Insights & Essays

Why should our Jewishness be associated with solemnity, judgment and a growling stomach? Why not with who we really are--the people that dance with a book.

Simchat Torah (“The Joy of the Torah”) is the day when we finish the annual Torah-reading cycle and begin anew. Learn 15 facts that you may not have known!

The sequence of festivals makes sense only once you look beneath the surface. For Simchat Torah, very deeply.

Books are for reading. For understanding. For discussing. Dancing? Really? Does anybody do this?

For seven days of Sukkot, Jews walk around in circles, carrying an assortment of green and yellow flora. Then, on Simchat Torah, they dance in circles carrying Hebrew scrolls, working up to a frenzy.

At times G‑d assumes a posture of justice, and at times He assumes a only posture of kindness.

Why a circle dance? Why move in such a way that you don’t get any further than when you started?

It’s Yom Tov, and scores of Chabad chassidim are leaving the Crown Heights neighborhood of Brooklyn on foot—some walking as far as Queens and Upper Manhattan! No, it’s not some fitness craze. It’s Tahaluchah.

I was wondering, what’s the connection between stuffed cabbage and Simchat Torah? Or is it just something my mom did?

On Yom Kippur, G‑d forgives us. A week and a half later, it is time to celebrate the atonement we've attained, time to rejoice with "the second tablets."

As in a marriage, when the wedding-party is over, the couple's true intimate life begins. Shemini Atzeret is described as the "time of intimacy with the Divine." At this time, we ask for rain - the symbol of intimacy between heaven and earth.

"I love my wife," said Berl. "That's why I do everything she asks me to do. She says, 'Berl, please take out the garbage,' and right away, I take out the garbage." We all agreed that Berl loves his wife.

Why do we celebrate our relationship with the Torah on Simchat Torah, and not on Shavuot, the day we received the Torah?

An essay on why we dance in circles on Simchat Torah, and how this day celebrates—of all things—how Moses shattered the tablets in the aftermath of the Sin of the Golden Calf.

Why celebrate our connection to the Torah more than four months after the date when it was given?

The source for our happiness on Simchat Torah, the center of attention, is of course the Torah. Yet, throughout the entire Hakkafos celebrations, the Torah is never opened...

Do you work in order to holiday, or do you holiday in order to work?

When we lift our feet, committing ourselves to one more good deed, our minds, and the Torah we are holding, are also able to dance...

Seven thought-provoking questions that lead us to uncover deep truths and empowering messages embedded within this holiday.

Before we roll back the Torah to Bereishit, let us reflect for a moment on Moses' final words: "Fortunate are you, O Israel…"

After you build the Holy Temple, take it home with you, allow the holiness to be part of your daily life.

On Simchat Torah, and during the coming year, I won’t be dwelling on hatred. Instead, I will focus my mind and heart on kindness, on unity, and on a renewed sense of Jewish pride

Many old-timers recall the custom for children to carry a candle stuck into an apple on top of a flag.

The earliest known source for specifically going around seven times is Rabbi Yitzchak Luria, the Arizal (1534-1572). But he provides no source.

The table was crowded with people I wouldn’t expect to see at a Chassidic gathering.

The soldier stared at the boy, fighting back tears. "Over these four terrible years, this is the first live Jewish child I have seen..."

It’s hard work nowadays, isn’t it? To turn everything off and just be present with one.

G‑d created many spiritual worlds filled with angels, who have a sophisticated understanding of spirituality. Beneath these spiritual worlds is the physical world, where we human beings exist. We have almost no awareness of G‑dliness at all, but we sustain all of the spiritual worlds with our mitzvahs.

For maximum effect, you need to deal with your 'challenge' from all sides. You need to focus the setting, gather your energy beforehand and then dispense it evenly and deliberately. A sudden spill of forceful energy in one area will never equate to careful attention to all details...