Compared with Christianity, Judaism has always been light on dogma and heavy on behavior. Since the early church, Christians persecuted heretics for espousing the “wrong” version of Jesus’ divinity and the like. But we Jews have never been so numerous that we could afford to expel people too hastily. With the notable exception of Maimonides,… Read more »

Happy Tuesday! After a summer hiatus, I am returning to Tefillah Tuesdays. Our progress through the liturgy, has brought us to the first paragraph of the Amidah. Today, let’s linger over the phrase above, קונה הכל/Koneh HaKol, affirming that “God possesses all.” Like so much in the prayer book, this is a biblical allusion: After… Read more »

The God of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Sarah, Rebecca, Rachel and Leah. Who else belongs on the list of sainted ancestors that begins our Amidah? I want to share with you a daring, stimulating and challenging midrash that may provide a harmonic note for your prayer. An early medieval midrash, Pesikta Rabbati (Aharei Mot, #47), includes… Read more »

א’להי אברהם א’להי יצחק וא’להי יעקב … א’להי שרה א’להי רבקה א’להי רחל וא’להי לאה/God of Abraham, God of Isaac and God of Jacob, God of Sarah, God of Rebecca, God of Rachel and God of Leah. The initial blessing [“Avot”] of the Amidah invokes “the merit of our ancestors” by citing Exodus 3.6, God’s… Read more »

This introduction to every traditional blessing may be the most familiar phrase in the Jewish lexicon. It rolls off the tongue of even non-observant Jews.   So what does it mean?  Let’s focus today just on the word barukh.   We typically translate this as blessed or praised are You, Adonay. This constitutes a kind of joyous apostrophe: hooray! How wonderful is Hashem! That works, although there… Read more »