Parshah Columnists for Bereshit

How are we supposed to live with ourselves in the aftermath?

Why was G-d so afraid that humans would gain eternal life that He was compelled to throw Adam and Eve out of Gan Eden?

“Why” questions are often less of a genuine inquiry into the truth of the matter and more like veiled accusations and criticism.

Why is it thus named?

It is not easy to understand how a world view that leads nowhere and ultimately explains nothing became so rooted in the human psyche

Those who refer to the biblical story of Eve as a Divine endorsement of sexism are overlooking a simple truth: a curse is not something that should to be the way it is -- it's something that should not be the way it is...

Beneath the façade, the Oneness reality has never changed; it has simply receded. We, conscious human beings, can reactivate the Oneness reality. That is our destiny. Our privilege. And our duty.

Really! Have you ever heard of carbon dating? Aren't there stars a millions light years away? Have you ever heard the word "dinosaurs"?

I'm incredibly grateful that we have food to eat, clothing to wear, and a roof over our heads. Nothing is lacking as I carefully budget, trying to maximize every penny; but I still can't stop worrying and stop the anxiety from creeping into my heart...

When G-d created Adam, at the moment Adam opened his eyes, what was his psychological profile? He had no Oedipus complex because he had no mother. He didn't have a birth trauma, because he wasn't born. He had no sibling rivalry... What was this man like?

“Why?” I ask myself. “Why is this woman always a prisoner to the past and to what she lacks?”

Genesis is preoccupied with fundamental questions, its narratives brimming with exemplary figures whose actions shape our lives today. Clearly, it would have been impossible to begin the Torah without them.

The metaphor of a peel captures all we need to know about unholiness: its origin, its purpose, the challenges it presents, and ultimately the way to deal with it.

if we want the initial or "natural" state of the world--which was non-existence--to be defied, then we need to keep fueling the thrust of creative energy that brought the world into existence in the first place...

The sooner we realize it’s all a mind game, the sooner we will be able to win the game.

The sin of the Tree of Knowledge is one of the most perplexing episodes in the Torah. Insight into the story sheds light on woman's unique qualities and role in the process of redemption

The vastness, the boundless variety, the sense of structure and the sense of a constant interplay of dynamic forces, --all express something about G-d

On that busy Friday afternoon, G‑d taught us something about time and the importance of its management; every moment has an exclusive energy to be utilized, and a purpose for which it alone was created.

G‑d created Adam and Eve unclothed, and they walked around the Garden of Eden . . . naked. If public nudity was fine with G‑d, why does the Torah tell us to be modest, to cover up, to subdue our natural allure? What changed?

The media has capitalized on the post–Fruit of Knowledge schism in a brilliant way. If the body is so distracting, then do everything you can to distract! Call attention to yourself. Be alluring. That is the key to success.

It is the sweet sadness of reaching the end . . .

"Beit!" cried the angry little Aleph to G-d. "Beit is a nice little house with a roof and walls to hold out the Infinite Light and a little door on one side to let a trickle in. And You chose that constipated, square-headed letter over me!"

It was an eerie feeling as the orbit of the planets suddenly swung into reverse. The moon was no longer receiving and reflecting light; as though sucked inwards, radiance flowed from the moon to the sun...

Together, a man and a woman form a single being.

In this swamp of confusion, darkness becomes evil, for it entraps the light. When we tug to fissure their bond, an iron resistance opposes us. In the final release, a burst of energy shakes the cosmos....

What is an Alef? A point above, a point below, and a line of Torah connecting them.

Aside from stimulating our minds and inspiring our mystic wonder, what are the practical ramifications of the truth that G‑d is creating the world anew every moment of time?

"And the earth was chaotic and void, and darkness was upon the face of the deep; and the spirit of G-d hovered upon the face of the waters." A spooky verse, a Talmudic law, and an empowering Midrash.

As the Torah tells it, G-d spent six days making a universe, creating physicality and spirituality, time and space, matter and energy, water and earth, stars and trees and animals -- and then created a single human being and said to him: "All this is to serve you."

Were He not to create humanity there would be no-one in the universe capable of understanding that he or she was created and that G‑d exists.

What exactly was the first sin? What was the Tree of Knowledge of good and evil? Is this kind of knowledge a bad thing such that it had to be forbidden, and was only acquired through sin? Isn’t knowing the difference between good and evil essential to being human? Isn’t it one of the highest forms of knowledge? Surely G‑d would want humans to have it? Why then did He forbid the fruit that produced it?