Why is it so important that Moses loses responsibility and the Children of Israel take it on, for Moses’ own failure? 

Israel, like the Netherlands, is a small country with a strong literary culture and a healthy publishing industry. Nevertheless, certain types of subject matter don’t seem to get much play.

“…there is nothing like experiencing failure to give you a more intense understanding of responsibility—that is, if you manage to open yourself to it wholly and without prevarication—as responsibility for one's self.”

צו רעדן אַן אַלטע שפּראַך אין אַ נײַעם אָרט

According to Fromm, narcissism was not only an individual trait. Individuals could sometimes transfer their narcissism onto groups. Instead of saying: "I am wonderful," they say: "My nation is wonderful, my religion is perfect, my race is superior, my political movement alone possesses truth, my denomination alone is chosen."

The AI revolution is causing a realignment of the ways that we provide for ourselves economically. I could have said jobs, but even the idea of what a job is seems to be up for grabs.

In the poem that I have translated, Yehoyash references the expulsion of the Jews from Judea that Tisha B'Av commemorates, but turns his focus to assimilation that Yehoyash lived through in the Russian Empire and America, where children become instrumentalized to destroy the old world culture.

דער ערשטער מאָמענט וואָס איך בין אַרײַנגעגאַנגען אויפֿן באָדן פֿונעם פֿעסטיוואַל־אָרט, האָב איך זיך געפֿילט ווי איך וואָלט געװען אַרײַן אין אַ בלעזל, אָדער ווי איך וואָלט געהאַט ארײַנגעקומען אין אַ שלאָס.

In his treatise, Voltaire wrote against religious intolerance and the fanaticism of the church. He claimed that religious intolerance is the cause of war and bloodshed, not, as the state put it, a means to preserve peace and stability.

Jewish learning is not the memorization of a catechism. Getting the right answer is less important in Jewish learning than developing an understanding for oneself of the question and an answer.

But the question is, what does it actually mean for Jews to be united? As Balak and Balaam discover, the Jewish people cannot be broken into pieces by sorting them into “good” and “bad.”

Working your way up to a strong level of competency as a Jewish learner is not an end unto itself. It is a foundation for further learning, deeper self-knowledge and a balanced integration of one’s Jewish and secular identity.

ס׳זענען דאָ לעכער, פֿעלער, אין די מעשה, און אַז מע לייענט פֿרעגט מען וואָס דווקא איז געשען. נאָר דער עיקר איז אין גאַנצן קלאָר: מע זאָל לעבן אָן מורא, און זוכן נישט קיין סיבות צו האָבן מורא. מע זאָל גײען אויף רײַזעס צום צדקן און אים שטעלן די קשיות, און ער וועט געבן גוטע עצות. 

Korach seems unpleasant at least. We can easily judge him for that alone. The rabbis have been much harsher in their judgment.

The philosopher Jonathan Lear writes that Freud had 3 primary contributions: “a science of subjectivity; the discovery of an archaic form of mental functioning; the positing of Love as a basic force in nature.”

Yeshayahu Leibowitz (1903-1994), the Israeli philosopher, scientist and polymath, raises a question we still grapple with today: what is the “correct will?” Is there such a thing as correct will?

Haynt-bay-nakht in Inglewood, Kalifornye, shpilt di manshaft fun di fareynkte shtatn kegn paraguay. Der internatzionaler bekher haybt zikh on far di amerikaners, der ershter metch in der grupe shtapl. Shpayter, ire kegners veln zayn oystraliye un turkay. 

Persky's obsessive focus on Hebrew language and literature was no longer in sync with Jewish society even to the extent that it had been between the years 1910 and 1925. Persky was always at the center of American Hebraism. Sadly, after the 1920s the movement itself drifted farther and farther from the center of American life.

Can ordinary citizens be trusted to govern themselves? This question is centuries old and the answer to it usually determines one’s position towards democracy.

I went down the rabbit hole on “Deportee,” after finding that it appeared on Dolly Parton’s 1980 album “9 to 5 and Odd Jobs.”