Our guest this week is Rabbi Michael Beals, leader of Congregation Beth Shalom in Wilmington, Delaware. Rabbi Beals was ordained at the Jewish Theological Seminary. He is also a graduate of the ...

Out guest this week is Rabbi Philip Scheim of Toronto’s Beth David congregation. Rabbi Scheim is also the president of the Rabbinical Assembly. His career in the rabbinate began in 1981, when he was ...

This week’s parshat Ekev and its haftarah hit uncomfortably close to home. They promise blessing, protection, and victory—if we remain faithful to God. But they also force us to confront an unsettling ...

In Parashat Ekev, which is part of Moses’ lengthy speech, there is a well-known passage where Moses warns the nation of Israel against the sin of arrogance that may come as a result of success and ...

As a child, I attended Yeshiva Torah Vodaath. Every day at morning services, I was mesmerized by an older man named Rabbi Chaim Gelb. I can still remember Reb Chaim calling out “Amen.” Sometimes he’d ...

President Barack Obama initiated a firestorm when he said “you didn’t build that” in a campaign speech, his reminder to those who fancy themselves self-made they in fact built their companies with the ...

Please note that the posts on The Blogs are contributed by third parties. The opinions, facts and any media content in them are presented solely by the authors, and neither The Times of Israel nor its ...

This week I have been thinking a lot about the importance of studying history. History, at its core, is the study of people. History can help us understand ourselves as a people, as we see patterns ...

It was a threat that parents and movie characters alike used. “We can do this the easy way or the hard way.” The threat implied that the outcome was inevitable. We were going to be bathed, whether we ...

Rashi notes that the word ekev connotes a human heel. What the text is teaching is the importance of keeping those commandments that seem less important, like the dirt that one kicks up with one’s ...