By Alexander Poltorak לע”נ אבי מורי, אברהם שמשון ע”ה בן ראובן Between the jubilation of Rosh HaShanah and the solemnity of Yom Kippur lie ten
… mi‑b’sari echezeh Elokah—From my flesh I behold G‑d (Job 19:26) Introduction – “In His Image” The Torah’s initial description of humanity is both profound and enigmatic:
Zealotry and Mercy: Parallels Between Pinchas and the War in Gaza The biblical story of Phinehas (Heb. Pinḥas or Pinchas) presents a complex moral scenario
The Torah portion Tzav describes a ritual performed by Moses in consecrating Aaron as the High Priest (Kohen Gadol) and his sons as priests (kohanim):
The forty-nine days between Passover and Shavuot are called the days of Sefira or the days of counting Omer—Sefirat HaOmer—when Jews count every day as
This is the fourth installment in the series of essays on the nature of the soul. The first three installments can be found here: What
In the biblical story of the creation of Adam, the Torah states: Then the Eternal G‑d formed man of the dust of the ground, and
Now the earth was unformed and void. Genesis 1:2 We have a big problem in cosmology: the problem of the initial conditions of the universe at
Yom Kippur means “The Day of Atonement.” Some view it as a frightening day full of regrets of the past and anxiety for the future.
We are quite familiar with space—we move freely in space back and forth; we concur space on land and beyond; we reclaim land from sea;
And Rebekah spoke unto Jacob, her son, saying: “Behold, I heard thy father speak unto Esau thy brother, saying: Bring me venison, and make me
For the life of the flesh is in the blood.” (Leviticus 17:11) The word translated here as “life” in the Hebrew original is nefesh, i.e.,
There is a Biblical Commandment to count the days between the Passover and Shavuot, the “Feast of Weeks” (a.k.a. Pentecost). We start counting on the
And every meal-offering of thine shalt thou season with salt; neither shalt thou suffer the salt of the covenant of thy G‑d to be lacking
As we discussed in the previous post “Singularity and Paradise,” Paradise offers a beautiful metaphor for modern cosmology wherein Eden is the initial singularity preceding
These are the chronicles of the heaven and of the earth when they were created, in the day that the Eternal G‑d made earth and
As we discussed in the earlier post, The Tree of Knowledge as a Metaphor for Superposition of States and Heisenberg’s Uncertainty Principle, the Heisenberg uncertainty
And the messengers returned to Jacob, saying: “We came to thy brother Esau, and moreover he cometh to meet thee, and four hundred men with
And the Lord spoke unto Moses, saying: ‘Command the children of Israel, and say unto them: When ye come into the land of Canaan, this
The Lord spoke to Moses, saying: Speak to the children of Israel and you shall say to them that they shall make for themselves fringes
Meditations on the Maaseh Merkavah – II This post is a sequel to my previous post, “Space – Between Future and Past.” For background information,
Meditations on the Maaseh Merkavah – I We do science by studying nature. We study physics in a lab, peering into space or working out
The previous Lubavitcher Rebbe, the Rebbe Rayatz (a.k.a. the Fridriker Rebbe) told the story about his father, the Rebbe Rashab. Once the brother of Rebbe
Today, Yud Shvat, is the yartzeit (anniversary of passing) of the sixth Lubavitcher Rebbe, Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak Schneersohn, a.k.a. the Rebbe Rayatz, or the Frierdiker
Now, therefore, write ye this song for you, and teach thou it the children of Israel.” (Deut. 31:19) The four known fundamental forces are: gravitational
In the Torah portion Emor (Leviticus 21:1–24:23), we are instructed to abstain from work every seventh day on Shabbat. Next week’s Torah portion, Behar, continues
In the Torah portion Shlach (Numbers 13:1-15:41), Moses instructs his spies to scout the land of Canaan and to bring back a report. He says
When G‑d created the first humans, Adam and Eve (Chavah), He created them as one. And G‑d created man in His own image, in the
In this Torah portion, Vayechi, Jacob, gathers his children to reveal to them “Ketz HaYamim”–“the End of Days.” Rashi explains that Jacob’s intention was to
I grew up in Russia and was raised on the metric system based on decimal arithmetic. When we immigrated to the U.S., I had to
The holiday of Passover – Pesach – is called zman cheruteinu– time of our freedom. As we have discussed many times on this blog (see
Do you like riddles? Here is a riddle – what do these two figures represent in the context of Exodus? No Idea? How about
Bo: Exodus 10:1 – 14:16 The Erev Shabbat parshat Bo (the Eve of Sabbath of the week when we read the Torah section Bo) 2014
The story of entangled twins is continuing in the Torah portion Vayeitzei (Genesis 28:10–32:3.) Structurally, it is very similar to the story in the previous Torah
This Rosh HaShanah I had the strangest dream. I dreamed that I was giving a lecture in cosmology at a university when I suddenly realized
