Tag: Jews
-
The Future in a Narrow Time: Commentary on Shiv’ah Asar BeTammuz
This commentary was offered for Hebrew Seminary: A Rabbinical School for Deaf & Hearing on July 24, 2024. You can listen to the recording here. The Future in a Narrow Time: Commentary on Shiv’ah Asar BeTammuz 5784 By Rabbi Lauren Tuchman, Hebrew Seminary Professor of Rabbinic Literature The 17th of Tammuz…
-
Knowing and Not Knowing: Celebrating the Expansiveness of Torah
Originally published in 2021 Today, I remember. I remember vividly the all-consuming sadness I felt last Purim, as the sun was setting and my celebratory seudah was ending, the last event I attended with a large Jewish community. I remember feeling overcome with the intuitive sense that it would be…
-
Starting From the Same Beginner’s Mind
This teaching appeared as part of Hot Off The Shtender, a series of teachings from SVARA fellows. Starting From The Same Beginner’s Mind
-
Behar 5782
Parashat Behar, our Torah reading for this week, introduces us to the Shmita year. Every seven years, Leviticus/Vayikra instructs us that the land must lie fallow—no agricultural or food production is permitted and there are a number of other restrictions put into place in addition. As it so happens, 5782…
-
Finding My Possibility Model
A version of the below piece originally appeared as part of Hot Off The Shtender, a series of reflection pieces from SVARA. It is hard, nay impossible, to adequately capture the feelings that came over me when I learned about the passing of a dear friend: the fierce and…
-
Torah From A Mussar Perspective Vayeshev 5782
The below commentary first appeared as part of Torah From A Mussar Perspective through the Mussar Institute. Parshat Vayeshev contains within it the multi-faceted story of Judah and Tamar. Judah, Jacob and Leah’s fourth son, has journeyed away from his brothers and has married a woman named Shua with…
-
Thoughts For Yom Kippur 5782
Yom Kippur is often translated into English as the Jewish day of atonement, though I feel that this is a mistranslation. Yom Kippur’s awesomeness, in the literal sense of the word, is that the Jewish tradition provides us with a 25-hour period, Shabbat Shabbaton (the sabbath of sabbaths) to focus…
-
Bamidbar 5781
This week, we begin the fourth book of the Torah, Sefer Bamidbar. In Hebrew, bamidbar means wilderness or desert. In English, the title Numbers derives from the multiple censuses taken throughout the book. Bamidbar is a much more apt title for the journey that we will be taking these next…
Rabbi Lauren Tuchman 