Shabbat Shalom The weekly parsha commentary (link to original page) Click here to receive the weekly parsha by email each week. Parshat Metzora If, however, he is poor and his hand cannot attain, he shall make one male lamb for a guilt offering, to be elevated in expiation for him, one tenth of a measure of choice flour with oil mixed in for a meal offering and a log of oil (Vayikra 14:21) If, however, he is poor and his hand cannot attain – Because poverty may be a personality characteristic as in 'gaunt and...
Shabbat Shalom The weekly parsha commentary (link to original page) Click here to receive the weekly parsha by email each week. Parshat Tazria On the tenth of this month, let every man take a lamb for a father's house, a lamb for a household, in proportion to the persons, each man according to what he eats shall take his portion of the lamb. (Shemot 12:3-4) According to what he eats – who is able to eat. This excludes the sick and the aged who are not able to eat an...
Shabbat Shalom The weekly parsha commentary (link to original page) Click here to receive the weekly parsha by email each week. Parshat Shmini This is the statute of the teaching that the Lord has charged, saying: Speak to the Israelites, that they take you a perfect red cow that has no blemish and on which no yoke has been put. (Bemidbar 19:2) This is the statute of the teaching. The rites pertaining to the red Heifer were designed to discourage association with the dead, prompted by the bereaved's often excessive love for the departed. Alternatively, that people should...
Shabbat Shalom The weekly parsha commentary (link to original page) Click here to receive the weekly parsha by email each week. Parshat Tzav – Zachor Therefore shall ye abide at the door of the tabernacle of the congregation day and night seven days, and keep the charge of the LORD, that ye die not: for so I am commanded. Therefore shall ye abide at the door of the tabernacle of the congregation day and night seven days – He warned them not to leave the door of the tabernacle by day or night, that is to say, until...
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...