Vayikra

The very possibility to demand of a king to acknowledge his sin is a great novelty. All the more so, we would never expect that there would be someone with permission to rebuke the king or to demand of him to admit that he sinned.

Is it the land lying fallow that is the central theme, or are the Jews who do not work it during the shmita year the focus?

In this week's Torah reading, why begin the description of the Avoda on Yom Kippur with telling us of the demise of the sons of Aaron?

This Shabbat, we find ourselves between two staggering events: the tragedy at Har Meron last Friday, and Yom Yerushalayim this Sunday night and Monday. Two mountains, steeped in Jewish history, associated with the most significant personalities and pathos: Avraham, Yitzchak and Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai.

The Sages said: “‘They will stumble over each other’” – read this as ‘stumble because of one another’: this teaches that all Israelites are responsible for one another.” This is an exceedingly strange passage. Why locate this principle here?

Looking at the Ohr HaHayim's commentary on this week's Parshat Behar to discover the answer to the centuries-old question: Will Redemption come miraculously or by natural means?

Nothing is as challenging to our faith as seeming injustice and tragedy. How does a believing person reconcile an apparently cruel world with an Omnipotent and Merciful Creator?

The idea behind the sabbatical year remains fixed in the minds and hearts of the Jewish people wherever they may live. And that basic idea is simple: that the world and all its land belongs to and is subject to the will of the Creator.

Sefer Vayikra was given during Bnei Yisrael’s period in the desert. It is therefore telling that the Torah already relates as a given fact the situation in which they are working the fields of Eretz Yisrael, suspending work during Shemitta and Yovel, and following the rules of transactions regarding real estate in the Land among other financial matters.

Looking into this week's Parshat Emor to discover the definition of Hilul HaShem [desecration of G-d's Name] in a national sense and what it means with regards to living in the Diaspora.