Kol Ramah

Parsha Talk with Rabbis Eliot Malomet, Barry Chesler and Jeremy Kalmanofsky. Parashat Va-yetze [Genesis 28:10–32:3] is a personal favorite, in that it is my Bar Mitzvah portion. Coincidentally [or not] it is the Bat Mitzvah portion of my wife, Carol. And, my Hebrew name is יעקב [ya’aqov, Jacob], who is the main character. The parashah begins with Jacob heading northeast, to the land of his uncle L...

Parsha Talk with Rabbis Eliot Malomet, Barry Chesler and Jeremy Kalmanofsky. Parashat Toldot [Genesis 25:19–28:9] is the sixth of the weekly parashiyot in the Book of Genesis. The toldot, or generations, from which the parashah takes its name, belong to Isaac. Eilleh toldot yitzhaq ben avraham, avraham holid et yitzhaq: this is the story of Isaac, son of Abraham; Abraham begot Isaac. After a coupl...

Parsha Talk with Rabbis Eliot Malomet, Barry Chesler and Jeremy Kalmanofsky. Parashat Hayyai Sarah [23:1–25:18] is the fifth of the weekly parashiyot in Sefer B’reshit [the Book of Genesis]. It begins with the death notice of Sarah, and continues with the first acquisition of land by Avraham in Canaan. This is the basis of the subsequent Jewish claim to the Land. Canaan is the place where Avraham...

Parsha Talk with Rabbis Eliot Malomet, Barry Chesler and Jeremy Kalmanofsky. Parashat Va-yera [Genesis 18-22] is the 4th weekly parashah in the Book of Genesis. It primarily consists of a series of events in the life of Abraham: the visitation of the angels/messengers of God with the news that Sarah will give birth to a son, Avraham’s discussion with God over the fate of Sodom and Gomorrah, a seco...

Parsha Talk - with Rabbis Eliot Malomet, Barry Chesler and Jeremy Kalmanofsky. Parashat Lekh L’kha [Genesis 12:1–17:27] is the third parashah in the Book of Genesis. It opens with God’s dramatic call to Avram, instructing him to leave “his land, his birthplace, his father’s house, to go to the land that I [God] will show you”. Because this is the opening verse of the new parashah, it is easy to fo...

Parsha Talk with Rabbis Eliot Malomet, Barry Chesler and Jeremy Kalmanofsky. Parashat Noah [Genesis 6:10–11:32] is the second parashah in the Book of Genesis. The main story in the parashah is the flood that God brings in order to destroy God’s creation, to begin again with Noah, his wife, their three sons, and their wives. Our tone was more somber than usual, in the wake of the news in Israel sin...

Rabbis Eliot Malomet, Barry Chesler and Jeremy Kalmanofsky. We start our annual Torah Reading again this week with the first parashah, B’reshit [Genesis 1:1-6:8]. Because of scheduling issues, we recorded this last week, before the war in Israel broke out. Our prayers and thoughts are with Israel: the land, the state, and the people. May comfort come to those who mourn, may loved ones, soldiers an...

Parsha Talk with Rabbis Eliot Malomet, Barry Chesler and Jeremy Kalmanofsky. Because Sh’mini Atzeret and Simchat Torah fall on Shabbat and Sunday, we have another special edition of Parashah Talk. The parashah for this Shabbat is Deuteronomy 14:22–16:17, from parashat Re’eh, which is also read on the last day of Passover and second day of Shavuot. It is Deuteronomy’s festival calendar. Ironically,...

Parsha Talk - with Rabbis Eliot Malomet, Barry Chesler and Jeremy Kalmanofsky. The parashah this week is a special Torah Reading for Sukkot. This may be familiar to those who remember the Torah reading from the second day of Passover, 6 months ago, and it will be repeated again on Sunday in communities observing two days of yom tov [holiday]. The Torah reading comprises the sacred calendar of Levi...

Parsha Talk with Rabbis Eliot Malomet, Barry Chesler and Jeremy Kalmanofsky. When either Rosh Hashanah or Yom Kippur falls on Shabbat, this week’s parashah, Ha’azinu [Deuteronomy 32] is also Shabbat Shuvah, with a special haftarah [Hosea 14:2-10, Joel 2:15-27, according to the Ashkenazic tradition recorded in the Etz Hayim]. Though the Shabbat takes its name from the first word in the Hosea text [...

Parsha Talk with Rabbis Eliot Malomet, Barry Chesler and Jeremy Kalmanofsky. It is the week before Rosh Hashanah [which begins this Friday evening, September 15, 2023], so the weekly parashah is replaced by the special Torah readings for the holiday: on Saturday, Shabbat, we read Genesis 21; on Sunday, we read chapter 22. Rather than speak directly about the Torah reading this week, we spoke inste...

Parsha Talk with Rabbis Eliot Malomet, barry Chesler and Jeremy Kalmanofsky. This week’s double parashah Nitzavim/Va-yelekh [Deut. 29:9–31:30] is relatively short yet contains memorable lines and ideas that have had a kind of an afterlife well beyond the Torah. The phrase lo bashamayim hee [Deut. 30:12], “it is not in heaven” figures prominently in one of the great talmudic stories, The Oven of Ak...

Rabbis Eliot Malomet, Barry Chesler and Jeremy Kalmanofsky present Parsha Talk. Parashat Ki Tavo [Deuteronomy 26:1–29:8] contains a lengthy section [Deut. 28] known as the תוכחה [tokhehah, or “rebuke”], which parallels the similar text found near the end of Leviticus [ ch. 26]. Before we got to it, we spent quite a lot of time discussing the passage about the first-fruits ritual [Deut. 26:1–11], a...

Parsha Talk with Rabbis Eliot Malomet, Barry Chesler and Jeremy Kalmanofsky. Parashat Ki Tetze [Deuteronomy 21:10–25:19] is, to use one of Eliot’s favorite phrases, mitzvah-dense, with 74 of the 613 commandments according to Sefer ha-Hinukh, a medieval compilation and explanation of the laws of the Torah. With so much to choose from, we used a somewhat random method, rolling dice to determine a ch...

Parsha Talk with Rabbis Eliot Malomet, Barry Chesler and Jeremy Kalmanofsky. Parashat Shoftim [Deuteronomy 16:8–21:9], as described by Jeffrey Tigay in his JPS Torah Commentary on Deuteronomy, “deals with the responsibilities of public officials, . . . It introduces four main types of human authorities: judges, kings, priests, and prophets . . .” It is thus a political document, outlining the rule...

Fantastic soundtrack of "Alladin". A bogrim production. Take a listen to our live soundtrack recorded in Bet Am Bet by Radio Kol Ramah staff Omer and Ben. Yasher Coach Bogrim!

Sophia , Rebecca , Hannah , Talia , Jolie and Gaby talk on Radio Kol Ramah about their best and favourite moments of Kayitz 23

In our first episode of The Camp Ramah in The Berkshires Summer 2023 Walking Tour, our host Zoe (Shorashim) takes us to the Agam -the lake- to learn all about what happens at camp. She gets to sit down with Rosh Agam Robbie Kroll, who shares a little bit about what he does at camp, his deep connection to the waterfront and some of his favorite things about the lake. This Kol Ramah podcast series w...

In our second episode of The Camp Ramah in The Berkshires Summer 2023 Walking Tour, our host Zoe (Shorashim) takes us on a long walk around camp on the way to the Ulam. We discuss things that she loves to do at camp, new Hebrew words that she has learned, the experience of having her have her sister join her as part of the Taam program, and that’s all before we get to the Ulam itself. Once there,...

In this episode of The Camp Ramah in The Berkshires Summer 2023 Walking Tour, our host Jayden (Tikva) and his counselor Rachel takes a walk around camp to go to Animal Care. Along the way he interviews campers, and counselors and specialist as he talks about all the things he likes about camp and sees on his way. Jayden then sits down to talk to his counselor Rachel Kimball. This Kol Ramah podcast...

In our final episode of The Camp Ramah in The Berkshires Summer 2023 Walking Tour, our host Zoe (Shorashim) takes us on short walk from the chadar ochel to where we have worked all week to create this podcast series. Zoe talks about what she sees in the studio, and then sits down to talk to the rest of the Kol Ramah podcast team, Omer, Ben and Darone. This Kol Ramah podcast series was hosted by Zo...

Parsha Talk, with Rabbis Eliot Malomet, Barry Chesler and Jeremy Kalmanofsky. Parashat Re’eh [Deuteronomy 11:26–16:17] is a family favorite because it was the parashah for both my daughters’ synagogue Bat Mitzvahs [albeit 11 years apart; they each also celebrated a camp Bat Mitzvah the year before]. Re’eh, like every other amazing parashah, is chock full of good conversation material. There is the...

Leora, Aliza & Zoe made a great audio play of the famous book&movie Alice In Wonderland - Listen To it!

Dr. Alison Joseph of chinuch worked in small groups with Solellim and Bogrim. Reading Parashat Ekev they worked all week reading the parsha. Chanichim chose points or questions they thought interesting to explore and developed different segments for the podcast.

Parsha Talk with Rabbis Eliot Malomet, Barry Chesler and Jeremy Kalmanofsky. Parashat Eqev [Deuteronomy 7:12–11:26] is perhaps best known for the 2nd paragraph of the Shema [Deuteronomy 11:13-21], but it also contains the scriptural basis for the Grace after Meals, the verse that is quoted in the second of the four blessings in that prayer [8:10], and two verses before that, the list of the 7 spec...