[with apologies to Julie Andrews] Reasonable people ought to be able to debate the central issues around the charedi draft. Agree with them or not, there are indeed arguments that can be made for both sides. It should be the mark of civility to be able to competently present the position with which one disagrees, without becoming apoplectic. I am more than troubled, on the other hand, by the infantilization of the charedi community by its own would-be spokesmen. Some of the ideas that have been placed before the public are horribly insensitive and counter-factual. One wonders whether those who ..read more

We instinctively think of nega’im as born of lashon hora, “evil speech,” and we’re not wrong. But there is another birther of the condition, one that is evident in the very word metzora: tzarus ayin, “miserly eye” – selfish narrowmindedness, begrudging others one’s possessions. That is particularly evident in the fact that, in the case of nig’ei batim, the tzara’as that afflicts walls of a house, the owner, before the house is declared tamei by a kohein, is told to take the home’s vulnerable vessels outside, exposing them to public view. What’s more, the Torah’s concern for the owner’s possess ..read more

Tum’ah, or “ritual defilement,” is invisible but consequential in many contexts, especially, though not exclusively, with regard to kodoshim, material holding holy status. And, in most cases of tum’ah impartation, the defilement happens as a matter of course, through contact of one sort or another with a source of tum’ah. Tzara’as, the skin condition that occupies the bulk of parshas Tazria, is different. It is wholly dependent on the judgment, based on the detailed laws in the parsha, of a kohein. And not just his judgment but his pronouncement of “tamei.” Hence, we have the law that a groom ..read more

When describing the camel and pig, animals that lack either of the two signs required for their species to be considered consumable by Jews, the Torah’s wording is odd. Kosher species require cud-chewing and split hooves, yet the camel, the text states, is forbidden “because it chews its cud, but does not have a [completely] split hoof”; and the pig, “because it has a cloven hoof that is completely split, but will not regurgitate its cud.” The “becauses” are seemingly misplaced, since the reason for the species’ forbiddance is for the lack of one kosher sign, not the presence of one. Similar w ..read more

The following is a document that slipped through a worm-hole from a parallel universe. Nothing in it occurred in the universe we know as our own. But it is something we can think about. Would such a cri de cœur have helped the present situation, and even have averted the funding freeze? Who knows? KOL KOREH From the Moetzes Gedolei HaTorah Dear Brothers and Sisters! We stand before you like Yosef HaTzakik, proclaiming “Es achai anochi mevakesh!/ It is my brothers that I seek.” If there is one point to this kol koreh that we would like you to remember, it is that we long to feel a genuine achva ..read more

Among the various karbanos called shelamim, two are very limited regarding when their meat and accompaniments must be consumed – the day they are offered. Regular shelamim are permitted double that window of time. The two are the korban Pesach and, in our parsha, the korban todah, the “thanksgiving” offering. The latter, like the former, is offered in response to having been saved from a dire situation. The Gemara (Brachos 54b), citing Tehillim 107, gives the examples of 1) going to sea, 2) traveling in a desert, 3) enduring a serious illness and 4) being confined to prison. Interestingly, the ..read more

On Purim, Jewish men, to varying degrees, imbibe strong drink, and Jewish women do their best to keep them safe and anchored in civilization.  The holiday thus may not seem very female-centered.  But it is. Not just because its hero is a heroine and the holy book about the historical event it commemorates is named after her, but because Megillas Esther verily revolves around femininity. The pliable, preposterous monarch we meet at the Megillah’s start is a poster child (or, perhaps better, poster adolescent) for male chauvinism.  His 180-day drinking party, as the Talmud descri ..read more

Inordinate stress is put by the Talmud on being somech geulah litfillah, placing a reference to redemption immediately before prayer, i.e. the amidah (Berachos 9b). It isn’t clear why that is so important, but what has always occurred to me is that, before praising and beseeching Hashem, a consciousness of hakaras hatov, recognition of His favor toward us, embodied in the concept of geulah, is essential. Hakaras hatov, of course, is a fundamental – perhaps the most fundamental – Torah concept. At the very beginning of history, we read that the vegetation created on the third day would not spro ..read more

[Editor’s note: People are slowly becoming aware of the growth of harsh resentment of charedim in the Dat-Leumi community, which has sustained an outsize proportion of the war-related suffering. This is tragic, at a time that so many people, observant or not, have internalized the need to see all of us as bound together as a unified Am Yisrael. While some of the rhetoric has been harsh, this is not universally so. I was impressed by both the tone and content of R. Yitzchak Sheilat’s open letter to charedim. Naively or not, I can hope that his words will stimulate more thought in our world, and ..read more

The parallel in wordings between the Torah’s account of the universe’s creation and of the building of the Mishkan has been noted by commentaries. I won’t cite examples here but they abound. The late British Chief Rabbi Jonathan Sacks well phrased the upshot of that parallel, writing that “Genesis begins with G-d creating the universe as a home for humankind. Exodus ends with human beings, the Israelites, creating the Sanctuary as a home for G-d.” A little-known Midrash, I believe, also adds to the parallel.  The Midrash Hagadol, on the parsha’s final pasuk (Shemos 40:38) – which states t ..read more