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Parashat Ki Tisa

“I’m sorry everyone, I’ve got a load of things to do today and I’m in a hurry so I need to rush through this.” Hmm, have you noticed we are always in a hurry? This has to be done, that has to be done. Even in our work, pressure is on us to meet deadlines etc… This week’s Sidra tells us that Moshe was still on the mountain with the…

Parashat Tetzaveh

There are a number of key themes running through the building ‎and equipping of the Mishkan (tabernacle), the altar with its ‎incense and impact on the senses designed to remind us of the ‎need for constant prayer, and the eternal light filling the area with ‎light indicative of G-d’s presence eternally with us. We also now ‎read of commandments to make garments for Aaron, for the ‎priesthood. The Mishkan in…

Parashat Terumah

God’s Blueprint Nothing in the universe is left up to chance. We do not live in an ‎unpredictable, unplanned cosmos wrought by the hidden ‎uncontrolled hand of statistical randomness. The universe, all ‎creation, runs according to the rules set down by the only God, of ‎Avraham Yitzchak and Ya’akov. It is not a cold unfathomable ‎place, hostile to humanity, far from it. It is a warm and above all ‎righteous…

Parashat Mishpatim

“These are the rulings you are to present to them: If you purchase a Hebrew slave, he is to work six years; but in the seventh, he is to be given his freedom without having to pay anything. If he came single, he is to leave single; if he was married when he came, his wife is to go with him when he leaves. But if his master gave him…

Parashat Yitro

Setting boundaries for protection This portion begins with our people waiting before Mount Sinai, encamped 3 days, expectant, having been commanded to go out and worship Him ‘on this mountain’. They had purified themselves and the encounter with G-d and Moshe is about to begin. Curiously Moshe is told to do something, read Shemot (Exodus) 19:10-13 and 21. He is told to ‘set bounds’ or build fences around the mount,…

Parashat Beshalach

Tu b’shevat, the 15th of Shevat, is a day designated as the New Year for trees. Our Land has always been a fruitful and blessed, fertile Land, while at the same time having the potential to be incredibly dry and arid, a living picture to the narrow balance we have in Israel between being blessed of the Lord, relying on His faithfulness to provide (as we see today in the…

Parashat Bo

In last week’s Parasha, G-d brought seven of the plagues on Egypt and each time we are told that Pharaoh hardened his heart. In this week’s Parasha, G-d brought a further three plagues upon them: a plague of locusts, darkness, and the death of the firstborn. After the first of these three, the locusts, Pharaoh called for Moshe and said… “I have sinned against ADONAI your G-d and against you….

Parashat Va’era

Knowing when not to say no For 400 years our people toiled and worked in Egypt, just as G-d had promised they would, not a day longer or less, exactly what was promised and foreseen. When the time was up, G-d, who had been working behind the scenes for all this time, began to bring about Israel’s deliverance: Moshe was born, a man destined by G-d to walk with Him…

Parashat Shemot

‘And these are the names…’, thus begins this new book in the scroll, the same phrase used at the end of Bereshit to detail the people leaving their homeland to sojourn in Egypt. The parallels are meant to be stark, then we were small, now we are large in number, then we were free, now we are enslaved. Much had happened in the ensuing 400 years. To begin with life…

Parashat Vayechi

The long term historical aim of British society has been to develop a multicultural model of existence where all value systems are equal and to be exalted as valid and worthy of contribution. Alongside this we have seen the concept of individualism as a high ideal and a cultural rebuttal of the age old dictum ‘no man is an island’. In the face of this we see community breakdown, family…

Weekly Drash