Mishpatim, מִּשְׁפָּטִים

The thing is, in order to let God in, you have to make space inside. I don’t know about you, but my inner world is pretty crowded, stuffed tight with worries and judgments . . . (Click image to read more)

False beliefs put you in a claustrophobic box, but truth will open the doors and the windows for you to step out into who you really are.

“The Merciful One wants the heart.” . . We need to act, but we also need to hear, to pause for a moment and be receptive, to open up to listening and taking in. (Click image to read more)

(Origninally published in 2021) These are our internal strangers, living in our system as second class citizens. When we welcome them in, when we welcome the holes, they shift from being outsiders in this world to insiders in another world . . . (Click image to read more)

My father spoke beautiful English with a heavy Polish/Yiddish/Russian/Israeli accent. He loved this country. He liked to say that this was the only country in the world where a poor immigrant-refugee like him could come and have his children educated in the highest institutions in the country. In 2007, almost exactly 10 years ago, he

“Under His feet there was the likeness of a pavement of sapphire, like the very sky for purity” (24:10). This description of a vision of God appears in this week’s parsha, alongside its many laws. “A pavement of sapphire” in Hebrew reads, livnat hasapir. Rashi, quoting the midrash, says that this levaynah, “pavement” or “brick,” was at