The High Holy Days are an exciting time for me. As I consider the year gone by and the year to come, I feel a rising sense of possibility. In our tradition, on Rosh HaShanah, the first day of the new year, names are inscribed in the book of life; on Yom Kippur, one’s \t’shuvah\, …
It’s official: Friday’s \New York Times\ lead editorial said President Bush’s Thursday anti-terrorism speech to the National Endowment for Democracy “suggested an avoidance of today’s reality that seemed downright frightening.” There is irony here, of course: Bush’s speech was an act of rhetorical terrorism, designed to scare all of us deeply enough to place our …
For the past few days, these lines from Deuteronomy 22:8 have been resounding in my head with the regularity of a heartbeat: “When you build a new house, you shall make a parapet on your roof, so that you do not bring bloodguilt on your house if anyone should fall from it.” A statement’s appearance …
A story is told about a town that suffered from drought (I heard a version of it from Rabbi Zalman Schachter-Shalomi, but if you want to transpose it to a priest or a minister or imam, it will work just as well; if you Google the key words, you’ll see others have done likewise). People …
This is my third and final essay about the rich learning I was privileged to share at the ALEPH Kallah, a spiritual retreat at the end of July. In the afternoons, I took a class entitled “Melitz Yosher: On Becoming An Intercessor,” offered by Rabbi Ruth Gan Kagan, she of generous heart and deep learning. …
As I wrote in my last essay, at the end of July I attended a large spiritual retreat, the ALEPH Kallah, where I studied with two wonderful teachers. Today, my hope is convey a few of the insights I gained from Rabbi David A. Cooper, whose class in “Kabbalah, Zen and Dzogchen: Interweaving Contemplative Paths” …
During the last week of July, I never read a newspaper, never heard the radio, never turned on the TV. I recommend an annual respite from our 24/7 broadcast of whatever the editors and pundits think is worth noting, if only to experience the useful instruction that comes when we tune back in and find …
\The Self-Made Man\, a new film by my friend Susan Stern, will have its television premiere on the PBS series “P.O.V.” this coming week (and while I’m boasting about my friends, let me say that “P.O.V.” was created by another friend of mine, the prodigiously talented Marc Weiss). Most stations will air it on July …
Tonight, the Hebrew calendar marks the beginning of Shavuot, a holiday that has its roots in ancient offerings from the barley harvest, and has come to mark the giving of the Torah at Mount Sinai: the holiday of revelation. Like every milestone in the liturgical calendar, Shavuot invites us to examine our own lives and …
This month marks the first anniversary of Arlene’s blog. In one of my first posts, I wrote about a consulting project I was doing with Global Kids’ Newz Crew Project, which involves high school-age kids in online dialogues about global issues. As I am a certifiable fogey, this project also gives me a chance to …