Shabbat Shalom The weekly parsha commentary (link to original page) Click here to receive the weekly parsha by email each week. Parshat Vayikra When a person presents an offering of meal to the lord, His offering shall be of choice flour. (Vayikrah 2:1) When a person presents an offering – The term 'soul' in respect to a voluntary offering is used only in conjunction with the flour offering. Who customarily brings a flour offering? A pauper. Said the Holy One, Blessed Be He: His offering is accepted as if...
Shabbat Shalom The weekly parsha commentary (link to original page) Click here to receive the weekly parsha by email each week. Parshat Pekuday – Shkalim He erected the Courtyard all around the Tabernacle and the Altar, and he emplaced the curtain of the gate of the Courtyard. So Moshe completed (vayechal) the work. (Shemot 40:33) By the seventh day God completed (vayechal) His work which He had done. (Bereishit 2:2) The word 'completed' (vayechal) – about completion of a thing that is perfect, and is not lacking anything (as in "So Moshe completed the work")....
Shabbat Shalom The weekly parsha commentary (link to original page) Click here to receive the weekly parsha by email each week. Parshat Vayakhel And the men came with the women, everyone of willing mind, they brought brooch and nose-ring and signet-ring And necklace, every kind of gold object (Shemot 35:22) The reason for 'and the men came with the women' is that the contribution of ornaments is more common amongst the women, they all possessed them, and they removed their nose-rings and rings immediately, and came first, and the men who were with them brought along...
Shabbat Shalom The weekly parsha commentary (link to original page) Click here to receive the weekly parsha by email each week. Parshat Ki Tissa "A half-shekel by the sanctuary weight" (Shemot 30:13) In the midrashim are found several reasons for the half-shekel, and I intend to add three more. The first – because the sin of the calf caused the breaking of the tablets into two, therefore must they donate a beka (half-shekel – beka means a break) which is a shekel broken in two. The second: inasmuch as this was atonement for the soul...
Shabbat Shalom The weekly parsha commentary (link to original page) Click here to receive the weekly parsha by email each week. Parshat Tetzave "And thou shalt make the robe of the ephod all of blue" (Ex. 28:31) The robe of the ephod – upon which the High Priest wore the ephod. All of blue. It seems to me that this means the way it appeared beneath the ephod and the breastplate, which are meant for memory, and also the blue of the sky, which is also for memory, as our rabbis wrote regarding the blue of the fringes,...
Shabbat Shalom The weekly parsha commentary (link to original page) Click here to receive the weekly parsha by email each week. Parshat Truma And you shall make a lamp stand of pure gold, hammered work it shall be made, its base and its shaft, its cups, its calyxes and its blossoms, shall be from that work And you shall make its seven lamps, and its lamps shall be mounted and give light in front of it… (Shemot 25:31,37) And give light in front of it – Make the six lamps at the heads of the branches, which...
Shabbat Shalom The weekly parsha commentary (link to original page) Click here to receive the weekly parsha by email each week. Parshat Mishpatim "If a fire shall go forth and find thorns, and a stack of grain or a standing crop or a field is consumed, the one who kindled the fire shall make restitution." (Shemot 22:5) If a fire shall go forth – by itself… and our sages of blessed memory interpreted this in Baba Kama (60b) in terms of the destruction of the Temple, as it is written (Yeshayahu 64:10): "Our holy...
Shabbat Shalom The weekly parsha commentary (link to original page) Click here to receive the weekly parsha by email each week. Parshat Yitro You shall not covet your neighbor's house. You shall not covet your neighbor's wife, nor his servant, his maidservant, his ox, his ass, nor whatever he possesses. (Shemot 20:14) You Shall Not Covet. It is common knowledge that desire depends upon the heart, and the essence of the commandment is that man must relinquish all thought of possessing that which his friend possesses – property and movables – and turn his heart away from this...
Shabbat Shalom The weekly parsha commentary (link to original page) Click here to receive the weekly parsha by email each week. Parshat Beshalach – Tu BiShevat When, in the evening, the Lord gives you meat to eat and bread to satiety in the morning, as the Lord hears your complaints that you complain against Him – for what are we? – not against us are your complaints, but against the Lord! (Shmot 16:8) Not against us are your complaints – You directed the complaint against us when you said that we brought you out . But it...
Shabbat Shalom The weekly parsha commentary (link to original page) Click here to receive the weekly parsha by email each week. Parshat Bo No one saw his fellow and no one rose from where he was three days, but all the Israelites had light in their dwelling places. (Shemot 10:26) A man could not see his brother – Something new appeared before their eyes, a partition between the light and their eyes. Even people close to each other could not see one another. And so it is written in Midrash Rabba: "A darkness one can feel" – how...