I am my beloved's, and my beloved is mine... Song of Songs 6:3 Tonight we greet Rosh Chodesh Elul, a month when the King, Hashem, is in the field. Yesterday, the United States watched as the moon's umbra moved across the sun, a momentous occasion. A total solar eclipse had not been seen anywhere in… Continue reading Elul
In our most trying times, we must always strive to see the light. Rabbi Nachman wrote: Inevitably you must encounter all kinds of difficulties and setbacks. You will fall down many times before you can enter the gates of holiness. Even the greatest Tzaddikim have gone through all this. There are cases when a person… Continue reading Light and Dark
This is perhaps the first time in my life that I have truly grasped the aura of Tisha B'Av. Despite years of going to shul (synagogue), years of learning about it and grasping the technicalities of the fast, it never resonated with me on a personal and spiritual level - until this year.Tisha B'Av marks… Continue reading Tisha B’Av
While we watched with bated breath, Israel's leadership decided to capitulate over the Temple Mount's security, relinquishing a golden opportunity to reassert authority and take control of a situation that has quickly spiraled out of control. For the first time in too long, Jews had been able to openly pray at the Temple Mount (Har… Continue reading Redemption
By the rivers of Babylon we sat and wept when we remembered Zion. (Psalm 137:1) Despite what I've written on this blog so far, my experiences in Israel were not limited to terrorism. There is so much more to Israel than its worst times, though naturally we must contend with those as well. What I found… Continue reading Memories
I found a draft of a blog post I was beginning to write a couple of years ago, a few months after moving to Israel officially: "Since coming to Israel, I've received some mixed criticism and confusion from my non-Jewish friends who don't quite understand why I would come to such a dangerous and so… Continue reading Israel
Like a child running to hide behind her mother's skirt, I ran back to America. And like that child, I found that it did no good. It didn't erase the big, frightening world out there. In my case, Aliyah did not fail me. I failed myself. I gave up when we were on the brink… Continue reading Failure?
What kind of world do we live in? Where sentiment is an emotion and a love letter is a text. When morals are subjective and change according to how one feels. Where likes and dislikes are black and white and we swipe right to find not a soulmate, but a one night stand. When sex… Continue reading Modernity
"So do Jews hate Jesus?" a coworker asked me the other week. The question itself wasn't particularly disturbing; I knew it was asked out of genuine curiosity and naivety. But the truly unsettling part was the remembrance that I was in exile. A stranger in a strange land. I had gone from living in Israel… Continue reading Exile
Let me sketch a picture for you. Women (and men) scream that it is a woman’s right to abort her baby – her body, her choice. These same people often weep at the near extinction of many species of animals – whether by natural or unnatural causes – and weep about the destruction of forest… Continue reading Hypocrisy
The Singing Soul 