Madlik Podcast – Disruptive Torah Thoughts on Judaism

Join Geoffrey Stern and Rabbi Adam Mintz recorded live on Clubhouse. This week's parsha iis as much about water as it is about Chukim or challenging rules. It starts with the death of Miriam and her well, segues into Moses fatal sin in striking the water rock and concludes with the Red Heifer and its purifying water. Today we focus on the ability of sprinkled water or emersion into water to purify...

Join Geoffrey Stern and Rabbi Adam Mintz, recorded on Clubhouse. Moses uses a title for God he uses in only one other place and which is not used again in all of Tanach: "God of the spirits of all flesh". This name for God strikes us as very universalist, even humanistic and we explore. Sefaria Source Sheet: www.sefaria.org/sheets/576389   Transcript on episode web page: https://madlik.com/2024/07...

Join Geoffrey Stern and Rabbi Adam Mintz recorded on Clubhouse. The so-called Biblical Spies are actually not characterized as undercover agents but rather as tourists or in Hebrew; Turim. Broadcasting live from Venice, Italy, we take this opportunity to explore the significant impact that journey has played in defining the Jew. Sefaria Source Sheet: www.sefaria.org/sheets/575122   Transcript on e...

Join Geoffrey Stern and Rabbi Adam Mintz recorded on Clubhouse. We've encountered age limits in the Torah with regard to reaching the age of majority, military age and the age required to serve as a priest, but there is a singular verse which provides a mandatory retirement age and this is the subject of our discussion. Sefaria Source Sheet: www.sefaria.org/sheets/574152   Transcript on episode we...

Join Geoffrey Stern and Rabbi Adam Mintz recorded on Clubhouse. This week we start the fourth Book of the Torah and it is also my grandson Ari's Bar Mitzvah. As the Torah quantifies and qualifies its members, there is nothing new with the emphasis on the genetic lineage of the tribes. What is surprising, is a strategically placed Rabbinic comment that whoever teaches Torah to another, Scripture re...

Join Geoffrey Stern and Rabbi Adam Mintz recorded live on Clubhouse. God threatens to scatter the Israelites among the nations. The Septuagint, in its Greek translation, coins a new word, maybe a new concept. A Greek word used, not for migrants but to reference a people who identify with a specific geographic location, but currently reside elsewhere. The word is Diaspora, a seminal concept in Juda...

Join Geoffrey Stern and Rabbi Adam Mintz recorded on Clubhouse. This week's parsha is Behar, which means "at the Mountain". While Rabbi Mintz is not at the Mountain, he is in Israel and will share impressions of his recent visit to the only Haredi Hesder Yeshiva. The Talmud suggests that we set aside specific times for Torah study and we will use the Sabbatical year referenced in the parsha to foc...

Join Geoffrey Stern and Rabbi Adam Mintz recorded on Clubhouse.  We usually think of Tishrei and the Fall as a marathon of Jewish holidays, but if you count Rabbinic and Israeli holidays, the seven weeks of Spring win the holiday race with ease. Pesach, Yom Hazikaron, Yom Ha'atzmut, Pesach Sheni, Lag ba'Omer, Yom Yerushalyim and Shavuot. We use Leviticus 23 which has the most complete summary of B...

Join Geoffrey Stern, Rabbi Adam Mintz and special guest Rabbi Menachem Bombach recorded on Clubhouse. This year Yom Hazikaron; Israeli Memorial Day, will be different for many reasons and from many perspectives. We invite Rabbi Menachem Bombach, a maverick visionary in the Haredi community to join us for a conversation about the meaning, history and halachic significance of this day for Israelis i...

This week's parsha is Acharei Mot.. literally; After Death. From Rabbinic Judaism up until the present, we Jews "Choose Life". Was it always so? Was it so obvious? Is it the secret sauce of Jewish survival? And…. Is it at the core of the current conflict? So many questions and only half an hour. Join us for Life Comes First recorded live on Clubhouse. Source Sheet: www.sefaria.org/sheets/561608  ...

Join Geoffrey Stern and Rabbi Mintz recorded on Clubhouse. This year our Seder will be different from other seders. For the first time in many of our lives it will be a Leil Shemorim, a night of concern; a night of uncertainty, fatigue and confusion. So, let's follow the advice of the Rabbis to see ourselves as though we too are leaving our Egypt. Join us as we recast the ancient texts of the Hagg...

On the last day of a wartime visit to Israel, I visit the Shittim Institute; The Kibbutz Institute for Holidays and Jewish Culture, situated on kibbutz Beit Hashita in Northern Israel. I recently discovered this amazing institute when I purchased a first edition Kibbutz Be'eri Haggadah from 1950. I was researching the provenance of this new edition to my collection when I learned that Machon Shitt...

A conversation in Jerusalem with Professor Daniel Polisar, co-founder of Shalem College and his assistant, Hannah Liberman. We talk about the miraculous and sui generis emergence of the Hamal Yerushalyim;   The Jerusalem Civilian Command Center at the beginning of the October 7 th War. We also try to quantify and comprehend the IDF's cataclysmic failure to provide basic protective gear for Israeli...

Join Geoffrey Stern in the Negev to meet with soldiers in the 97th Netzah Yehuda Battalion, previously known as Nahal Haredi, a battalion in the Kfir Brigade of the Israel Defense Forces. The soldiers are all Haredi and you will be hearing first from the commander and then from one of the new recruits, both of which spoke English and approached me to tell their story. While the government of Israe...

Join us for a conversation with Elimelech Crystal; one of the leaders of Beyahad Em Lochamey Kippur 1973, an organization dedicated to supporting Israel's combat soldiers while at the same time protesting the current government. Transcipt on episode web page:   https://madlik.com/2024/03/30/veterans-of-the-yom-kippur-war-are-heard/    

Join Geoffrey Stern in conversation with Ruth Calderon. In Israel while the war in Gaza rages on and with over 100 hostages still in captivity, we sit down with Talmud scholar and founder of Amla; Ruth Calderon to discuss the need to reclaim Jewish texts and create a shared cultural language in Israel..... now more than ever. Sefaria Source Sheet: www.sefaria.org/sheets/554640 Transcript on episod...

Join Geoffrey Stern and Rabbi Mintz recorded on Clubhouse. The Book of Vayikra (Leviticus) is also called Torat Cohanim (The Priestly Torah) and has traditionally been the first book to be studied by children in the Cheder. Today there is a growing and no longer fringe group of Mikdashnikim who want to rebuild the Temple. So today, from the mouth of babes up until the present we will trace and try...

Join Geoffrey Stern and Rabbi Adam Mintz recorded on Clubhouse. Moses feels obliged to acknowledge the individuals who designed and built the Tabernacle and to provide an exact accounting of all the funds used. We explore the profound place that transparency, accountability and most of all; honoring one's sources, play in Jewish tradition, culture and in light of the reckoning that lies ahead for...

Join Geoffrey Stern and Rabbi Adam Mintz recorded on Clubhouse. By tradition, the holiday of Passover is preceded by five specially named Shabbatot. The first is called Shekalim and we discuss the meaning of this shabbat in light of both Rabbinic and New Testament texts and in the process join our forebears in preparing for the Spring awakening. Sefaria Source Sheet: www.sefaria.org/sheets/549744...

Join Geoffrey Stern and rabbi Adam Mintz recorded on Clubhouse. We invite Berel Dov Lerner the author of recently published: Human-Divine Interactions in the Hebrew Scriptures to discuss his book and his premise of Covenants and Cross-Purposes . We'll use a simple basin made of pedestrian copper found in the Tabernacle as our point of departure. Sefaria Source Sheet: www.sefaria.org/sheets/547714...

Join Geoffrey Stern and Rabbi Adam Mintz recorded on Clubhouse. W e explore the enigma of the Urim and Thummim; the priestly breastplate, especially within the context of the Torah's explicit rejection of sorcery and divination. And we wonder …. We wonder about contemporary incarnations of divination and prophesy in the form of opinion-polling and social media engagement. Sefaria Source Sheet: www...

Join Geoffrey Stern and Rabbiu Adam Mintz recorded on Clubhouse. According to Rabbinic tradition Moses was shown a paradigm of the Menorah but was uncertain how to translate the vision into reality of the moment. Bezalel had no such reservations and succeeded where Moses failed. We use this tradition to explore the modern concept of Paradigm Shift and wonder whether we are at such an inflection po...

Join Geoffrey Stern, Rabbi Adam Mintz and special guest, the Reverand Dumisani Washington recorded on Clubhouse. As the rubber meets the road and the Torah begins to translate its vision of liberation into practical rules and regulations, we sense a pattern. The Torah starts by addressing a legal institution close to home; slavery, and provides laws of emancipation. Next the Torah begins to create...

Join Geoffrey Stern, Rabbi Adam Mintz and special guest Shikh Muhan Fares for a discussion recorded on Clubhouse.. We celebrate Yitro and our Druze brothers and sisters. We marvel at the superlatives that the Torah uses to describe Jethro and how the same characteristics of loyalty, leadership and integrity are showcased by Israeli Druze today…. and maybe in the process, we learn a little bit more...

Join Geoffrey Stern and Rabbi Adam Mintz recorded on Clubhouse. Nachshon is the posterchild of what Heschel called "Praying with your feet". He personifies Judaism's clear bias for action over the status quo, action over prayer and even action over reflection. Today we explore the darker side of Nachshon and the potential deficiencies of Action Bias in decision theory.  Sefaria Source Sheet: www.s...