repentance
Forget Your Past – For Now
By Elie Mischel Fifteen years ago, when I was working as a corporate attorney in New Jersey, I joined a volunteer program in which lawyers helped Holocaust survivors fill out incredibly long and detailed applications for Holocaust...
How to Properly Repent
By Adam Eliyahu Berkowitz Being a father has taught me more about religion than any rabbi ever has. One time, I took my three-year-old boy to the park. He was playing with a friend when the other boy pushed him, toppling him into the...
The Unlikely Connection Between a Captive Woman and the Hebrew Month of Elul
By Adam Eliyahu Berkowitz Dani is a member of our small synagogue and every Shabbat, when we gather together after morning prayers, he jumps up and gives a speech on the weekly Torah portion. It isn’t nice to say, but his speeches drive...
Once a Brother, Always a Brother
By Adam Eliyahu Berkowitz We raised our kids with a strict ‘No hitting’ rule. So I was shocked when I walked into the playroom and found my two sons, ages ten and eleven, hitting each other. To be more precise, the older boy was leaning...
Back from the Dead? The Incredible Sons of Korah
“And the earth opened its mouth and swallowed them up with their households, all Korah's people and all their possessions.” (Numbers 16:32) That was the tragic price that Korah and his group of comrades had to pay for attempting to...
When “I’m Sorry” Just Isn’t Good Enough
We've all done it; despite all of our good intentions, we make a bad mistake and we hurt someone we love. Full of regret, we apologize. But sometimes, apologies aren’t enough. When a borrowed car is returned with a bent fender, a trip to...
How the Rewards of Sin Bring Us Closer to God
Sin is horrible. It drives us away from God, pushing us into a reality that seems devoid of life, love, and hope. This state of despair envelopes the most precious aspects of our lives. Marriage, the source of our greatest joy, can become...
The Exile as a Sign of God’s Everlasting Love for Israel
There are two passages in the Torah that contain a short list of promised blessings should the Children of Israel adhere to the commandments, and a longer list of curses should they not. The first is found in Leviticus chapter 26 and the...
God’s Thirteen Attributes of Mercy
After the Children of Israel sinned with the Golden Calf, Moses ascended Mount Sinai and pleaded with God to forgive them. His pleas were successful so Moses considered it an auspicious time to ask God for a way to ensure forgiveness for...
What happened to the Temple Menorah?
The Arch of Titus, constructed in 81 CE by Emperor Domitian to commemorate the victory over the Jewish rebellion in Judaea, stands on the Via Sacra in Rome to this day, bearing witness to the fact that the Romans carried away the golden...
