VaEt’chanan: Torah as a Life-Giving Force

by Rabbi Danny Stein
No matter the circumstances, each imprisoned and formerly imprisoned person deserves a life filled with dignity.
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Returning from the Narrow Place

by Rabbi Steven Jacobs
In our tradition, from any place on earth, even in a prison cell, there is always the possibility of teshuvah — a return.
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Holding the Space

by Rabbi Ora Weiss
We were told earlier in the Torah to love our neighbor and even the stranger as ourselves. But these commandments are included and yet reframed in our mitzvah, "V’Ahavta et Adonai," love everything/everyone. Signaling, perhaps, that we are also to understand love differently, that we are ready to learn a higher level of embodying love.
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Antisemitism is Not Inevitable

by Sophie Ellman-Golan
I believe, however, that antisemitism is not eternal or inevitable. It is something we can overcome, if we understand it properly. Common references to antisemitism as “the world’s oldest hatred” obscure the ways that it actually functions and who it benefits. 
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“Act Like You’ve Been There”

by Rabbi Joshua Strom
Rabbi Joshua Strom advises us to "act like we've been there" when we read VaEt'chanan.
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Senseless Hatred Among Us

by Rabbi Lizz Goldstein
On the 9th of Av, 5772, I had to attend the wake of a close friend who died suddenly at the age of 24. It was the first time I ever fasted on Tisha B’Av. I wasn’t raised with any observance or even knowledge, really, of the day, and even as I became more observant...
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Dispossession in our text and in our world

by Mackenzie Reynolds
Jewish stars spray-painted by settlers onto the deserted shops left by Palestinians after they were expelled from Shuhada Street. Bullet holes shot by settlers into the water tanks of Palestinians, who already have erratic and dramatically insufficient water supplies.  The palimpsest of “Free Palestine” where settlers have spray painted bold blue stars over the green...
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Inescapable Face

by Rabbi Dianne Cohler-Esses
“There is a commandment in the appearance of the face, as if a master spoke to me. However, at the same time, the face of the Other is destitute; it is the poor for whom I can do all, and to whom I owe all. “ —Emmanuel Levinas Rabbi Joshua, the son of Levi, said: at...
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The Trials and Tribulations of Paying Attention

by Rabbi Andrew Marc Paley
Recently, I was with a group of students on an early morning nature walk. I tried to create a moment that I was hoping would be a different kind of prayer experience. Rather than read or chant through the prayers, we tried to experience them with the benefit of Mother Nature. It soon became clear...
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