Torah

Shavuot and What It Means to Be Truly Human

Shiyur – Tikkun Leil Shavuot 2021: Shavuot and What It Means to Be Truly Human By Dr. Saundra Sterling Epstein Email: shulisrose@aol.com Download the source sheets SHAVUOT: Without Shavuot and its historical significance, Pesach and its experience seven weeks beforehand would be meaningless.  For what good is Zeman Cheruteinu, the Time of our Freedom without [more]
Purim: Inside Out

Purim: Inside Out

Rabbi Steve Greenberg - Purim is about concealment. More specifically, it is about movement from the covert to the overt. There is a sustained tension between what characters are and what they seem to be that moves the plot forward.  It is the careful unraveling of disguises that makes for salvation. The major characters are [more]
Gayness and God

Gayness and God

Parashat Yayishlach - By Rabbi Steve Greenberg - Jacob is returning from Ur to face his brother Esau.   He crosses back over the Yabbok river, and there, finding himself alone, encounters a man who wrestles with him until the morning light. “And Jacob was left by himself [Yaakov levado]; and there a man wrestled with [more]
Embracing All of Our Children and Their Differences

Embracing All of Our Children and Their Differences

Parshat Toldot - By Dr. Saundra Sterling Epstein - Eshel Director of Welcoming Shuls Project -  Parents are different.  Children are different. Families are different.  We may not all like the same things.  We may not all have the same professions, the same personalities, the same characteristics, the same aspirations in life, the same … [more]
Between God and Torah: Judaism’s Gambles

Between God and Torah: Judaism’s Gambles

Parashat Toldot - By R. Shai Held - Intro by R. Steve Greenberg: For many of us in the Eshel world, remaining connected to a Torah that seems to erase, banish or incriminate our ordinary human desire for intimacy and companionship is an enormous challenge.  In my own life and in the stories that many [more]