Rabbi Levin's Blog

The faith and resilience of the Jewish people is remarkable. Once again another Haman has vowed to wipe us out. His threats continue as he is being routed. But his threats come with missiles that target men, women and children, and have unfortunately caused a lot of destruction. Every life lost is an entire world.  Every person injured and every building destroyed is a tragedy. And the suffering extends to the entire nation.  I have many friends and relatives in Israel and they are all very tired. Woken up by sirens every night; running to shelters where they can’t sleep; and the general stress of living under fire takes its toll. Like so much of our humor that comes from oppression, a new pithy post said: Am Yisrael Chai, but I’m dying to get some sleep. Yet in my conversations and correspondence I hear people talking about the great miracles that we are seeing all the time. There is a powerful feeling of faith and gratitude to Hashem. We know that we will survive. We kno...

I took a group of our staff to Yosemite the other day.  It’s one of the perks I offer for dedicated young people who come here from other places, in this case Israel, and devote themselves to our children and community for a year or for a few months.  Halfway there, one of the teachers asked me if I have an itinerary or would just drop them off and let them find their own way once we got to the park.  (They obviously had no idea what to expect in Yosemite.)  I told them not to worry, they will see some amazing sights, including “some waterfalls” they  had heard about.  They trusted me and got what they had hoped for and more. This got me thinking about what we read in the Parsha this week about the Jews wandering in the desert for 40 years, on their way from Egypt to Israel.  Well, they didn’t actually wander for 40 years.  They camped in 42 places along the way.  In some places they stayed for a day or two, sometimes for a month or two, and ...

Is sameness a good thing?  How about hierarchy?  Equality is the word nowadays, but what does true equality mean?  The Jewish nation was created with a hierarchy.  The 12 sons of Jacob, also called Israel, were the original “B’nai Yisrael.”  Jacob gifted Yosef a double portion, as the first-born of his beloved wife Rachel, making his two sons Menashe and Efraim heads of separate tribes.  Of the 13 tribes, one stood out, the tribe of Levi.   The Levites were chosen to carry the portable Sanctuary through the desert, and serve in the Temple as guards, singers, doorkeepers and more.  They lived in special cities and guided the people.  The leader of the Jewish people, Moshe, was from the tribe of Levi.  They stood out in their faithfulness to Hashem in Egypt and throughout the journey in the desert, by circumcising their children and following the traditional lifestyle passed down by Jacob.  They did not participate in the Golden ...

Hashem gave the Jewish people the Torah.  We are taught that He chose us to receive the Torah.  In the blessings we say every morning and upon being called to the Torah, we say “Who chose us from all the nations and gave us the Torah.”  It seems as if the Torah was an exclusive gift that Hashem chose to give specifically to us as opposed to the other nations. Slight problem:  Our Sages teach that Hashem offered the Torah to every nation!  When Moshe blessed the people before he passed, he said the following Devarim 33:2):  “G-d’s presence came from Mount Sinai to meet them. He shone forth to them after coming from Mount Se’ir. He appeared after coming from Mount Paran.  What was He doing on Mount Se’ir and Mount Paran?  This is the Biblical source for the teaching that Hashem first offered the Torah to all the nations.  The nations didn’t want the Torah because it interfered with their lifestyles.  The nation of Eisav said they live by t...

The Torah seems to be giving good advice to farmers:  Sow your field for six years and let it lie fallow on the seventh.  On a superficial level, it seems like a good idea, to let the field rest and regain its nutrients.  And over the years I have had this discussion with many people, intimating that the Torah was written by scholars in an agricultural society and that it makes a lot of sense for the physical needs of the land. There are a few problems with this approach however.  First of all, the verse states: The earth shall rest “a Shabbat for Hashem.”  This is not about the benefit of the earth, this is about doing something for Hashem.  There are several other issues that come up.  In addition to not sowing the field, the Torah says not to prune the vineyard during the Sabbatical year.  Is there some physical benefit to the field from that?   I am not a farmer, a biologist or a botanist, so I did a little research.  It seems t...

Tonight and tomorrow (Friday) is Lag Ba’omer.  What exactly is Lag Ba’Omer? The word “lag” is not actually a Hebrew word.  It is a composite of two letters, lamed and gimel, and is used for the numerical value.  Lamed is 30, gimel is 3, so “lag” is 33. Ba’omer means “of the Omer.”  So Lag Ba’Omer is the 33rd day of the Omer counting.  One of the questions I wan tto address is why we mark the day as the 33rd of the Omer and not by the date on the calendar, 18 Iyar. During the period between Pesach and Shavuot, we “count the Omer”, counting each of the 49 days leading from the Exodus until the Receiving of the Torah at Mount Sinai.  It is called “Counting the Omer" because it begins on the second day of Pesach when the Omer offering - a measure of barley flour, was offered on the Altar.   Chassidus explains in depth the connection between the sacrifice, the counting, and the two holidays.  In a nutshell, when the Jewish people left Egypt they w...