Posts by Rabbi David Wolpe

How important was respect for our Sages? The Talmud discusses whether one can carry a lit candle on the Sabbath. In Talmudic times of course, without a candle the night was entirely dark. It relates that when Rabbi Abbahu was with Rabbi Joshua Ben Levi, he would carry a candle, but when he was with Rabbi Johanan, he would not (Yebamot 14a). Explaining the difference, we are told that Rabbi Abbahu would act in accordance with the beliefs of his colleagues. Although he shared Rabbi Joshua Ben Levi’s belief that it was permitted, out of respect for Rabbi Johanan, when…

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Over three thousand years ago Jerusalem was chosen. There are indications it was a place of distinction before, but David’s decision to choose a capital city located between the North and South — as Washington, D.C. is in the U.S. — was decisive. In the great poet Yehuda Amichai’s imagination, Jerusalem still whispers its original Jebusite name: “Y’vus, Y’vus, Y’vus in the dark.” The silent stones speak of ancient peoples, and even today notes are placed in the wall as if to coax the mute rocks into eloquence. Through endless songs and photos and explanations people have tried to capture…

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A man complained to his psychiatrist that he talked to himself and was told that it is commonplace, nothing to worry about. But, said the man, you have no idea Doctor, what a nudnick I am. The more time we spend alone the more likely we are to grow accustomed and perhaps impatient with our own voices inside our heads. For some it is a good thing: musician and wit Oscar Levant said he was giving up reading because he found it took his mind off himself. For most of us however, other voices are essential even if we are…

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In the 12th century the great sage Maimonides wrote, “One who is ill has not only the right but the obligation to seek medical aid.” Jews have long been overrepresented in the medical field. To take one statistic quoted by Sherwin Nuland (a Jewish Doctor) in his short biography of Maimonides (a Jewish doctor): In the beginning of the fourteenth century, Jews comprised only 5% of the population of Marseilles. Almost half of the city’s doctors were Jewish. This connection endured over time. In Vienna before the second World War, close to three quarters of the doctors were of Jewish…

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“The Lord is my shepherd…” Few passages in the Bible are more familiar than the 23rd Psalm. It is recited at funerals, at the bedside of the sick and in times of consolation. Its brevity and majesty make it among the most loved poems of all time. For English speakers, the King James translation of the Psalm is part of the common culture: ‘my cup runneth over’ and ‘I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.’ For us however, it is a word often unnoticed that is the most important in the entire Psalm: “Yea, though I walk…

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I have a book called “Synagogues Without Jews.” It contains photographs of synagogues, many of them beautiful, where the Jewish community no longer exists. All that remains is the empty sanctuary. It bears mute, eloquent testimony to the destruction of Jewish communities across the globe. In this week when we celebrate Israel’s Independence Day, Yom Ha’atzmaut, there are once again synagogues without Jews. The pandemic has emptied houses of worship and the sacred scrolls stand in the ark awaiting our return. Unlike the desolate sanctuaries in the book however, we will return to the synagogue. Once again celebrations and song…

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Passover is done, but may I bring one more word about matzah? Rabbi Simcha Bunim, a great chasidic master, once pointed out the strange sequence in the seder. Matzah represents freedom and the bitter herbs slavery. The seder begins with the Israelites enslaved. Why then do we eat matzah before maror, the bitter herbs? His answer was that we need to appreciate freedom before we can understand the bitterness of slavery. Matzah must come first. When we lament that we are trapped at home, it is because we understand the joy of being able to go where we wish. Every…

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“There was not a house in which there was not death.” The Torah says this with regard to the Egyptians, but it is also a universal truth. Sooner or later in every house in which there is life there will be death. We avoid confronting that reality. For most of human history people died in the streets or at home. Modern arrangements have made death remote and antiseptic. But the world reminds us that we do not have forever; that life is fragile and fleeting; that refusing to confront the reality of death does not change the fact that we…

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“This is the bread of affliction which our ancestors ate in Egypt. Let all who are hungry, come and eat.”   Why does the second sentence follow the first?   Perhaps we are misreading the famous injunction to be kind to the strangers because we were strangers in Egypt. It might not mean — you were a stranger so it is natural to have empathy for other strangers. For often people react in the opposite way: “I suffered and made it through, so they too can make it through.” Sometimes the difficulty of one’s own experience hardens rather than softens…

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This is the bread of affliction which our ancestors ate in Egypt. Let all who are hungry, come and eat.” Why does the second sentence follow the first? Perhaps we are misreading the famous injunction to be kind to the strangers because we were strangers in Egypt. It might not mean — you were a stranger so it is natural to have empathy for other strangers. For often people react in the opposite way: “I suffered and made it through, so they too can make it through.” Sometimes the difficulty of one’s own experience hardens rather than softens us. The Torah may be…

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