Torah Viewpoints

In “ Of Man and Earth ,” we learned that Adam’s first role upon his creation was to work and guard the Garden of Eden:  The Lord God took the man, and He placed him in the Garden of Eden to work it [לעבדה] and to guard it [לשמרה]. Beresheet 2:15 God told Adam not to eat from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. In turn, Adam told Hava not only to abstain from eating from the tree, but also not to touch the tree, lest she die. We learn this by observing Hava’s response to t

During the Corona lockdowns in 2020, I found myself, like many others, dabbling in a small garden. It was nothing much - just a few pots and some seeds on the small patio outside of my apartment. The street just past the bushes surrounding our corner apartment smelled like exhaust and looked like any other ugly, gray suburban street in a middle-class neighborhood: small restaurants and stores in an old strip mall, a gas station across the street, and covert drug deals and dru

For You tested us, Oh God; You refined us as though refining silver. Tehillim/Psalms 66:10 For the past several years, I’ve observed that...