A Bat Mitzvah’s Teaching on the Downstream Effects of Kashrut
By Rabbi Nathan Kamesar This past Shabbat we celebrated the Bat Mitzvah ceremony of Claire Englander. Claire’s Torah portion falls in the Book of Devarim (Deuteronomy) where Moses is delivering his parting address to the Israelites as they get ready to cross over into the promised land. A central part of this address is a recapitulation of […]
Faithfulness to Our Moments of Clarity • Nina’s Names
By Rabbi Nathan Kamesar This past Shabbat we studied the weekly Torah portion from the Book of Devarim (Deuteronomy) in which Moses is delivering his extended farewell address to the Israelites as they stand at the precipice of the Promised Land, where he will not be joining them. As part of the farewell address, Moses reminds the […]
Lingering with the Divine
By Rabbi Nathan Kamesar This past Shabbat we studied Parashat Pinchas (the Torah portion known as “Pinchas,” named after a religious zealot who practices a cruel form of vigilante justice early in the portion). Parashat Pinchas includes the prescribed musaf offering associated with the different holidays, including Shabbat, that are to make up the rhythm of the Jewish year. Musaf means “additional” […]
Understanding Lonlieness Through The Prayers of Kabbalat Shabbat
By Rabbi Nathan Kamesar I was honored to be invited to offer a teaching for My Jewish Learning, the web’s leading pluralistic, nondenominational Jewish educational resource, and I did so on Divine Loneliness and Kabbalat Shabbat, a reflection on the idea that God, too, might be lonely, yearning for connection, and how Kabbalat […]
I Before Thou?
By Rabbi Nathan Kamesar This past week’s Torah portion, Balak, finds the Israelites continuing their wilderness journey, circuitously making their way to the Promised Land. (And doesn’t it mirror life’s wanderings, finding periods in our lives as something of a wilderness as we make our way towards what we imagine to be a land of milk and […]