Humash

Tzvi Sinensky responds to Herzl Hefter's Akeida essay.

Ayelet Wenger weaves together the personal, historical and exegetical in advance of reading Sefer Shemot.

In his letter to the editor, Gershon Klapper draws upon three medieval sources that undermine Ben Greenfield's recent reading of the Zohar on the three attributes of the Avot.

Chaim Trachtman sees the Akeida as addressing the threat to human life, especially that of children, which is always inherent in the religious experience.

Jacob is described in Rabbinic thought as a pursuer of truth, but many have questioned whether this aligns with the simple reading of the text. Gavriel Lakser argues that a close reading shows that it does, even if he made some mistakes along the way.

Sarah's conspicuous absence from the dramatic Akeidah narrative is the subject of both traditional and scholarly interpretation. Michael Wolff offers an approach through the lens of gender roles.

Eliyahu Freedman compares hospital chaplains to the Kohanim.

Surprisingly, Bible scholars have not addressed the remarkable intertextual conversation between Jacob's blessings in Genesis 49 and Deborah's song in Judges 5. Michael Bernstein offers his original etymological analysis of the two poetic texts.

For Eve Grubin, Bilam's hidden messages is a lesson for the Torah and for life.

Ben Greenfield calls attention to a crucial, but unnoticed feature of the early narratives in Exodus.