Essays

Are you you smart, stupid, graceful, clumsy, bold, wimpy, articulate, shy? Whatever your answers, they will limit and define you as certainly as if they were a cage made out of concrete and steel

Doing good without believing in reward is the flip side of doing good only for reward. In the one case, good is constrained to the metaphysical; in the other, it is limited to a crass physical expression . . .

Ever wondered where that instant inspiration comes from? Where does that spontaneous urge of faith stem from? What truly is the essence of our soul?

To serve or not to serve is not the question, and it is not the choice. Every character serves the author. The choice is only about how you serve--directly, playing the good guy, or indirectly, playing the villain

It is important to realize that the Kabbalah is more about losing ourselves than about finding, becoming more other-centered and less ego-centered. The literal translation of the word Kabbalah is 'that which is received.'

I often speak of the Torah as a unifying document with an all-encompassing and harmonizing perspective on reality. There seems much that contradicts this in the Torah. So does the Torah indeed advocate separateness as a value?

Everything has its place in the plan of creation and it is "good."; it becomes "very good" when all the parts are working in unison

Teshuvah, tefillah and tzedakah commonly translate as "repentance," "prayer" and "charity." But these English words fail to express the full significance of these concepts, and even convey the very opposite of their true import

This is what compassion does: it simply comes to say hello, with kindness and grace; to be a companion in whatever circumstance presents itself; to banish loneliness, and if not, to accompany the lonely in their solitude

We really should not have to die at all, despite Adam's sin. And G-d, so to speak, is sensitive to this. It "embarrasses" Him...

When opening the door for Elijah, the children gather round to watch the quivering liquid ripple, hoping to detect some sign of its sampling by the visiting prophet. But surely there's more meaning to this cup than a child's imagination

Why does an all-knowing G-d need to test anybody? Shouldn't He know what is in our hearts? And why is Abraham's test of faith "the entire glory of Israel and their merit before their Father in Heaven"?

He was a world-famous figure, I was an anonymous student from 3000 miles away. Quickly it became clear to me that he believed in me more than I believed in myself

That common but feeble excuse, "I couldn't help myself," is not acceptable to anyone sensitive to the message of the tefillin

Miracles are a concession to the human need to see things from a different perspective in order to apprehend what they've already seen. Shavuot is when G-d believes in us enough not to indulge it

It is irrational to believe that an elephant can fit itself through the eye of a needle. But what about the One who brought elephant, needle, size, space and logic itself into existence?

The very substance of the cosmos continually oscillates between a state of being and not-being. This oscillation, say the Chassidic masters, is the primal source of Time

"It is not good," said G-d of the first and only human being, "for man to be alone." As long as man was alone, he could not really be good