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What then are we to make of the phrase, “Pharaoh condemned only the boys to death, but Laban sought to uproot everything”?

The next day, there was knock on their door. "Who is it?" asked Mrs. Levi, but no one answered. She asked again, and again no answer, so she looked through the peephole, but saw no one.

What the Maccabees had was that light, was that ability, to let in the goodness which is G-d and his Torah.

Rabbi Mecklenburg notes that another cognate, “sha,” means “closing one’s eyes” (Isaiah 6:10 and 32:3) since when a person closes his eyes, it appears as though he attaches his upper eyelid to his lower one.

If we treat the mitzvos with respect, we will be awarded the maximum reward for them.

Itzchak, having grown up in the household of Avraham and Sarah, had never encountered deception before, and was thus, in his innocence, misled by his son. Rivka, who had grown up in the company of Lavan, recognized it very well, which is why she favored Yaakov,

No one likes to be in the company of a pessimistic and depressing person. To say the least, it's not a pleasant experience.

“Sav” is related to the Hebrew word “seivah,” and both these words form the basis of “saba,” which means “old man” or “grandfather.”

The two explanations from Rashi seem to contradict one another. In this week’s parshah he says that Avraham could take the land as its rightful owner, and in parshas Lech Lecha he said that Avraham had not yet acquired the land.

The answer again is that to understand a death, we have to understand a life.

Rabbi Shlomo is well known for his love of every single Jew and his ability to reach so many souls with his special music and his magnetic personality.

Rabbi Wertheimer writes that "ayeh" is used when one has no inkling where something is, while "eifo" is used when one does have a general sense of where it is.

The seed alone cannot produce the tree, it needs earth, or soil. And these two components alone cannot either produce a tree, they require water, sun and other nutrients.

He had deposited Shlomo’s real, original check into his account, and when it had cleared he had made up this weird story to get an additional 3,600 shekels out of Shlomo!

A pattern is beginning to emerge: Avraham was learning that there is a long and winding road between promise and fulfillment. Not because G-d does not keep His word, but because Avraham and his descendants were charged with bringing something new into the world

With hope and a prayer, and the longing of a daughter to save her mother from the abyss of sadness, Laura drove straight to Minnie’s home and knocked on the door, her arms filled with unexpected packages.

Another word for dust, mentioned above, is “avak.” Rabbi Pappenheim argues that afar is run-of-the-mill dirt while avak is finer dust.

We must continue to educate the world about Who the single creator and ruler of the world is. But how are we to do so?

Avraham is the father of faith--not as acceptance but as protest

Sometimes a person just wants empathy, understanding, and having someone just be there in the moment with a hug or a listening ear.

Sometimes when we are locked in our little boxes, we, like Noach in the ark, need a window. When we think our world is crumbling and that we are doomed to a fate that is too difficult to bear, the Almighty tells us to make a window.

Rav Yerucham explains that the beginning of everything defines what it will be. We find that in the beginning of the parsha, Noach is referred to as an ish tzaddik tamim, and now he is referred to as an ish ha’adama.

Every so often I would sit down at the baby grand piano in my childhood home and play a few songs. I had learned enough to play piano on an intermediate level.

A window to the world.

When we choose our friends and connect to certain types of people, we must make sure that they are good people inside and out.

The Vilna Gaon argues that man stopped resembling G-d in the generation of Adam’s grandson Enosh when idol worship began to develop.

It was one of the few weddings, maybe the only one I’ve been to, where people weren’t talking to each other or on their cell phones during the chupah.

The Torah is telling us something very powerful. Never think of people as things. Never think of people as types: they are individuals. Never be content with creating systems: care also about relationships.

If we were to neglect or disregard such a gift, that would be a great insult and disrespect to whoever gave us the present. The greater the value, the greater the insult.

The thunderous, urgently repeated “Ya’amod” precipitated a virtual kibbutz galuyos that made my heart skip a beat and my breath catch in my throat.