Parshah Columnists

Without humility, it’s impossible to look in the mirror and assess yourself realistically. Either your flaws will be invisible so that you can’t work on them, or in your overly critical mind, the only thing you can see are your weaknesses, and you will be mired in dysfunctional despair.

We have a responsibility not only to help others and protect their dignity, but also to ensure that we refine and develop a sensitive, compassionate and respectful identity for ourselves.

Our entire existence is on loan from G-d. The question is, can we make the divine loan into a divine investment?

if we lift ourselves up just a little higher, we can see how small the world really is.

How did that pitiful remnant manage to recover, remarry and redeem Judaism for a new generation? How did they have the bravery to bring new children into a world that they knew could be so evil?

G‑d is omnipotent. He can simultaneously be within and yet remain aloof. But we, His children... how can we be expected to suffer through exile while retaining our exalted status as G‑d's children?

Higher and higher we scale; to come closer to G-d is our goal. Sometimes we find ourselves going downhill, slipping and sliding on the slopes of morals, tradition and ethics. We get drunk, we ditch our calling. It is unfortunate, and we must change course.

Six reasons for the Sabbatical year: The soil, a macro-Shabbat, making up for six years of Shabbats, a lesson in faith and humility, unity, and liberation.

We are forever asking: What is the reason? What is the meaning? We ask this question of all commandments and all occurrences, even those we supposedly understand . . .

Think of what you posses not as something you own but as something you hold in trust for the benefit, not only of you and your family, but also of others.

Leviticus 25 sets out a number of laws whose aim is to correct the tendency toward radical and ever-increasing inequality that result from the unfettered play of free market economics.

What makes Judaism distinctive is its commitment to both freedom and equality, while at the same time recognizing the tension between them.