dreams. To be a Jew is to believe that slaves can become free. It is to believe that the senselessness of this world can be disrupted by divine words that break through the barrier between heaven and earth. It is trust, even on our darkest days, that we are part of God’s dream.…

The Talmud is notoriously complex, and its stories are no exception. In this class, we will learn strategies for how to understand these texts such as structural analysis, to explore the narrative flow and construction; interiority, to uncover the unstated emotions and motivations of the sages; and contextual analysis, to place each story within th…

The tragedy of Moshe’s final conversation with his father-in-law are the words that he leaves unsaid.By Hadar Institute

The psalms attached liturgically to each day of the week are often mumbled over quickly, without much attention to their meaning. In this series, we'll engage in careful literary-theological readings of these psalms, looking at how various midrashim interpret the psalms, and bring new meaning to this part of our daily prayers. Key themes explored w…

There are moments in life where things have gone so wrong that we cannot see a way forward. That may be what has happened to the woman who chooses to drink the sotah waters.By Hadar Institute

To be a Jew is, when we are lucky, to feel the memory of Sinai in our bones. We strive to feel as if we have experienced both the slavery and liberation of Egypt first hand, as if we ourselves saw God’s miracles.By Hadar Institute

What did we hear at Sinai? What does God want us to hear?By Hadar Institute

When it comes to the enslavement of Jews, God gives us two imperatives. First, strive to be like God. Failing that, resist the temptation to become like the Egyptians.By Hadar Institute

The psalms attached liturgically to each day of the week are often mumbled over quickly, without much attention to their meaning. In this series, we'll engage in careful literary-theological readings of these psalms, looking at how various midrashim interpret the psalms, and bring new meaning to this part of our daily prayers. Key themes explored w…

What makes Lag Ba’Omer, the 33rd day of the Omer, special? Why has this day become an oasis of relief, and even celebration, amidst the generally mournful period between Pesah and Shavuot? The Talmud tells us simply that one year, R. Akiva’s 24,000 students all died between Pesah and Shavuot; a post-talmudic tradition asserts that the plague that f…

Parashat Emor features two types of ritual buildings: the first, the mishkan (tabernacle), later transformed into the beit ha-mikdash (Temple); and the second, a sukkah. We encounter the mikdash this week, mostly in the form of limits on who may serve in it and how they must conduct themselves. Those who may serve there are not allowed to engage wi…

When you stop to think about it, Pesah Sheini is a very strange holiday, with a motivation that would be incomprehensible for almost any other festival. As we read in Bemidbar 9, some people were ritually impure on the 14th of Nisan—the eve of Pesah—and therefore unable to perform the foundational mitzvah of slaughtering and eating a paschal offeri…

Yom Kippur, depending on who tells its story, is animated by one of two central wounds.By Hadar Institute

The Talmud teaches us that God is a God of truth who it would seem values honesty. Yet, what does that mean for all of our questions and doubts? Is there a limit to how honest we can be and are there situations in which another value trumps honesty for the sake of something greater? This class, which is part 1 of a 3 part series, will turn to Talmu…

Each of us was brought into this world by someone who allowed their body to become home to a stranger. This is what mothers do before we meet our children: watch, sometimes in wonder, and sometimes in grief, as the bodies which were once ours alone grow, bend, ache, and change in ways that make us unrecognizable to ourselves. Feel our ribs widen, o…

Although it eventually won out, it was not always obvious that “Hatikvah” would be the Israeli national anthem. There were other competitors, and various critiques of the poem written by Naphtali Hertz Imber. Among those critiques was a voice from at least some religious Zionists who thought the work too secular to reflect the religious import of t…

Vayikra is a book that is concerned with the holy and the profane; the pure and the impure. Nearly every mitzvah in Vayikra contains these categories. The Jewish people are told that they are to be kadosh because God is kadosh. In Vayikra, it is the holy that is the primary pathway to God. The mishkan (tabernacle), the center of holiness on earth, …

It shouldn’t be possible to say such a thing, but I have spent most of my life taking the Holocaust for granted. My father of blessed memory was a child survivor; my mother, she should live a long life, is herself the child of survivors. I have no memory of learning about the Holocaust, no recollection of a parent telling me what it was, of what ha…

The burnt ashes of the korbanot (sacrifices), piled on the altar, represent the intermingled prayers and dreams, experiences and regrets, of the Jewish people.By Hadar Institute

We are doing a lot of prep work this week. We are cleaning our homes, kashering pots and cutlery, making sure we’ve got everything on our Seder shopping lists.By Hadar Institute

The unspoken drive towards human sacrifice lurks in the background of Sefer Vayikra.By Hadar Institute

The first Pesah was a leil shimurim, a night of watching, a night of fear and uncertainty. Amid darkness and screams, the fate of the Israelites hung in the balance, with hopes of redemption and freedom in their hearts. They were asked to believe in a God they didn't know and to set out on a journey with no destination in sight. Amazingly, they tru…

Human beings love to make idols of our dead. Desperate to keep our lost loved ones within reach, we create forms that we can cling to in their stead. We name buildings and mark park benches; install portraits and keep voicenotes on our phones. We believe, somewhere in our hearts, that if we can create the right form, capture the right image, wear t…

The psalms attached liturgically to each day of the week are often mumbled over quickly, without much attention to their meaning. In this series, we'll engage in careful literary-theological readings of these psalms, looking at how various midrashim interpret the psalms, and bring new meaning to this part of our daily prayers. Key themes explored w…

It’s only in the moment when Moshe once again commands the Jewish people to keep Shabbat that we know they are truly forgiven.By Hadar Institute