Shavuot 5762 - May 16, 2002
Editor's note:
What is the Torah? An ambitious question, no doubt, but when to ask it if not on the week that we celebrate the festival of Shavuot, marking the 3,314th anniversary of the Giving of the Torah at Mount Sinai?
This week's issue of Chabad.org Magazine includes 40 attempts to answer that question: we look at the relationship between the Torah and G‑d, Torah and reality, Torah and science, Torah and history, Torah and anthropology, Torah and physics, Torah and literature, Torah and time, Torah and Jewish identity, Torah and language, Torah and love, Torah and logic, Torah and music, Torah and couture, Torah and nirvana, Torah and mountain-climbing (why did it have to be on top of a mountain?), Torah and geography, Torah and personal property, Torah and calligraphy, Torah and biblical criticism, Torah and political correctness, Torah and religion (what does that word mean, anyway?), Torah and freedom of choice, Torah and relationships, Torah and marriage, Torah as law, Torah as truth, Torah and world peace, a series on the Ten Commandments --
Plus stories from cyber-heaven, the Soviet gulag, the American Midwest, the icy sidewalks of Brooklyn, and a pre-historic fantasy...
Whether you relate to perspective #13 or #31, we hope you'll find something here to make your experience of the festival more meaningful. In the words of the traditional Chassidic Shavuot blessing, "May you merit to receive the Torah with joy and inner harmony!"
40 essays, stories, meditations and readings, each offering a glimpse into something the Torah says about itself and its place in our lives
Who are the Jews, what it means to be "chosen", the revelation at Sinai, the Ten Commandments, and the three pilgrimage festivals
The world gets dry statistics about the number who died. But numbers don't tell stories. Numbers don't say what it's like to prepare a meal for one, to do laundry for one, when yesterday you had a husband and two teenaged children
Monotheism is a dangerous belief. Perhaps one of the most dangerous beliefs there is. For monotheism to enter the world safely, it must be married to a deeper belief…
"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!"
Everyone has a right to an opinion. It is inevitable, however, that certain opinions will carry more weight than others.
Sages and mystics explore the primordial "mind" of G-d to ask: Is it the Torah that makes the Jew a Jew, or is it the Jew who makes the Torah a Torah?
It’s G-d’s world. Everything He gives is good, the sweetest good.
But it is often a good far too great for us to understand. We imagine it is not good, because that’s the only way to make sense of it with our small minds.
Yet the truth is, He gives us all the good we can handle. If we could take more, He would g...
