Devorah Tucker-Fick is a Cantorial student at ALEPH. Our parsha is Toldot. In this parsha, two twins, Esau and Jacob, have complicated relations. Esau is beloved by his father, Jacob by his mother, ...

Jeremy Rosen, is an orthodox rabbi, born in Manchester. Studied philosophy at Cambridge University in England and Be’er Yaakov and Mir yeshivot in Israel where he received Semicha. He has served as a ...

בראשית כו:יח וַיָּ֨שָׁב יִצְחָ֜ק וַיַּחְפֹּ֣ר ׀ אֶת־בְּאֵרֹ֣ת הַמַּ֗יִם אֲשֶׁ֤ר חָֽפְרוּ֙ בִּימֵי֙ אַבְרָהָ֣ם אָבִ֔יו… Isaac dug anew the wells which ...

Jewish tradition teaches that the Torah has shiv’im panim – seventy faces. It is not a book of simple answers or one-dimensional truths. That is its beauty: always fresh, always authentic, inviting us ...

As Jacob leaves his parents’ home at the behest of his mother, Rebecca, the Torah declares that Rebecca was the mother of both Jacob and Esau (Genesis 28:5). At first blush, this seems to be an ...

In the aftermath of the Union army’s terrible defeat at the battle of Fredericksburg, Virginia, in December 1862, Abraham Lincoln felt compelled to relieve General Ambrose Burnside of command of the ...

Standing before his father Isaac, Jacob claims that he is his brother Esau (Genesis 27:19). While some commentators rationalize Jacob’s behavior, others insist that, for the rest of his life, he is ...

Parashat Toldot: A call for impassioned Jewish renewal If the parasha is a saga of inheritance, of blessings fought over and destinies forged, then the haftarah is its echo, reminding us that a ...

In Beethoven’s Ninth symphony, the power of the opening musical notes sets the tone for the rest of this remarkable symphony. Listening to it we feel hit with an uppercut on the chin, leaving us ...

Earth and sky, woods and fields, lakes and rivers, the mountain and the sea, are excellent schoolmasters, and teach some of us more than we can ever learn from books.-Sir John Lubbock Modern parents ...