Sublime

In the aftermath of this attack, Ariel Sharon decided to respond, and shortly thereafter, Israel launched Operation Defensive Shield.

In an age of death and destruction, Rabbi Yohanan taught that a fundamental religious response was to increase loving-kindness and multiply life itself.

God’s larger dream: a world in which human dignity is real, and the presence of God is manifest.

Ironically, as a result of its victory in 1967, the Jewish state now had a new and increasingly potent enemy that was going to…

Some highlights have been hidden or truncated due to export limits.

What is wrong in Jewish life today is that we have forgotten Zis gut zu zein a Yid, “It’s good to be a Jew.”

Preferably, I thought, Israel should have unilaterally applied the Bush-Sharon letter, building only within those areas we could keep in any peace deal—Jewish Jerusalem and the settlement blocs—and signaling our seriousness about creating a viable West Bank Palestinian state.

Rabbi Irving “Yitz” Greenberg, all human beings are endowed with three “intrinsic dignities”: infinite worth, equality, and uniqueness.10

they sensed, without Sinai at the core, without a unique and particular Jewish message rooted in classic Jewish writings, Jewish statehood and sovereignty would be rendered meaningless.

Without the dream it hardly seems worth living as a Jew. With it, everyday unredeemed life hardly seems worth living at all.