The creation of the world is about to be celebrated in our annual readings from the first book of the Torah, beginning with “In the beginning, God created…” It is a time to reflect, to consider the awesome beauty of the world as well as our own efforts to live up to a divine image. It is also a time that reminds us of oneness, as we recite yet again the Shema, “Hear Oh Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is One.” The oneness of God was considered to be a revolutionary step in the spiritual development of mankind. Oneness has been imagined and reimagined over the generations, and I leave it to theologians to define it in more profound ways than I possibly can. For me, oneness has taken on very local meaning, thanks to a recent interest I have developed in the Great Lakes and the water of our region. read more

It is always melancholy after the passing of a great writer, like that, last week, of Toni Morrison. But it is also a message to read or re-read their works, and I have been doing so this week. I’m sort of a non-fiction guy, and will get around to re-reading Beloved, promise. But I just finished one of her last volumes, The Origin of Others, a group of lectures published in 2017. Already the stench of the person occupying the highest office in the land was pervading our conversations, and, despite our best efforts to ward him off, infiltrating and (dare I use the word?) invading our thoughts. Let me quote Morrison, describing the contents of a novel, not one of hers: read more

It has been years since I last saw Joe. On Wednesday I saw him vividly on the street in Mississippi, sitting with heartbroken weeping children whose parents were brutally locked up.

I met Joe when he was a successful young engineer. He was married. Had three children whom he adored. People often remarked on his devotion to his kids. He would announce at work without a shred of apology that he could not attend a meeting because one of his children needed him. I met him in a playground in Jerusalem where he often was the only father among a throng of mothers. read more

It is the first of the Hebrew month of Av. The month where we recall the two destructions of the Holy Temple. The ninth of Av is the day the sages determined that the Temples were destroyed. As the ninth of Av approaches, we enter deeper into despair, we turn off the music, let our hair grow unkempt, weddings are postponed. Meat and wine are avoided. This is a somber time. On the ninth of Av, we reenact the devastation of Jerusalem.   Sitting on the synagogue floor, we read the Book of Lamentations. The language is graphic: “The tongue of the suckling cleaves to its palate for thirst” (Lamentations 4:4), “More fortunate were the victims of the sword than the victims of famine…Hands of compassionate women have boiled their own children; they became food when the daughter of my people was shattered.” Lamentations 4:9-10). This book is not for the fainthearted. read more