Rabbi Steven Moskowitz

We recall this week’s portion in the opening benediction of the Amidah with the words: “Blessed are You Adonai shield of Abraham and helper of Sarah.” God is a protecting shield. The Torah recounts: “Some time later, the word of the Lord came to Abram in a vision. God said, ‘Fear not, Abram, I am a shield to you; Your reward shall be very great.’” (Genesis 15:1) A shield is a military image. It blocks the path of enemies. It leads the charge. It affords added protection. And yet Abram responds: “O Lord God what can You give me, seeing that I shall die childless?” Our hero Abraham addresses only the promise yet unfulfilled and not the reassurance of divine protection. If it were possible to say it appears as if Abraham loses faith. He lacks confidence in the journey he has only recently set out upon. God commands, “Lech lech—Go!” and Abraham goes. And then he begins to doubt the promise, saying in effect, “You told me I am going to be a great nation but how can this be true

In 1862 a reviewer wrote the following about Victor Hugo’s publication of Les Miserables : “One cannot read without unconquerable disgust all the details Monsieur Hugo gives regarding the successful planning of riots.” And yet most people describe the Broadway production of “Les Miserables” to be among their favorites. It is a remarkable show. 150 years after the Paris Uprising of 1832, or depending on your perspective the June Rebellion, with no allegiances to either side in that struggle standing among us, we are afforded the luxury of historical perspective. We can more easily judge the artist’s work. This is among the challenges confronting us when evaluating the production of John Adam’s opera, “The Death of Klinghoffer.” Not only is thirty years insufficient time to grant us an objective, historical view, but the struggle continues. Palestinian terrorists remain our enemies. The memory of a painful summer of war still haunts us. We do not see a death, but murder. And

This evening begins the holiday of Simhat Torah, the day that marks the joy we feel when we begin the Torah reading anew. According to Jewish tradition the Torah is perfect. If a sentence appears repetitive, a word seems curious, a letter seems out of place, the fault cannot be with the Torah, but instead with the interpreter. Each and every week we unroll the scroll and discover a question. And so we begin again. Why does the Torah begin with a bet? If the Torah is without error and authored by the hand of God then why open with the second letter of the Hebrew alef-bet, rather than the first? The rabbis offer suggestions. Their answers are discovered in a collection of sermons called Bereshit Rabbah, a book compiled in the land of Israel during the third century. Rabbi Jonah said: Why was the world created with a bet? Just as the bet is closed at the sides but open in front, so you are not permitted to investigate what is above and what is below, what is before and what is behind

Below is my article distributed by ReformJudaism.org . Our tradition gives life to journeying. The Torah affirms wandering. Usually we think of the Torah in its discrete portions. We divide it up week by week. The reading of these five books can then be more easily completed in one year’s time. On this occasion think of the Torah in its entirety. Early on God promises that we will find fulfillment in a new land. God tells Abraham, “Go forth from your native land and from your father’s house to the land that I will show you.” (Genesis 12:1) Abraham and his children and his children’s children build a new life in a new land. For generations our ancestors built a home in this Promised Land, but as everyone knows they become slaves in Egypt until hundreds of years later God rescues them and promises to return them to this land. The remainder of the Torah, actually the majority of the Torah, is about this journey home. We wander for forty years. Near the end of our holiest of boo

What follows is the written text of my Yom Kippur morning sermon exploring the recent war in Gaza, antisemitism and our best response to the world's evils. I returned from my annual trip to Israel searching for a return to normalcy. The signs of the war I left behind appeared everywhere. I ventured to West Neck Beach to join my friends for a morning swim in the Long Island Sound. It is my latest fitness passion: open water swimming. The parking lot was filled with trucks and tents. Apparently West Neck Beach parking lot is the staging area for the filming of “Royal Pains,” a show often filmed in the Huntington area. Over the years there have been times when our showers and bathrooms have been transformed into a Tiki Bar. The signs of the weeks prior reappeared. My mind wandered to my friends and acquaintances waiting at their army units’ staging area on Gaza’s border for the start of the ground offensive. Our parking lot appeared as such a trifling by comparison. A stag

What follows is the written text of my Yom Kippur evening sermon exploring human motivation and in particular the motivation for good. The summer that only recently ended has been an excruciating few months. While the weather was nearly perfect we watched the world slip into chaos. To name but a few of the tragic events there was the shooting down of the Malaysian airliner over the Ukraine, the unchecked terror of the Ebola virus, the racial riots in my hometown of St. Louis and the antisemitic mob hysteria in Europe, the war between Israel and Hamas and the rampaging destruction of ISIS. As ISIS rapes and murders its way across Syria and Iraq, a few Westerners were caught up in its path. Steven Sotloff was such a man. He was gruesomely murdered on September 2nd. He was kidnapped a year earlier. Most people did not know until some time after his death that not only was he Jewish, but Israeli. He made aliya to Israel in 2005. In a letter written in May and smuggled out to hi

A Hasidic tale. Rabbi Hayim of Tzanz used to tell this parable: A man, wandering lost in the forest for several days, finally encountered another. He called out: “Brother, show me the way out of the forest.” The man replied: “Brother, I am also lost. I can only tell you this: The ways I have tried lead nowhere; they have only led me astray. Take my hand, and let us search for the way together.” Rabbi Hayim would add: “So it is with us. When we go our separate ways, we may go astray. Let us join hands and look for the way together.” On Yom Kippur we recount our sins. We examine our ways so that we might mend our wrongs and repair our mistakes. In fact the Hebrew word for sin, cheyt, is better translated as missing the mark. Sin implies that one is tainted by an action, that repair is nearly impossible. Missing the mark, however, suggests that repair is more a matter of getting back on the proper path. And how do we get back on that path? With the help of others. This is