TOPPLING A LEADER How do you topple a leader? What is the best tactic to use in order to create a takeover without the use of force? On the face of it, Korach, in this week’s parsha, has adopted a very smart tactic. When he makes his bid to be leader of the Jewish people,...
CATCH 22? When Joseph Heller published his novel, Catch 22, in 1961, he hadn’t realized how quickly his title would become a catch phrase. What started as an illogical rule in army bureaucracy, soon came to include any situation where a a person can’t escape because of contradictory limitations Moses is faced with a Catch...
AI AND THE MENORAH The scenario is the Tabernacle or Temple. The Kohanim are getting their instructions on how to light the golden Menorah. They are told: Beha’alotcha, “when you cause to rise up.” When lighting the Menorah the Kohen needed to hold his taper to the wicks until the lamps could burn independently. What...
RABBINIC PLATFORMING The late Rabbi Dr. Norman Lamm, (d. 2020) head of Yeshiva University (whose yahrzeit fell last week) used to remark that he knew of only one joke in the Mishna: the statement that “rabbinic scholars increase peace in the world!” Yet, the late Rav Kook (d. 1935) addressed this question. He said it...
JUBILEE AND COMMUNITY This weekend is all about numbers! Of course, the number 70 is on everyone’s mind as we celebrate Her Majesty’s magnificent milestone. But this Shabbat we begin to read the Book of Numbers, which opens with the numbering of the Jewish people in the desert. This will not be the first time...
COUNT DOWN OR COUNT UP? This Shabbat will be the 42nd day of the Omer. Six of the seven weeks from Pesach to Shavuot will have passed. The Sefer HaChinuch (Spain 13th cent.) poses an obvious question. If the Omer count represents the time that the Israelites, having left Egypt, anticipated receiving the Torah on...
