Women on the Weekly Torah Portion

Since leaving the Garden of Eden, human impulse is an admixture of both good and evil. Our task is not to squelch the impulse but to mine it, by toning down the “mine” aspect.

Disagreements in marriage can be a real exercise in humility and maturity and force us to transcend our subjectivity. If we embrace the discomfort of the dispute we can come out with a lot more than a wounded ego...

I'm incredibly grateful that we have food to eat, clothing to wear, and a roof over our heads. Nothing is lacking as I carefully budget, trying to maximize every penny; but I still can't stop worrying and stop the anxiety from creeping into my heart...

Despite its violent and threatening nature, the flood is not just an enemy to be overcome or obliterated. It’s the very vehicle that pushes and elevates the ark to greater heights . . .

One can well understand then that Noah was worried about bringing new life into the world. Why give birth, toil and work the program that living entails if all that is built could at a point in the future also be destroyed!?

I've been a renegade since kindergarten. At university, the invite was to become a card-carrying member of (shhh… shhh) the Communist Party. And in my forties, the big-wide-world beckons that I fade the rebel's stain and dip myself in dyes of the Bourgeoisie. House, stocks, retirement fund… life insurance. All that stuff...

I loved to play with my grandmother's matriyoshki, sweeping the set off the shelf and enclosing one within her mother until all that stood before me was the ancient matriarch of the set. Silent. Robust. Red. Fat and pregnant with maybe fifteen smaller versions of herself. It crosses my mind that these matriyoshki are a visual model for a secret of the universe...

As a mother, I have a responsibility to teach my sons to do the right thing. But the right thing can mean, at least ephemerally, getting along and cooperating...

Noach teaches a person a very fundamental lesson in interpersonal relationships — how to avoid saying negative things about other people, and how to avoid seeing negative things in other people.

I just received our monthly credit card bill. On it was a month's worth of food shopping, as well as my utilities and phone bills. There were no luxuries; everything was a bare necessity. I gasped when I saw the total. How are we going to make it?

Abraham's plan would effectively remove himself from Pharaoh's hit list... and make Sarah available for Pharaoh's hedonistic abuse! Talk about a lack of chivalry! Is this Abraham, the first Jewish husband and the ultimate mentch?

Each Jew must look at him or herself and ask the question, “Who am I? What do I believe?” For we are not intended to be robots, we must do, but we also must know and understand...

Does your name define you? Do you know what your name means? Would you consider it a goal to live up to the meaning of your name? My English name is Stacey, the meaning of which is not fit to print in a Jewish magazine...

Speaking of sacrifice, I had a frightening epiphany one day last month. I used to think of myself as an altruistic person, but a little objective reflection forced me to conclude that that wasn't the case at all...

I read how Lot is saved and his wife turns into a pillar of salt. And I search to see my life in these words. I'd rather not see it, of course, as the connection is too intense, too real, too true

In a final summation of Sarah’s life, the Torah tells us two things—that she was beautiful and that she had a flawless character—her two great qualities juxtaposed.

Surrounded by a group of able-bodied men, Eliezer did not appear as a helpless, weary chap begging for a drink. And Rebecca was a young woman of nobility, not a poor servant girl accustomed to lugging water from wells . . .

Be spiritual. Listen to Sarah. Listen to your body. Use it. Use your animalistic drives and earthly achievements for G-dly missions. That’s exactly what G-d wants from you.

Some of us thrive as a result of a challenging environment; our struggles refine our characters and make us even greater people. And sometimes, no matter what we do, we cannot seem to rise above the circumstances of our birth...