Category: Bereishit
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Bereishit 5786: One Thing and One Thing Only
Rabbi Yehuda Amital z’l was a tremendous scholar and a sophisticated speaker but he spoke and wrote in a plainspoken style. And one of his plainspoken and pithy observations about Parashat Bereishit has been lovingly preserved…
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Bereishit 5780: “The Tree of Growing Up”
Bette Davis famously said “old age ain’t no place for sissies.” This is a quote that launched a thousand novelty t-shirts and coffee mugs and tote bags. If I were designing one of those inspirational coffee…
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Bereishit 5779: “Nothing but Evil All the Time”
The Torah is not a book of theology written by people. It is a book of anthropology written by God. The Torah is likewise not a book of philosophy and is not a book of history…
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Bereishit 5775: “Islamic Terrorism & the ‘Shabbos App’”
A biology course that I took in college taught me something important about religion. Steven J. Gould, the great evolutionary biologist, taught a survey course at Harvard which he ambitiously called “A History of Life.” Professor…
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Bereishit 5774: “Kove’a Itim”
Why is Genesis in the Torah? It is a counter-intuitive question – how could the Torah not contain the account of Creation? The flood? The stories of the patriarchs and matriarchs? But Rashi begins his commentary…
Rabbi David Wolkenfeld 