I’ve fallen out of love with much of the Judaism that I see around me. Being around most other observant Jews is hard for me—I feel like we’re operating on different wavelengths. At times, I feel like we’re worshipping different Gods.

The Judaism that I see around me has become a lifeless, legalistic shell, impotent to attract all but the most delusional…

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The Gap Between Vision and Reality

Many of us entered the rabbinate with a burning desire to help others connect with God and find meaning in Jewish life. Yet somewhere along the way, we've found ourselves focused more on rules and compliance than on nurturing these vital spiritual connections.

Think about how many of us approach our role. We feel persona…

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Introduction to the Tanach

Tanach is a Hebrew acronym for Torah (Pentateuch), Nevi’im (Prophets), and Ketuvim (Writings)—תורה, נביאים, כתובים. Another way of referring to Tanach would be the “Bible”, though in Christian contexts, this has the added connotation of including the “New Testament”. 

The Tanach is comprised of twenty-four different books. Being…

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It always amazes me that people are ready to throw out the Bible because of contradictions in form or style between passages or books, as if they’d discovered this great and hidden mystery that the (in their minds, inept) editors of the Bible had tried (or not, as it were) to hide from us. 

Louis Jacobs, in the introduction to a book1 he wrote defending h…

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It’s startling how afraid people are of new ideas. 

I am privileged to have taught a wide range of people in my career, both traditionally observant and less so. Each comes into my sessions with their own beliefs and ideas, their own stories that they tell themselves to make sense of the world. Don’t get me wrong—I don’…

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Introduction

What if you could understand the Tanach through … the Tanach? 

An astute reader of Tanach will notice that, in some places, the language that Tanach uses in one place harmonises with the language used elsewhere in other stories. Sometimes, it may be a word or a phrase that catches our attention; at times, even a whole story may be similar to …

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Knowing Hebrew is a foundational skill in Torah learning.

The Torah is written in Biblical Hebrew, a variation of Modern Hebrew spoken today in Israel. A foundational Jewish belief is that God wrote the Torah, and to access the text in its original language, one must know how to read and understand Hebrew.

Transla…

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Learning does not have to be hard. 

You do not have to suffer to learn Torah. Not only do you not have to suffer, but taking such an approach will inevitably lead, as it does in all other areas of life, to burnout. I’ve met people, brilliant, smart, talented people who burnt out on learning Torah.

They’ve never gone back. 

If we’re going to build a life-l…

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Introduction

As we set out on this project to learn how to learn, the first thing we have to ascertain is—What is halacha and why does it matter? Why should Jews pay attention to it? Where does it come from? Why is it binding? What parts of it are binding?

Every Jew who professes to follow the halacha must ultimately identify the halacha as an attempt at implementing God's will in the world. This assumption—that God exists, that he gave the Torah to the Jewish people on Mount Sinai, and that the Torah is consequently explained and understood by and through the oral Torah—is foundational to Judaism. You simply do not have Judaism without a God-given Torah and a halacha that attempts, in so far as possible, to implement God's will as given in that Torah in the world.

This belief in the divinity of the Torah and the authority of the Sages' version of the Oral Torah is where so many problems arise for us as Torah-observant Jews. Problems that plague us in modern society, like agunot or mamzerim, are as thorny as they are precisely because we respect the authority of the Written and Oral Torah and take their precepts seriously. It's precisely the boundaries that they set out which create the problem and that simultaneously might offer the solution.

The entire reason that there is a corpus of halacha surrounding the exact ways in which meat and milk may combine without creating a new issur, and how we deal with it when a mishap does happen in the kitchen, is because Torah-observant Jews want to understand precisely what it is that God has asked, and how He should be worshipped.

It’s difficult to overstate this point—the entire legal tradition of Judaism has developed in response to this fact—keeping Halacha means keeping God's will in the world.

This point has an affective purpose as well. It's easy for us to get lost in the legality of what we're doing and lose the forest for the trees. As the prophet1 writes:

“And the Master said, Inasmuch as this people approached with its mouth and with its lips honored Me but kept its heart far from Me, and their reverence for Me was a commandment of men learned by rote.”

Rote religion is a problem. Our lives are only structured as they are because we are ultimately trying to do God's will—when we lose sight of that and turn halacha into a thing to be worshipped in and of itself, we both lose the purpose for the halacha, as well as create a new religion, one of worship of the Halacha as opposed to worship of the Divine through the halacha.

Why is the halacha the key to worshipping God?

Many Jews reject the halacha and yet demand to remain part of the Jewish people. They consider themselves Jewish by race, perhaps, or nationality. The problem is that the selfsame text which is foundational to Judaism, and defines what a Jew is or isn't, and who is or isn't involved in the covenant, rejects this claim.

“And now, if you will truly heed My voice and keep My covenant, you will become for Me a treasure among all the peoples, for Mine is all the earth.”2

Our relationship with God is predicated on one very clear consideration - "if you will truly heed My Voice". If we heed God's voice, we are in the covenant with all of the attendant privileges. Indeed, our side of the covenant is keeping God's laws. The alternative is a rejection of that covenant and a removal from the people of Israel.

Over and over again in the Torah, certain sins are listed which can "cut a person off from his people".3 A person who rejects the basic premises of the Oral Torah is not considered a Jew in many respects.4 Further, there are even some authorities5 that suggest that a person who rejected Judaism and now wants to do teshuva needs to dip in the mikveh like a convert!

All this reinforces the idea that our continued relationship with God is predicated on our doing his will. Yes, if a Jew sins, he is still technically considered Jewish6; nevertheless, it is clear that what sets us apart from other nations, and what forms the basis for our nation as a whole, is our keeping of the halacha.

The late professor Jose Faur7 put it succinctly: "Peculiar to Jewish monotheism is its insistence on monolatry: the one God may be worshipped only as prescribed by the Law. ... As the morality described above, the religious ceremonies of the Law are fundamentally arbitrary. ... They are, rather, norms of conduct, mutually agreed upon by God and Israel."

The mitzvot are meaningless outside of their proper context - a relationship with God

Faur’s point is that no mitzvah has any worth independent of the covenant. What would wearing leather straps on your arm and head mean if God didn't command it? Why would someone desist from certain precise types of creative artifice every seventh day if it weren't for the location of Shabbat within the covenantal relationship? What possible worth could there be to shaking palm fronds for seven days in the Autumn if such a request didn't come from God?

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To learn Tanach properly, you need to pay attention.

The key to effective learning lies in a structured, step-by-step approach. As with all approaches like this, it’s too prescriptive and confining for the expert, but is a perfect place for a beginner to start. Learn it, make it second nature, and then forget about it.

Step 1: Understand the Context

Grasping the context is crucial for any text in Tanach. This involves things like identifying the historical period, understanding the cultural and geographical setting, and recognising the key figures involved. 

Familiarise yourself with the broader story arc or the book’s purpose to fully appreciate the text’s significance.

What to Do: Start by setting the scene. Just like you wouldn’t watch a movie without knowing its genre or background, you shouldn’t dive into a Tanach text without understanding its context.

How to Implement: Research the historical era and cultural setting of the text. Is it set during the time of the Kings? Is it a part of the Exodus story? Read different commentaries, both traditional and modern. They offer various perspectives and enrich your understanding of the text. 

Why It Matters: This step helps you understand the ‘why’ behind the ‘what’, giving depth to your study.

Step 2: Narrative flow and character analysis

Understanding the story as it was written is a crucial step.

You might think this is elementary, but a quick example might show otherwise. To start, a question: who sold Joseph into slavery?

If you said the brothers, you’re in good company, but you’re also wrong, at least according to the Biblical text.

The text reads, in part, as follows:

19 And they said to each other, “Here comes that dream-master! 20 And so now, let us kill him and fling him into one of the pits and we can say, a vicious beast has devoured him, and we shall see what will come of his dreams.” 21 And Reuben heard and came to his rescue and said, “We must not take his life.” 22 And Reuben said to them, “Shed no blood! Fling him into this pit in the wilderness and do not raise a hand against him”—that he might rescue him from their hands to bring him back to his father. 23 And it happened when Joseph came to his brothers that they stripped Joseph of his tunic, the ornamented tunic that he had on him. 24 And they took him and flung him into the pit, and the pit was empty, there was no water in it. 25 And they sat down to eat bread, and they raised their eyes and saw and, look, a caravan of Ishmaelites was coming from Gilead, their camels bearing gum and balm and ladanum on their way to take down to Egypt. 26 And Judah said to his brothers, “What gain is there if we kill our brother and cover up his blood? 27 Come, let us sell him to the Ishmaelites and our hand will not be against him, for he is our brother, our own flesh.” And his brothers agreed. 28 And Midianite merchantmen passed by and pulled Joseph up out of the pit and sold Joseph to the Ishmaelites for twenty pieces of silver, and they brought Joseph to Egypt. 29 And Reuben came back to the pit and, look, Joseph was not in the pit, and he rent his garments, 30and he came back to his brothers, and he said, “The boy is gone, and I, where can I turn?”

Read the text carefully—who sold Joseph? The Midianites! The brothers had no idea what happened to Joseph. The text later on emphasises that the Midianites sold him1:

But the Midianites had sold him into Egypt to Potiphar, Pharaoh’s courtier, the high chamberlain.

By taking the time to read the story carefully, we can ensure that we *actually* understand what’s happened.

What to Do: It’s time to map out the story and understand the characters. 

How to Implement: Create a simple timeline of events or a diagram showing how characters are related to each other. Visualise or role-play scenarios to better understand character motivations and dynamics. 

Why It Matters: This helps you follow the story more easily and connects you with the characters on a deeper level. It will also allow you to understand the Biblical story more accurately.

Step 3: Utilizing Tools for Literary Analysis

Various tools and resources can enhance understanding for those delving into literary analysis. Commentaries from renowned scholars provide insights into language and thematic elements. Dictionaries of biblical Hebrew elucidate word meanings and connotations. Cross-referencing with other texts in Tanach can also reveal recurring themes or contrasting viewpoints.

What to Do: Now, focus on the text itself. Pay attention to how things are said as much as to what is being said.

How to Implement: Analyse the language. Why did the author choose these words? What impact do these literary devices have? Utilise resources like lexicons or online platforms like sefaria.org or alhatorah.org to delve deeper. They can unveil meanings and nuances you might otherwise miss. 

Why It Matters: This analysis uncovers layers of meaning, making your study more insightful.

Step 4: Synthesise and reflect

This is where the real work is, as you work to go beyond the simple level and really work to understand the piece as a whole.

What to Do: Bring together everything you’ve learned and ponder on it. 

How to Implement: Write down your overall understanding of the text. How do the context, literary elements, and narrative fit together? Formulate any questions or insights that arise. These can be great starting points for further study or discussion. 

Why It Matters: Synthesis solidifies your learning and encourages deeper reflection and curiosity.

Step 5: Apply and extend your learning

What to Do: Use your newfound knowledge as a springboard for further learning.

How to Implement: Apply what you’ve learned to other texts in the Tanach or to real-life scenarios. Join study groups or discussions to share your insights and learn from others.

Why It Matters: This step helps you integrate your learning into a broader understanding and keeps the learning process dynamic and engaging.

Remember, studying the Tanach is a journey of discovery. Each step builds upon the last, providing you with a comprehensive and enriching learning experience. Don’t be afraid to dive in, ask questions, and explore.

Leveraging AI to help you

We can leverage AI to help us approach the text this way on a consistent basis. Let’s say we wanted to learn about the story of Pilegesh B’Giv’ah. We plug in our framework in the form of a custom prompt (below) and our AI Torah Coach helps us through:

The prompt

We’ve done the heavy lifting for you and packaged this framework into a succinct prompt you can give your AI tool of choice to get you started.

Of course, this prompt, like our others, is baked right in to our custom AI Torah learning coach, RabbAI, which you get access to when you subscribe.

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You need a sparring partner to learn.

The Rambam1 explains that the fall of Man in Eden was from a world where he could access "truth" and "falsehood"—i.e. a world of objectivity—to a world where subjectivity ruled. Remember when the fall took place—during the creation story. This is a baked-in fea…

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The Jewish world has a problem.

Not enough people can or will teach Torah correctly, emphasising skills, understanding, and personal autonomy and sovereignty. Moreover, there isn't a roadmap or a vehicle to building one's understanding from the basics of the aleph-bet to the rarified heights of Talmudic discourse. In a generation that thirsts for high-quality, personal attention and education, we fail to answer this need at scale.

Educational theorist Benjamin Bloom pioneered a type of education called "teaching for mastery". In this paradigm, he proposed paying more attention to the individual student's attainment and progress on a developing ladder of skills and understanding. Instead of rushing all students through arbitrary grade levels at the same pace regardless of their actual achievement, Bloom proposed teaching students to achieve mastery at one level before moving on to the next. 

Bloom also made another shocking revelation that has become an unsolvable problem. Bloom observed that students who were tutored in one-to-one environments achieved two standard deviations better than the control group. The insoluble problem became applying this method at scale—there are far more teachers than students, and the dream of personally tutoring each pupil seemed out of reach. 

AI has solved Bloom’s problem

With the advent of AI in the form of LLMs (large language models) such as OpenAI's GPT4 and Anthropic's Claude, Bloom's problem is a thing of the past. We are now able to fine-tune the AI be the ultimate Torah coach, encouraging and helping each and every learner along their personal, unique Torah journey.

Our vision is that each person would work through a pre-developed set of skill-mastery markers with the help and coaching of the AI. Instead of being limited to the skills and time of a particular teacher or rebbe, each person gets a skilled, knowledgeable, and infinitely patient personal tutor. This brings Bloom's vision of personal tutors for all to fruition, coaching each individual along their personal journey to mastery.

What’s more, this new technology enables us to truly fulfil the words of our Sages:

‘But his delight is in the Torah of the Lord’ - Rebbi said: A person only learns Torah from the place that his heart desires, as it is said: 'But his delight is in the Torah of the Lord.'

For the first time, we can now offer personal Torah coaches to the entire Jewish world, offering them the ability to walk down their own unique path of Jewish development.

The purpose is not to replace human teachers and relationships

We believe that the affective side of Torah learning is as important as the skills and knowledge side. It would, however, significantly augment the ability of a given teacher or school to differentiate for each pupil's skill level without a complete overhaul of the education system or the expense of hiring personal tutors for each student.

Further, it would allow for people who perhaps have missed the opportunity to learn in a Jewish school—adults who have lately come to their tradition, or converts, for example—to have a tutor who was able to teach them the basics whilst still honouring their intelligence and development in other domains of their lives, a tough mark for any human teacher to meet. Additionally, older students are often reticent to publicly acknowledge deficiency in an area of knowledge, and offering them the ability to interact this way in the privacy of their own home creates another opportunity to connect. 

What's more, these models are now able to interact through direct speech as opposed to typing, so students with learning disabilities for whom spelling and typing are difficult can benefit from this technology.

A Torah coach helps you own your Jewish practice

One of the most pervasive and pernicious lies the Orthodox world perpetuates is that all a ‘good Jew’ needs to do is to ask their Rabbi. This is simply not true.

The Magen Avraham1 writes that even if one did something at the instruction of their rabbi, they are still liable if it was a mistake. This would mean that they would need to bring a Korban, not the rabbi who made the mistake. The Rabbi who made the mistake might also be culpable if he made an egregious error, but the person who did the action will be ultimately held responsible.

Having a personal Torah coach at your fingertips can help you to understand why you’re doing what you’re doing, and how it fits into the broader context.

Ultimately, it is up to us to decide how to act, based on the decision provided by the expert if we can’t learn ourselves. And this is—or should be—one of the roles of a good rabbi. A guide who helps you to understand your decision and to make it yourself.

Margaret Heffernan describes willful blindness as something that you should have known and could have known but still managed not to know. Digging your head in the sand does not absolve you of wrongdoing. In fact, it makes the crime more egregious, as you willfully act to subvert the correct legal process.

The Radach2 writes that if one could have been expected to have learnt and didn't learn, and as a result violated a commandment, it is almost as if he wilfully violated the Torah. If you could have been expected to know but didn't know, you're culpable. The Rambam3 says something similar about one who murders but didn't know that murder was wrong by a ben-Noach.

Now we have a powerful tool for taking back our personal sovereignty and fulfilling our responsibility—RabbAI!

How can RabbAI help me?

RabbAI’s uses and skills are as broad as your imagination. To give you a taste of what it can do, here are a few examples:

1. You want to understand why mixed dancing is bad:

2. You’re a fifteen-year-old Yeshiva student, and you want help understanding a sugyah that you’re learning in school:

   

   

   

3. You’re an adult student and want help devising a plan to learn the basic concepts of Torah:

   

   

This is just a taste of what RabbAI can do. Want to try it out? Click below:

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Introduction

The text of the Torah is frustratingly written without vowels or punctuation.

This is on purpose, and is one of the things that allowed our Sages to approach the text as a substrate for meaning1. The unfortunate part is that it makes it difficult for a novice reader to get started, to understand how to read a particular word or parse a pasuk,…

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This white paper was published in Hebrew by Torat HaMedina, a think-tank which explores the intersection of Halacha and politics. The original Hebrew can be found here.

One of the goals of our learning together is to delve into the Halachic process and understand how Halachic decisions are made. In our study together, I’ll quote the paper in English and then offer my comments where necessary. As we do this on many occasions, hopefully we’ll get a sense of how to arrive at a halachic decision.

Introduction

This position paper deals with the issue of bombing the Shifa Hospital in Gaza City, from the perspective of Torah sources. According to intelligence information, Shifa Hospital is used as a 'human shield' by the enemy's citizens, for the Hamas terrorist command. This position paper serves as an initial roadmap for implementing the principles of Jewish war ethics, through the prism of the Shifa Hospital issue, and argues that in light of the intelligence information, bombing Shifa is a moral and ethical obligation, according to Torah sources.

The people of Israel are a nation that desires peace. The Jewish vision aspires to a world where 'nation shall not lift up sword against nation, nor shall they learn war anymore.' Unfortunately, since ancient times, Israel's calls for peace have been answered with drawn swords by its neighbors, as it is said: 'I am for peace, but when I speak, they are for war.' Therefore, alongside the vision of peace, the Torah mandates a milchemet mitzvah (a war that’s a mitzvah).

The role of the Jewish people is to serve as a model for divine morality of good and evil, and to be a kingdom of priests and a holy nation on its own land. The ethics of war stem from the defense of the existence and destiny of the people of Israel, taking into account the early identification and neutralization of its enemies and the removal of obstacles to the realization of its spiritual destiny. The spiritual stance required of Israel's warriors is one of self-sacrifice, the prioritization of national needs, the renewal of the vision of inheriting the land, the sanctification of God's name, and the establishment of the Temple in Jerusalem, which will ultimately be a house of prayer for all nations.

Introductions like this are important because they can give us, the reader, a sense of where the author is coming from. Something that I’ve not seen discussed in halachic writings is how the preconceived notions or prior assumptions of the author affect the conclusions that the author arrives at.

As I wrote elsewhere, the most important thing you can do as a reader before you start to read something in depth is to understand the context of the work. In this piece, it’s instructive to understand that it was written within the first month of a war sparked by a truly horrific terror attack on civilians by Hamas. As you’ll see, there are definitely some underlying emotions coming through for the writers. I think that this is not a unique phenomenon here—many times you’ll see the writer of a teshuva becoming very emotional in the course of their writing, allowing other ideas about society, morality, and proper order to seep through into their halachic writing. This is an unavoidable human phenomenon, but it’s important to be aware of when you’re deciding how authoritative this argument is. A useful (but not 100% foolproof) heuristic—the validity of a halachic argument often inversely relates to the level of hyperbole and emotion in its presentation.

One more note here before we move on. In a footnote (2) the authors make the following caveat:

“It should be emphasized that the position paper deals with a human shield composed of enemy citizens and does not address a human shield composed of captives. This point requires a separate discussion.”

Modern halachic writings, on the whole, are composed in response to a particular situation. This is certainly the case with responsa, where a questioner has written in to a particular halachic authority and asked their opinion on a particular matter. This is important because people often take one author’s opinion as expressed in a particular responsa as their opinion in general regarding this halacha.

This is a mistake.

When responsa are written, they are written for a particular person or group, in a particular time frame, with a particular set of circumstances. The essential work of a rabbi, or really anyone making a halachic decision, is to מדמה מילתא למילתא, to compare one case to another and make a ruling. This is where so many machlokot arise, and it’s crucial for any good halachist to understand that each case must be judged on its own merits and not merely shoehorned into the decision of another case.

Let’s continue.

The 'Operation Returning Wind'1, Simchat Torah 5784, began with a Hamas enemy attack on the State of Israel. The enemy penetrated into the territory of the State of Israel, massacred residents of the settlements around Gaza, and many other civilians and soldiers, committed murder, arson, rape, and kidnapping. The State of Israel declared a war of necessity, for the defense of the people of Israel and the suppression of the Hamas regime. According to war plans, the destruction of Hamas requires the occupation of the Gaza Strip in a ground military attack. The questions to be addressed in the position paper are: Is it permissible to harm enemy civilians for the sake of victory and the decisive battle? Are there those who are defined as 'non-involved'? What is the law regarding civilian institutions serving as a 'human shield' for enemy forces? Is the bombing of Shifa Hospital, which serves as a shield and hiding place for Hamas terrorists, permissible or obligatory?

Background

For a long time, the main headquarters of Hamas has been located under the Shifa Hospital in Gaza. Additionally, in Gaza City, there is an enormous number of hospitals in relation to the population size, which, according to intelligence sources, serve as a cover for a network of tunnels and Hamas command centers. Apart from the hospitals, the Islamic University in Gaza, schools, and mosques also serve as civilian shields for command centers, tunnels, manufacturing facilities, and Hamas ammunition depots. The IDF has published maps with precise descriptions of military facilities located near or under civilian institutions. In fact, in this system, we are dealing with a military strategy, where its defense is built upon the use of civilian institutions for defensive purposes as part of its combat method, while inappropriately demanding to apply the principles of the Geneva Conventions and the accepted laws of war in the Western world to its combat, in order to achieve victory on the battlefield and in public opinion.

This section might seem banal, but it’s actually very important to any halachic writing. Halacha is, at it’s core, a set of principles that can be applied to various situations. It has rules and methods, but the way that it appears in reality will largely be determined by the facts to which it is applied.

Before one can embark on rendering a halachic decision, one must make sure that they have all the relevant facts of the case at hand. Too often, halachic decisors will rule a certain way without any regard to the person they’re ruling for or the facts of the case, and this can have disastrous outcomes.

When analysing a halachic argument, one fruitful area of inquiry can be the facts of the case—if these are not understood well or not taken into consideration by the person making the decision, there is room for improvement.

Summary of the morals of war

A. A state of war is a struggle between nations. In war, every citizen and individual is part of the collective and therefore an inseparable part of the war.

B. During combat, victory and the lives of our soldiers take precedence over the lives of enemy civilians. We are obligated to preserve their lives even if it results in harm to enemy civilians. 'Proportionality' is not an accepted Torah and moral criterion. We must protect the lives of our soldiers, and it is forbidden to risk even one Jewish soldier unnecessarily, even if it means that many enemy civilians will be harmed. The essence of the war is the battle of good versus evil, the divine light against darkness. The derivative to the spirit of combat is, fighting wholeheartedly without fear, and readiness for self-sacrifice for the sanctity of the Name, the people, and the land. The objectives of the war derived from this concept are, overwhelming and clear victory, in the most efficient and sharp manner possible.

C. The concept of 'revenge', as a component in national combat considerations, is fundamental in both Torah and Zionist thinking. Every attack on Israeli nationality and sovereignty must be responded to. The Jewish and Zionist statements 'blood of a Jew is not ownerless', and 'Never Again', in the context of the heinous acts of Hamas, require us to act against the enemy in a sharp and clear manner, and to include revenge as a component in our combat objectives. Revenge restores justice and right, and prevents the recurrence of such acts.

D. The principle 'If someone comes to kill you, rise up and kill him first' dictates that the best defense is offense. A hostile entity that threatens Israel and plots its destruction must be confronted with a preemptive war, and of course, there is no place for allowing them to attack us first.

E. The self-definition of the Hamas entity is the destruction of Israel as a Jewish state. A public entity existing within the borders of the Land of Israel, whose consciousness is anti-Israel, and the vast majority of its citizens hold this consciousness, is perceived in Torah sources as a continuation of the path of the 'Seven Nations' and 'Amalek'. This definition entails a unique moral warfare.

F. Hamas' warfare doctrine is a war crime – Hamas consciously involves civilians in combat. It establishes its command centers in civilian areas – in hospitals, mosques, and schools. It is akin to a military force that populates its armored personnel carriers and tanks with civilians alongside soldiers, to prevent the enemy from harming its combatants. The leadership in Gaza also deliberately blurs the ability to distinguish between combatants and civilians, and for this reason, Hamas terrorists often move without uniforms. Israel's victory requires fighting Hamas without fear of harming its civilians.

International law permits attacking military targets even when they use civilians as human shields. According to the Geneva Conventions and international war laws, it is forbidden for the army to attack civilian targets without military benefit. Also, according to these treaties, the use of civilians as human shields by military forces does not prevent the right to strike military targets.

There’s a lot to say about each of these points. I’ll reserve my comments until they’re discussed in depth in the coming sections.

A. War is a struggle between nation and nation, between collective and collective.

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1. The Torah is complicated.

I'll never forget the advice I was given by a mentor early in my career.

I was obsessed with making sure everyone around me knew that they had misunderstood the Torah's theology, that it wasn't what was written in plain sight.

And then he asked me a question - are you smarter than God?

Whoa.

"Why do you think He chose to write th…

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Discovering the Torah’s Graphical Interface

When I was growing up, I learnt Chumash from a version where the text was a giant block with no differentiation between the beginning and the end of specific sections, or between the beginning and the end of certain themes. It was challenging to find myself in the long block of text; it became almost an overwhe…

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One of the questions that people often ask when reading the Torah is “is it true?” What they mean by this, I think, is “did the stories in this book really happen?”

This is an interesting but entirely misleading question, for it makes an assumption about the type of book that the Torah is.

In How to Read a Book, Mortimer Adler points out a basic fact abou…

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In his Introduction to the Oral Torah, Maimonides deals with a thorny problem—where, why, and how do machlokot, disagreements, arise in the Oral Torah.

In the midst of that discussion, he lays out a three pronged taxonomy of argumentation which offers a profound mental model for analysing and thinking about disagreements, both in a halachic context and o…

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It’s a life goal of mine to connect people back to their Jewish roots, and I feel very strongly that the way to do that is to connect them back to the primary texts of our tradition. People need to learn more Torah, especially in these trying times.

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