EVERY ONE A STAR The James Webb Space Telescope, launched two years ago, continues to transmit beautiful and exciting images of the early universe, exceeding all earlier expectations. In order to be useful, the wealth of new information needs to be classified. There is a specific organization, the International Astronomic Union (IAU) which has conventions for labelling all new astronomical bodies. In the bible, we find it is G-d who takes this role. As the prophet Isaiah says: “He declares the stars according to their number, He calls all of them by name.” (40:26) Rashi cites this verse at the...
FAMILY REUNION Much of the country is gearing up for annual festive season celebrations. Media outlets discuss menus and the tricky dynamics of family members and friends who have not been together for some time. Family dynamics of a different kind emerge in this week’s parasha. When Joseph has revealed his identity to his brothers, he sends them back to the land of Israel with a message that Jacob should relocate to Egypt. In order to facilitate the long journey for his father, Joseph sends wagons to Jacob. The bible says that when the brothers returned to Jacob: “They told...
HIS FATHER’S VALUES Our patriarch Jacob was one of the wisest and holiest men in the world in his time. Yet, for all his closeness to G-d and spiritual insight, his son Joseph had disappeared and he had no idea what had really happened to him. Was he still alive or had he been torn to death by wild beasts? Events in this week’s parasha set Jacob wondering. Famine had broken out in the Middle East. One country, Egypt, had food. Chapter 42 opens with the words: “Jacob ‘saw’ that there was shever or food in Egypt.” Rashi questions the...
PEACE IN OUR TIME? Cast your minds back to the period before 7th October. Jewish press around the world contained reflections on fifty years since the Yom Kippur war. Israel was no longer threatened with an existential threat from without. Considerable progress had been made on normalising relations with the Gulf States, and an agreement was even being worked out with Saudi Arabia. True, the residents of the south had to live with regular threats of rockets from Gaza, but Israel’s Iron Dome defence systems were making life manageable. The main challenge lay not from the outside, but from within...
WHOLESOMENESS Jacob sent lavish gifts to his brother Easu. He fought with an angel and was injured. He met his brother and the encounter was not as traumatic as he feared. The Torah then tells us: “Jacob arrived in the city of Shechem, shalem or complete.” (Bereishit 33:18) The Talmud, quoted by Rashi, homes in on this description of Jacob. It explains that completeness or wholeness can be understood on three distinct levels: He was whole in his body, he was whole materially, and he was whole spiritually. He was whole physically in that he had now recovered from being...
