On this special Shabbat, Shabbat HaChodesh, the new month, we read from two Torahs. The additional special reading reminds us that we are entering the “first of months” and is apropos because it is ...

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Every Shabbos, Jews in synagogues of all denominations hear the cantor, rabbi or a layperson chant that week’s Torah portion from an open scroll. But Yiddish scholar Sheva Zucker says you don’t need ...

The next few Shabbat Torah readings leading up to the final uplifting and glorious conclusion of the Torah portray for us a somber picture of the experiences that the Jewish people will undergo in ...

of Jews who still the universe amaze. This poem was inspired on 10/27/24, a day after we celebrated the festival of Simhat Torah 5785, when we follow our annual conclusion of reading all the parshiot, ...

It was a Thursday evening in the winter, and the sun was sinking as I waited at a bus stop in Givat Shaul, practicing to chant my Torah reading from photocopied sheets of paper. Moses was late in ...

Jill Crimmings smoothly rolls three balls of challah dough into even strands. She lifts them, joining them together with a pinch, before laying them down to braid. But the loaf of challah, the ...

Simhat Torah is one of the most beloved holidays on the Jewish calendar, but it is also an anomaly. The festival, which celebrates the completion of the yearly cycle of public Torah reading, doesn’t ...