Yom Kippur 5774: High Holiday Word Play

What do you call an average-looking grassland? Plain plain. How would you describe an unsightly collection of 144 items: Gross gross. A super cool insect? Fly fly.

English homonyms are great. And I love a good pun just as much as the next nebbishy rabbinical student, but playing with English words…that’s small potatoes. Now, this may just be the reality of four-more years of school plus a lifetime in the rabbinate talking…but Hebrew Homonyms…that’s where it’s at.

Rosh HaShanah 5774: Sefer Zichronot

I delivered this sermon at University of Rochester Hillel:

I don’t know about all of you, but in the last few weeks, I have acquired a lot of books. Books for classes, reference books, library books, notebooks, planners. It is a miracle that there is a square inch of space to move in my room. But, this is how we start things. We collect and we open books. New classes? Textbooks. Bar Mitzvah? Prayer books, books of Jewish Wisdom, a stack of Torahs. Starting a new job? Workplace handbooks and instruction manuals from past employees. Time for the New Year? Rosh Hashanah is a holiday with plenty of books to dive into. 

Experience Rosh Chodesh at the Kotel

This post first appeared on Challah U'Dvash, my wife's and my blog from our Year in Israel. It then made its way to ReformJudaism.org and...now it's here too!

This morning, we went to the Western Wall to pray with Women of the Wall for Rosh Chodesh Sivan, the festival celebrating the new month. Though a large group of progressive Jews were present, there were also thousands of Ultra-Orthodox men and women who had been bused in to protest a recent ruling by the Jerusalem District Court allowing women to pray as they wish at the Kotel. It was a moving, tense, and, at times, frightening scene. After we took some time to process our experiences, we reflected together on the day.

Parshat Bo: A Sign To You

My first sermon as a student at HUC!