The Portion of Ha’azinu (Deuteronomy 32:1-32:52)
The portion of Ha’azinu contains the song mentioned in the previous Torah portion (Vayeilech), which God told Moses to teach the Children of Israel so they would always understand the consequences of their actions. It ends with Moses preparing to die before the people...
The Allure and Illusion of Luxury
By Adam Eliyahu Berkowitz A long time ago, I worked as a cook in exclusive restaurants in Manhattan. I once got a special order for a lunch party of ten young businessmen celebrating their success. They were all under thirty years old and they had each achieved a...
An Obligation to Serve?
By Rabbi Elie Mischel When I graduated from my Boston area high school about 25 years ago, I chose to spend a year and a half in Israel, where I studied the Bible and Jewish wisdom at a yeshiva (a school for Jewish studies). As I came to the end of my studies, I had...
The Palm-Tree Prophetess
By Rabbi Elie Mischel Throughout the book of Judges, the people of Israel’s greatest enemy was looking at them in the mirror. Though they were plagued by many dangerous external enemies, Israel suffered most from internal division and infighting. The tribes, by and...
