Why We Laugh – Parshat Vayeira 2017

I have some relatives that have a condition. It’s not serious and I doubt it has been categorized by physicians and psychologists as something that requires attention. But it’s clearly something inherited.  What these relatives do is they laugh at the wrong times. I mean, it happens to all of us that we occasionally laugh nervously at something serious …

On Guilt and Personal Responsibility – Parshat Vayikra 2017

The paranoia, the feeling of distraction, the troubled soul, the tell-tale heart. Over this past year, we’ve discussed confession, repentance, forgiveness. But we’ve rarely spoken of guilt. We all know what it feels like but no expression of it better encapsulates it than Edgar Allan Poe’s famous 1843 short story, the "Tell-Tale Heart." It tells of a man …

Shimon Peres’s Meaningful Life – Parshat Nitzavim 2016

In his book, To Heal a Fractured World, Rabbi Jonathan Sacks tells the story of an amazing woman named Sue Burns. Sue Burns had a difficult life; she was diagnosed with osteosclerosis, a neurological disease in which a person becomes less and less mobile over time. When visiting her in a nursing home, Rabbi Sacks fully expected …

Forgiveness is Mercy – Parshat Ki Tisa 2016

Now, I don’t normally quote stories from the Zohar but I found the following story both perplexing and inspiring: Rabbi Abba sees a man sleeping on a pile of rocks at the edge of the cliff. That’s a pretty ominous beginning - you know something is about to go wrong. Well, that’s exactly what happens. …