D'var Torah in a Minute

This week, we read the longest parasha in the whole of the Torah, Naso. The portion starts with a continuation of the census from last week, finishing up the enumeration of the Levites and their tasks; from there, we are commanded regarding interpersonal sins - one who commits a sin against another person must pay restitution in the value of the wrongdoing plus one-fifth of the aggregate value (that is, if the monetary value of the sin is $100, the added fine is $25 so that the value of the supplemental damages is one-fifth of the total amount of restitution paid). The parasha also includes the laws of the Nazarite, the Priestly Blessing, and the narrative of the consecration of the Tabernacle. And then, stuck in the middle of all this is the ritual of the Sotah, the accused adulteress. Also known as the Ordeal of the Bitter Water, the Sotah ritual is among the strangest ceremonies prescribed in the Torah, and it was abolished by an edict of Rabbi Yohanan ben Zakkai, though that became

This week, we begin the fourth book of the Torah, known in English as Numbers and in Hebrew as Bamidbar (technically, it should be B'midbar, but the grammatical construct being used shows definiteness by specification rather than using an article, and the name we use drops the specification, so we insert the definite article, or rather its assimilated form with the existing preposition, so that we call the book "In The Wilderness" and not "In a Wilderness"). But you didn't come here for a lesson in the nuances of Hebrew grammar, at least not when it's unrelated to the topic of the parasha. So, here we go.  This portion is boring. It's 159 verses of census-taking, for example, "As for the Tribe of Asher, their rolls by clan and household, listed by name, of all those 20 years and older, eligible for military service; the enrollment of the Tribe of Asher was 41,500". It repeats this exact formula for each tribe, with the names and numbers cha

This parasha, the last in the book of Leviticus, deals with some pretty heavy stuff. As the name, meaning "According to My laws" indicates, the first half of the portion is comprised of the blessings and curses that await the Israelite nation depending on whether they obey God's commandments or not (the second half is a list of the standard values of people and property for the purposes of monetary offerings for the upkeep of the Temple). The blessings are pretty standard - rain at the right time, ample harvests, prosperity, and peace and tranquility in the land. All good things. And then, we come to the other side of the equation. The list of curses is extensive and detailed. We are threatened with drought, invasion, mayhem, cats and dogs living together, the full gamut of chaos. Our sins will be punished sevenfold, though God will never forsake us, even as we are cursed to eat the flesh of our children. Even with the promise of God remembering us, this whole business of

At the start of this, the penultimate parashah of the book of Leviticus, we read about the cycle of shemitah, the sabbatical year. Once the Israelites enter the Land of Israel, they are to work the land for six years. In the seventh year, the land is to rest; just as we are to have a day of rest every seventh day, so should the land get to rest, with the time frames scaled up. While we in the Diaspora do not have to think about this concept, it is relevant in Israel, as Jewish-owned land cannot be used for commercial agriculture during that year (the current year, 5782, which began on the evening of September 6, 2021, and will end on September 25, 2022, is a shemitah year). Additionally, all debts owed to other Jews are canceled once the shemitah year starts (a rule which does apply outside of Israel).  Also, Israelite slaves become free automatically at the start of the shemitah year, though a slave who particularly loves serving his master has the option to extend his service by unde

This week's parashah, Emor, starts off pretty dry. God instructs Moses and Aaron in the special laws governing the conduct of kohanim in order to preserve their special holiness as the priestly caste. This includes things like who they may marry, the sorts of ritual impurity they must avoid, how and by whom the different sacrifices are to be eaten (most animal sacrifices were not burnt in their entirety, but rather most of the animal was eaten by the priests and/or the donor), and which conditions can disqualify a kohen from service. From there, the procedures for the celebrating of the various holidays of the year are expounded. We are commanded to blow the shofar on Rosh Hashanah, to fast on Yom Kippur, to wave the Four Species on Sukkot, and to count the Omer in the seven weeks following Pesach. And, of course, there are the details of the special sacrifices to be offered on each holiday. The instructions are recorded for lighting the eternal light in the Tabernacle and for the

This week, we have another parashah double feature with Acharei Mot and Kedoshim. Split between the two portions is a set of laws known to biblical scholars as the Holiness Code. This code details many different ways in which the Israelites are to behave as God's chosen nation. These laws run the gamut from equality before the law to appropriate handling of sacrifices to laws about prohibited mixtures. And then there's all the sexual ethics. Twice in the course of the Holiness Code, there appears the commandment not to "lie with a male as one lies with a woman," a verse that finds its way into American public policy discourse in 2021. But this d'var Torah is not about sexuality per se. It's about how our perceptions of sexuality affect our world. Although there are undeniably people whose anti-gay positions are based on the abovementioned verse from this week's parashah, that alone is not enough to explain their attitude, as the verse only proscribes one t