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FILE - In this Sept. 10, 1980 file photo, Egyptian President Anwar Sadat, center, flanked by Israeli Foreign Minister, Yi...
Monticello, NY - Sullivan County officials are considering adoption of a social host law, which would hold parents and ot...
German Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle / AP Berlin - Germany’s foreign minister on Sunday offered assur...
Ehud Olmert / AP Jerusalem - An Israeli court official says a verdict in former Prime Minister Ehud Olmert’s c...

Pinchas – The Zealot 5772 - Covenant & Conversation - Thoughts from the Chief Rabbi

Last Updated on Friday, 13 July 2012 08:58 Written by Chief Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks Friday, 13 July 2012 08:07

With Pinchas a new type enters the world of Israel: the zealot. “Pinchas son of Eleazar, son of Aaron the priest, has turned My anger away from the Israelites by being zealous with My zeal in their midst so that I did not put an end to them in My zeal” (Num. 25: 11). He was followed, many centuries later, by the one other figure in Tanakh described as a zealot, the prophet Elijah. He tells God on Mount Horeb, “I have been very zealous for the LORD God Almighty.” (1 Kings 19: 14). In fact, tradition identified the two men: “Pinchas is Elijah” (Yalkut Shimoni, Torah, 771). Pinchas, says Targum Yonatan (to Num. 25: 12), “became an angel who lives forever and will be the harbinger of redemption at the End of Days.”

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Tsav 5772 - Covenant & Conversation - Thoughts from the Chief Rabbi

Last Updated on Friday, 30 March 2012 14:56 Written by Chief Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks Friday, 30 March 2012 14:48

Among the sacrifices detailed in this week's sedra is the korban todah, the thanksgiving offering:

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Vayikra 5772 - Covenant & Conversation - Thoughts from the Chief Rabbi

Last Updated on Friday, 23 March 2012 08:02 Written by Chief Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks Thursday, 22 March 2012 23:00

The laws of sacrifices that dominate the early chapters of the book of Vayikra / Leviticus, are among the hardest in the Torah to relate to - for it has been almost 2000 years since the Temple was destroyed and the sacrificial system came to an end.

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Vayakhel-Pekudei 5772 - Covenant & Conversation - Thoughts from the Chief Rabbi

Last Updated on Friday, 16 March 2012 08:55 Written by Chief Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks Friday, 16 March 2012 08:50

The Torah in Parshat Vayakhel, which describes the making of the Mishkan, goes out of its way to emphasize the role women played in it:

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Ki Tissa 5772 - Covenant & Conversation - Thoughts from the Chief Rabbi

Last Updated on Friday, 09 March 2012 12:33 Written by Chief Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks Friday, 09 March 2012 12:19

Witnessing the birth of a new idea is a little like watching the birth of a galaxy through the Hubble Space Telescope. We can witness just such an event in a famous rabbinical commentary to a key verse in this week’s parsha.

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Tetzaveh 5772 - Covenant & Conversation - Thoughts from the Chief Rabbi

Last Updated on Friday, 02 March 2012 12:16 Written by Chief Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks Friday, 02 March 2012 12:10

Why is the Torah so specific and emphatic, in this week’s parsha, about the clothes to be worn by the Cohen and the Cohen Gadol? “These are the vestments that they shall make: a breastplate, an ephod, a robe, a knitted tunic, a turban, and a sash. Make them as sacred vestments for Aaron and his sons so that they will be able to be priests to Me” (Exodus 28: 4).

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Beshalach 5772 - Covenant & Conversation - Thoughts from the Chief Rabbi

Last Updated on Friday, 03 February 2012 17:09 Written by Chief Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks Friday, 03 February 2012 16:56

For the first time since their departure from Egypt the Israelites do something together.

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Bo 5772 - Covenant & Conversation - Thoughts from the Chief Rabbi

Last Updated on Friday, 27 January 2012 11:31 Written by Chief Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks Friday, 27 January 2012 11:24

It is no accident that parshat Bo, the section that deals with the culminating plagues and the exodus, should turn three times to the subject of children and the duty of parents to educate them. As Jews we believe that to defend a country you need an army, but to defend a civilization you need education.

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Va'eira 5772 - Covenant & Conversation - Thoughts from the Chief Rabbi

Last Updated on Friday, 20 January 2012 12:55 Written by Chief Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks Friday, 20 January 2012 12:49

Why did Moses tell Pharaoh, if not a lie, then less than the full truth? Here is the conversation between him and Pharaoh after the fourth plague, arov, "swarms of insects" (some say “wild animals”)

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Shemot 5772 - Covenant & Conversation - Thoughts from the Chief Rabbi

Last Updated on Friday, 13 January 2012 00:19 Written by Chief Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks Friday, 13 January 2012 00:06

Moses’ second question to God at the burning bush was, Who are you? “So I will go to the Israelites and say, ‘Your fathers’ God sent me to you.’ They will immediately ask me what His name is. What shall I say to them?” (Ex. 3: 13). God’s reply, Ehyeh asher ehyeh, wrongly translated in almost every Christian Bible as something like “I am that I am,” deserves an essay in its own right (I deal with it in my books Future Tense and The Great Partnership).

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Vayechi 5772 - Covenant & Conversation - Thoughts from the Chief Rabbi

Last Updated on Friday, 06 January 2012 09:47 Written by Chief Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks Friday, 06 January 2012 09:40

At almost every stage of fraught encounter between Joseph and his family in Egypt, Joseph weeps. There are seven scenes of tears:

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Vayigash 5772 - Covenant & Conversation - Thoughts from the Chief Rabbi

Last Updated on Friday, 30 December 2011 08:26 Written by Chief Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks Friday, 30 December 2011 08:22

There are rare and special moments when the world changes and a new possibility is born: when the Wright brothers in 1903 made the first man-made flight, or in 1969 when Neil Armstrong became the first man to set foot on the moon, or when, almost 6,000 years ago, someone discovered that marks made in clay with a stick could, when the clay dried, become permanent signs and thus writing, and civilization, were born.

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