Surrender or Struggle? The Akeidah Reconsidered
The story of the Binding of Isaac, Akeidat Yitzhak, is often invoked to teach that we must sacrifice our autonomous sense of right and wrong on the altar of Divine authority. This reading of the Akeidah, too easily enlisted in support of the repression of our moral voice, begets damaging consequences. In this essay, we […]
My Orthodox Rabbinic Ordination
My very assumption of this new role embodies Yeshayahu Leibowitz’s ideal that halacha adapt to suit a radically different reality – but he wouldn’t approve of all my ideas. SEP 7, 2022, 6:36 AM Shayna Abramson Kovler receives semikha from Rabbi Herzl Hefter and Rabbi Dr. Daniel Sperber in Jerusalem, ceremony MC-d by Rabbi Elhanan […]
Learning from Exodus: Freedom, law, and Israel
Our freedom today depends upon understanding and coming to an appreciation of how we have been shaped by Jewish history and the traumas of the past. We are in the throes of a crisis the outcome of which is still shrouded in a cloud. The story of the exodus from Egypt and the aftermath in […]
The religious Zionist community has some soul-searching to do
We need to set aside the messianism, ethnocentrism, and xenophobia in favor of a Jewish statehood that is rooted in Jewish identity yet suited to the modern world. How did it come to pass that more than 500,000 “nice and normative” religious Zionists awarded the “Religious Zionist” party with its 14 seats in the Knesset? […]
Reading in Pajamas
by Ilana Kurshan My three-year-old son goes through phases with books; when he is obsessed with a particular title, he insists we read it over and over, night after night. These days his favorite book is Engineer Ari and the Rosh Hashanah Train Ride, in which the engineer who has been chosen to drive the […]
Parashat Noah: Words Have Meaning
Parashat Noah: Words Have Meaning The biblical story of the Tower of Babel is the story of the catastrophic collapse of a fledging civilization from within. We in Israel would do well to read this story carefully and heed its lessons. The story revolves around the uses of language, common cause and hubris. And the […]
The Other-ing of God: Diversity at Sinai
By Rabbi Shayna Abramson Often, when two people are disagreeing over matters of Torah, they will agree to disagree, concluding their arguments with adages such as, “Eilu v Eilu Divrei Elokim Chayim -These and those are both the words of the living God” -or “Sheviim Panim LaTorah -There are seventy faces to the Torah”. But […]
The Children of Rebecca: A Lost Opportunity?
Today, it is widely accepted that Eisav is irredeemable…even evil, and that his path is incompatible with the destiny of Yaakov – and the Jewish people. Delving into the story of Yaakov and Eisav’s reunion shows that things are not always how they seem on the surface and provides a window into the possibility of […]
Watch the Panel
AMALEK IN OUR TIME: A PRE-PURIM PANEL AND EXPLORATION We want to thank Rabbi Herzl Hefter, Dr. Rabbi Avital Hochstein, Rabbi Professor Samuel Lebens, and Rabbi Elhanan Miller for their wisdom and insight on this panel about Amalek in our time. We encourage you to watch and share the panel! And we want to thank […]
“וספרתן לכן”
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