Bamidbar sermon: In the last year of the last millennium, I became a deputy at the Board of Deputies on behalf of the Union of Jewish Students. It wasn’t the most exciting of leadership positions to take up, and I don’t remember much about most of the meetings other than the sense of playful camaraderieRead More
In the summer of 2006 I was at a conference in Stockholm, where I had previously studied for a year. After the Shabbat morning service, during Kiddush, one of the wardens, who had known me when I studied there, came over to say hi. He asked after my mum and grandpa who he had givenRead More
I got a call from the head teacher at my kids school last week. I won’t lie, I was scared. What had one of them done? Had someone hurt them? Thank God, it was nothing terrible! Eliana, who is in year 6, had, along with her classmates, been writing a haggadah. In pairs the kidsRead More
“Because of our traditions, We’ve kept our balance for many, many years. Here in Anatevka we have traditions for everything… how to eat, how to sleep, even, how to wear clothes. For instance, we always keep our heads covered and always wear a little prayer shawl… This shows our constant devotion to God. You mayRead More
It’s Shabbat of the Cow. Shabbat Parah. A strange name for a Shabbat, particularly as it is here to announce the approach of (say it quietly) Pesach. Why cows? Well in the first torah reading we heard Nurit read so beautifully this morning, we heard the wrath of God unleashed after the famous incident ofRead More
On Monday night we will start celebrating Purim. It is going to be fun! After a long winter, which still doesn’t want to give way to spring, the continuing recession, the rise in the cost of living, the anniversary of the war in Ukraine, violence and social unrest in Israel, tragic earthquakes in Turkey andRead More
These 53 laws of Parashat Mishpatim come straight after the Israelites received the 10 commandments, which is generally considered to be the Jewish moral and ethical Constitution. The laws range from observing Shabbat to not charging interest on loans to the poor, taking care of widows and orphans, which in those days meant people who,Read More
I really enjoyed your D’var Torah, India, I appreciate your struggle to come to terms with the tragedy, in your family, during the Holocaust and your coming to terms with it/ through your own definition of justice. Justice is the topic I try to avoid in my sermons because it is a difficult topic toRead More
This year ‘Mental Health Awareness Shabbat’ falls on Parashat Va’eira where Moses tells the Jewish nation that their woes have ended and that redemption is at hand. This should have been a time of elation, but the Israelites were too overwhelmed by their own stresses to absorb this message. They had lost hope and couldRead More
At the beginning of the first lock down in 2020, my husband Gary and I decided to start watching the American medical drama ‘Grey’s Anatomy’. There were 16 series and I don’t think we quite realised what a commitment we were making. Gary gave up somewhere around season 8. Last week however he rejoined meRead More
When our eldest, Eliana, was 3 days old, we were sent home from the hospital, slightly terrified at this whole parenting business. I literally couldn’t even put the buggy up. Within an hour of our arrival home, the phone rang. It was Rabbi Abraham Levy, spiritual head of the Spanish and Portuguese community for 50Read More
I won’t pretend I have ever watched an episode of ‘I’m a celebrity get me out of here’. But it has been impossible to avoid discussions about it over the last fornight, and I’ve certainly been treated to selected clips and a wide range of opinions on the goings on in the jungle via socialRead More