Torah asides – Rereading Torah Towards Liberation

Structure and Blessing

Short note on a connecting root shared by birah and berakha.

Faith Resources from Gender Spectrum

Among the many useful resources at Gender Spectrum, is this set of responses to “clobber passages” in sacred text, Jewish and Christian. https://www.genderspectrum.org/articles/faith-resources-clobber

What God Has Twisted: Sukkot Addendum

“Who can straighten what God has twisted?” The Book of Kohelet (Ecclesiastes), which many communities read during the Shabbat of Sukkot or at other points during the festival, tells us: Consider God’s doing! Who can straighten what [God] has twisted? So in a time of good fortune enjoy the good fortune; and in a timeContinue reading “What God Has Twisted: Sukkot Addendum”

Experiment 5782

Not sure where this is going, but launching a new set of Torah explorations with Haazinu, near the end of Deuteronomy, and looking back/ahead to Breishit, at the start of the reading cycle. While the writing is mine, the thoughts are informed and inspired by Tzedek Chicago Torah study, a weekly on-line communal dive intoContinue reading “Experiment 5782”

Haazinu (Deut 32:1-52)

“Haazinu” means something like “Give ear!” The Torah portion, Haazinu is comprised of Deuteronomy 32:1-52, and most of it is set as poetry. This makes the penultimate portion of Deuteronomy, which closes out the desert story, a kind of bookend to the Song of the Sea (Exodus 15:1-18), which marks the crossing over into theContinue reading “Haazinu (Deut 32:1-52)”