The 4th week of the Omer is associated with Kabbalistic sphere of Netzach, which is often translated as fortitude or endurance. Interestingly, the first thing that came to mind regarding endurance was about the persistance, resilience, and stick-to-it-iveness of athletes. I guess those sports equipment ads really sunk in. Yet, endurance is a key part of good leadership of all kinds. A leader needs to show persistance, resilience and stick-to-it-tiveness to keep an organzation

"Inconceivable!" If you're around my age, this word probably brings to mind the movie, The Princess Bride . While not a direct quote of the commentators on a pasuk in this week's Torah portion, it's pretty close. Here's what happens: וּבָ֤א אַהֲרֹן֙ אֶל־אֹ֣הֶל מוֹעֵ֔ד וּפָשַׁט֙ אֶת־בִּגְדֵ֣י הַבָּ֔ד אֲשֶׁ֥ר לָבַ֖שׁ בְּבֹא֣וֹ אֶל־הַקֹּ֑דֶשׁ וְהִנִּיחָ֖ם שָֽׁם׃ And Aaron shall go into the Tent of Meeting, take off the linen vestments that he put on when he entered the Shrine,

I hope you had a chance to read the first installment in this Omer, Kabbalah and Leadership series, which explored leadership lessons from the sefirot of Chesed and Gevurah. As we move into week 3 of the Omer, we turn to the sefirah of Tiferet. Tiferet is associated with harmony and balance, in part due to its location on the mystical “Tree of Life” depiction. My dear friend, Dr. Rachel Barbanel-Fried, shared a framing for the concept of balance that really struck a chord wit

I'm getting this posted a little late this week. It wasn't even because it took me awhile to come up with ideas because I was done with the ideas by the end of Shabbat mincha last week! I just didn't get to write it out to share. Luckily, neither of these are particularly involved recipes, so they should still be easy to make. With our double parsha this week, my plan is to do one food per parsha. Of course, the major theme of Tazria is tzarat, this physical manifestation of

About 300 - 400 years ago, the Kabbalists added a new dimension to the period of the Omer - the 49 day period between the 2nd night of Passover and Shavuot. They matched each day to one of the 49 aspects of personality, derived from the interaction of the lower 7 sefirot. (Check out this article  from My Jewish Learning for a good explanation more deeply into the sefirot.)  As I was counting the Omer on yom tov, an idea came to me: each week holds a leadership lens. So I’m sh

The laws of kashrut originate in the Torah, though what we practice in our current lives is a lot more involved and detailed than the relatively sparse verses in the Torah. What takes 1 pasuk in the Torah - " You shall not boil a kid in its mother's milk" - becomes pages and pages and pages of rabbinic interpretation. Nonetheless, the practices we follow today have direct links to passages in the Torah a nd in our Torah reading this week we have one of the more comprehensive

I know we're getting close to Passover and about 90% of the "Menu" part of my brain is on seder and the days that follow, Shabbat is still coming and there's a parsha to inspire, so here we go! In this week's parsha, there's a lot of talk about the sacrifices (I know I could say that for a lot of weeks!) This week, in particular, there's a lot of information about the sacrifices (the what and the how) for the Tabernacle andAaron and his sons. After consecrating the Tabernacl

And so we begin another book of the Torah, the one which some (including a son of mine who will remain anonymous) think of as the most boring book....so many sacrifices, repetition, not a lot of action, but as we often say, when you look deeply you can always find something interesting. This week I have two examples of that phenomenon. The first comes courtesy of our cantor's shiur this past Saturday afternoon. We focused on the "mincha" offering, which is the offering of gra

This week I got some great inspiration for the #parshainspirdmenus plans from family members - my husband and our youngest son. Our son read though Vayakhel and noticed that the Israelites were uber-generous in their giving of materials to help build the mishkan. He thought it might be reflective of the Israelites seeing it as an opportunity to make up for the sin of the Golden Calf. If jewelry was given to make the Golden Calf, how much more so should they give lots of mater

A smoothie is one of my "go to" breakfast nowadays. I usually use banana, and maybe add in some berries, yogurt, maybe some almond powder...today I actually made it with mango and pineapple so it was very yellow, which reminded me of the element of the parsha that our youngest son called out to when we were discussing what to do this week. He remembered learning this parsha last year in his Tanach class and he laughed thinking about the "Egel Hazahav smoothie." So, what's a E

In the early years of having my own apartment and kitchen I used to get Cooks Illustrated. We loved hearing the mystery style articles of how the chefs came up with the best version of a beef stew, or chocolate chip cookies, or roasted green beans. We loved the kitchen hacks shared by readers. And we loved the sketchings and descriptions of foods done without color photos. I recently saw a Cooks Illustrated magazine in the "impulse" section of the supermarket and, well, acte

Several years ago I created a class on the waves of aliyah to Israel. I've had the chance to teach it several times and one part I always enjoy is discussing the amazing nature of the "ingathering" of Jews from all over the world to Israel. Some had an easier road getting there than others (thought A LOT of olim had hard roads.) As Israel got stronger, the country was able to help bring people to Israel. I LOVE that these operations were given names that referenced Torah, inc

It's not often that I see this notation in Sefaria and this footnote says " * armed Meaning of Heb. ḥamushim uncertain." There are certainly other words that have been translated differently, depending on the commentator or translation, but it means that this word is particularly in question. Is it armed as in with weapons? That would make sense later when they fight with Amalek. It could mean arms laden with the gifts from the Egyptians. This would also make sense later when

With the last 3 of the plagues in this week's parsha you could, once again, do food that plays off of the plagues, but I am always looking for something new so I came up with two new ideas of foods inspired by something that stood out in the parsha. The first comes from the back and forth with Moshe and Pharoah. I actually first noticed this last week. When Moshe comes to Pharoah, the "ask" is to let the people go so that they may worship God in the wilderness. Pharoah refuse

About 8 years ago I added some fun to our seder to entertain our boys and our guests by having an edible representation of each one of the 10 plagues...red jello in a wavy dish for the Nile turning to blood, gummy frogs, non-pareils for boils, and so on. You could definitely do something like that for this week's Parsha Inspired Menus, since we get the story of the first 5 plagues in this week's parsha. However, I wanted to focus on two interesting details that took me a diff

This week's parsha is a pointed reminder that the safety and security of the Jewish people (and really any minority people) is deeply linked with the favor of those who rule the land. When Pharoah was pleased with Joseph, his whole family was invited to come down to Eygpt to live, his father's death was mourned by the whole nation, and a retinue of honor escorted Jacob to his burial place. And then " A new king arose over Egypt who did not know Joseph." and the fates change f

As Jacob's life nears its end, he takes the opportunity to dole out blessings to his descendents. The story of the blessings begins with Joseph hearing that his father is not well and coming to see him. The Torah says " When Jacob was told, “Your son Joseph has come to see you,” Israel summoned his strength and sat up in bed." Jacob then proceeds to tell Joseph that Jacob will include Ephraim and Menashe, Joseph's sons, as if they are Jacob's sons. Jacob then notices Joseph's

And so we get to the dramatic conclusion of the Joseph story with the reuniting of Joseph and his brothers and then Joseph and his father. There’s a lot of big dramatic moments, but I want to focus on two specific words that lead to some Interesting ideas. The first is after Joseph has revealed himself to his brothers and he is telling them that he wants them to go back to Jacob, his father, and tell him that Joseph is alive and well and to have the whole family come down to

My understanding of biblical Hebrew is meh...some words that repeat and repeat I've got down, others, not so much. So, I usually read the Torah in translation and then sometimes look over at the Hebrew to see if there's anything that catches my attetion. Because, of course, every translation is a commentary and makes choices that obscure other potential translations. One of those is in this week's parsha with the translation of this pasuk: וַיִּשְׁלַ֤ח פַּרְעֹה֙ וַיִּקְרָ֣א א

Maybe it's because two weeks ago I was thinking about the promise to Jacob that his descendents would be as numerous as the dust of the earth (and made maple squares), but I was struck by the imagery of the stars in one of Joseph's famous dreams. These stars have been used in this family before... [Then in the vision, God] took him outside and said, “Look toward heaven and count the stars, if you are able to count them”—continuing, “So shall your offspring be.” (Bereshit 15:5