David Curzon
By David Curzon
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Culture Our Evil Imaginations
The story of the Flood is preceded and followed by unkind remarks of God on the nature of human imagination. In Genesis 6:5, at the end of last week’s portion, we are told: And the Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth and that every imagination of the thoughts of…
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Culture The Choice We Confront
If I were asked to recite the Torah while standing on one leg, I would repeat the summary formulation to be found at the end of this week’s portion, Nitzavim/VaYelekh. While standing on one leg, I would say — conflating Deuteronomy 30:15 and 30:19 — that the essence of the Torah is this, in the…
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Culture You Must Not Remain Indifferent
Deuteronomy 22:1-3 contains the admirable commandment to return any lost ox, sheep, ass or garment that you come across and, if necessary, to go out of your way to do this. And then, at the end of Deuteronomy 22:3, the point is generalized by a command that reads, in the older and more literal translations:…
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Culture The Search for Reasons and Meanings
The rabbis assumed that the text of the Torah was perfect so that any apparent discrepancy or repetition or contradiction had to be there for a reason. and it was up to us to impute a reason and formulate the lesson that it teaches. They also assumed that each sentence in the Torah had an…
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Culture Is This Too Much To Expect?
Zechariah 3:1-4, in the Haftarah to this week’s portion, reads: And he showed me Joshua the high priest standing before the angel of the Lord, and Satan standing at his right hand to accuse him. And the Lord said unto Satan: “… is not this man a brand plucked from the fire?” Now Joshua was…
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News Unintended Violations Of Decorum
My text is Leviticus 23:19, “And for a sin offering you shall sacrifice one male goat.” A sin offering was needed to atone for an unintended violation of ritual practice. Even though it was unintended, such a violation of norms creates a tear, a rip, in the social fabric that has to be repaired by…
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News Who Was the Pharaoh Of the Exodus?
The biblical text doesn’t identify the Pharaoh of the Exodus, no doubt because the text is a timeless story of the journey from slavery to freedom, and what is needed is a generic Pharaoh, not a historical figure. But the story seems set in the Egypt of the New Kingdom period. How can we accommodate…
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News The Enterprise of Walking Naked
What are we to make of the long descriptions of the High Priest’s ceremonial garments in this week’s portion? The garments include a breastplate, a robe, a fringed tunic, a headdress and a sash and an ephod, or long tunic, and each is described in detail. The robe, for example, is to have embroidered pomegranates…
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