Ta Shma

The Book of Numbers concludes by revisiting a narrative we first encountered last week: the story of Tzlofhad’s inheritance.  This episode appears first in chapter 27 and again in chapter 36, with the two accounts mirroring each other.  Yet, despite the extensive linguistic parallels between them, these similarities actually serve to highlight the deep gaps and contrasts between the two parts of t...

Who were the rabbis who shaped Judaism as we know it today? This class delves into  Talmudic stories about Rabbi Yohanan ben Zakkai, comes to know him as a human being and tries to understand his approach to rebuilding Judaism in the wake of a lost world. Recorded in Winter 2026.  The rest of the series is available on Hadar's Torah Library: https://hadar.org/torah-tefillah/collections/rabbin...

Over 250 years in America, Judaism—a way of life that centers obligation—has had to negotiate a culture defined by autonomy and freedom. How has that tension shaped Jewish life, mitzvot, and halakhah over the past 250 years? What will it take to sustain a culture of mitzvot over the next 250 years? Recorded at Hadar's Summer 2026 Kickoff Event.  Source sheet: https://mechonhadar.s3.us-east-1....

Over the past three years, a myriad of terms for the reality of war have emerged in Israeli discourse: a commanded war ( milhemet mitzvah ), an existential war ( milhemet kiyyum ), a war of restoration ( milhemet komemiyut ), an optional war ( milhemet reshut ), and more.  At the core of each concept lies a different mode of conduct and a different motive, and they express a stance on the place wa...

The tragedies we remember on 17th Tammuz are really of different kinds.

Bilam’s prophecies are rich, dense, and enigmatic. One in particular was emphasised recently in 2025 when the war with Iran took its name from Bilam’s words: “a people like a lion” ( am ke-lavi ). What does this phrase mean? What kind of people are “like a lion”? What does this mean for our identity as Israel? And what use of power does Bilam’s analogy suggest? 

Before the Amidah, we take three steps forward. What is the origin of this custom, and what is the symbolism of these steps? This class explores a number of approaches, all oriented to deepen our connection with God. Recorded at Hadar's Rabbinic Yeshivah Intensive, March 2026.  Source sheet: https://mechonhadar.s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/mh_torah_source_sheets/RYI2026KaunferSteppingIntoPrayer...

This parashah focuses on the leadership and religious dispute that erupts between Korah and his assembly and Moshe and Aharon. Seemingly, the parashah rules in favor of one side—that of Moshe and Aharon—against Korah’s claim. It could easily be extrapolated from this drama that disputes are harmful, that they create violence and division, and that what God really wants for us is total unity behind...

Not everyone has the best intentions. This class explores the category of the "eid zomem" - the false witness who tries, but fails, to condemn an innocent person through their testimony. What is the proper way to think about one who tries to do wrong, but doesn't succeed? What do we do when the punishment can't possibly fit the crime? The remainder of this 6-part series can be...

Parashat Shelah confronts us with a poignant question that touches our personal lives from time to time: How do we hold fast to a minority opinion?  How can we align ourselves with Yehoshua and Calev, resisting the temptation to join the majority consensus of the spies?

What do we do when our leaders—or our most sacred texts—repeatedly disappoint us? We live in a world that continues to struggle with how to live out a sexual ethics of mutual dignity. In this series, R. Aviva Richman confronts moments of disappointment related to sexual ethics in Talmud and explores how to inherit this part of Torah in ways that invite honesty and growth. Recorded In Winter 2026. ...

Parashat BeHa’alotkha returns us to the story of Pesah—this time, in the second year after the Exodus from Egypt—and underscores the ways in which observing God’s mitzvot is a fundamentally communal project.

What do we do when our leaders—or our most sacred texts—repeatedly disappoint us? We live in a world that continues to struggle with how to live out a sexual ethics of mutual dignity. In this series, R. Aviva Richman confronts moments of disappointment related to sexual ethics in Talmud and explores how to inherit this part of Torah in ways that invite honesty and growth. Recorded In Winter 2026. ...

Our parashah describes one aspect of the unique relationship between the Holy Blessed One, and Moshe.  The final verse of the parashah describes how the Holy One and Moshe would communicate in the mishkan (tabernacle). 

According to Rashi, the defining feature of the people of Israel at the moment of receiving the Torah is complete unity. 

What do we do when our leaders—or our most sacred texts—repeatedly disappoint us? We live in a world that continues to struggle with how to live out a sexual ethics of mutual dignity. In this series, R. Aviva Richman confronts moments of disappointment related to sexual ethics in Talmud and explores how to inherit this part of Torah in ways that invite honesty and growth. Recorded In Winter 2026. ...

“God spoke to Moshe in the wilderness of Sinai, in the Tent of Meeting, on the first day of the second month, in the second year after their departure from the land of Egypt, saying” (Numbers 1:1).  This verse opens the Book of Bemidbar and initiates God’s speech to the Israelites during these years of routine wandering.  

For many of us, confronting death raises urgent questions of faith, doubt, and the meaning and purpose of our lives. Yet we live in a culture that avoids talking about death, let alone the existential challenges it raises. Physician and ethicist Lydia Dugdale, author of The Lost Art of Dying, joins Rabbi Shai Held to draw on ancient and contemporary wisdom about mortality and meaning. Recorded in...

The Book of Leviticus, and Parashat BeHukkotai that brings it to a close, makes a clear and recurring claim: reality is not an act of fate, but the outcome of human choice and behavior. 

According to a midrashic tradition, the counting of the Omer (that may have seemed to be nothing but a calendrical counting of the days from Pesah to Shavuot) expresses the anticipation of the Israelites for the giving of the Torah.  The biblical commandment, however, appears in an agricultural context.

In Parashat Emor, we encounter the story of the blasphemer. This blasphemer undermines, degrades, and treats with levity the very foundation of the religious system—the root of faith and the bedrock of the world.  Yet various midrashim , in their characteristic fashion, are not satisfied with a dry, factual account.  

When the unthinkable happens, what remains of faith? Journalist Sarah Wildman, who lost her young daughter, joins Rabbi Shai Held in a searching conversation about grief, love, and the struggle to go on. They will probe how mourning collides with meaning-making, and how faith might fracture, endure, or be remade in the wake of devastating loss. Recorded in Fall 2025.  This conversation is part of...

Drawing close is no simple matter.  At times, it can be difficult—even dangerous.  And yet, to come near is also wondrous: it can nurture, enrich, and expand life.  The possibility of a misstep is always near—but so too are countless opportunities.  The line between one kind of closeness and another is often fine.  It depends on sensitivity, harmony, the insistence on not including elements foreig...

Dedicated in loving memory of my nephew, Yishai Elyakim Urbach, who fell in Gaza one year ago, a few weeks after setting out to build his own home. Tehillim 127:1 "Unless God builds the house, those who build it labor in vain."  Human beings cannot truly build alone.  What we build by ourselves, the psalmist suggests, cannot ultimately endure. And yet one of the most beloved songs sung i...

Chapter 12 of the Book of Vayikra deals with the sacrifice of the woman who has given birth.