This evening we explore the life-long connection Leonard Cohen had to Yom Kippur, through his music and his writing. We provide a new understanding of the central prayer, Unesaneh Tokef, which for many is frightening and harsh. Partially inspired by Cohen's last interview, we can understand this prayer as expressing the joy of God's loving intimacy, and the control we have to be better.

Michael Whitman is the senior rabbi of ADATH Congregation in Hampstead, Quebec, and an adjunct professor at McGill University Faculty of Law. ADATH is a modern orthodox synagogue community in suburban Montreal, providing Judaism for the next generation. We take great pleasure in welcoming everyone with a warm smile, while sharing inspiration through prayer, study, and friendship.

Rabbi Whitman shares his thoughts and inspirations through online lectures and shiurim, which are available on:

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC5FLcsC6xz5TmkirT1qObkA

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/adathmichael/

Podcast - Mining the Riches of the Parsha:

Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/ca/podcast/mining-the-riches-of-the-parsha/id1479615142?fbclid=IwAR1c6YygRR6pvAKFvEmMGCcs0Y6hpmK8tXzPinbum8drqw2zLIo7c9SR-jc

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/3hWYhCG5GR8zygw4ZNsSmO

Please contact Rabbi Whitman ([email protected]) with any questions or feedback, or to receive a daily email, "Study with Rabbi Whitman Today," with current and past insights for that day, video, and audio, all in one short email sent directly to your inbox.

Moshe ends his life with one of the hardest declarations in the Torah: HaTzur Tamim Po'alo - God's work is perfect. "All His ways are just, a faithful God who does no wrong."

But what happens when what we see makes those words almost impossible to say?

Last night I watched episodes 7 and 8 of Fauda, Season 5, its dramatic recreation of October 7. I was shattered by what I saw. And this morning, Moshe's words are much harder for me to hear.

Judaism does not ask us to pretend otherwise. Abraham challenged God. Moshe challenged God. Jeremiah and Job challenged God. For thousands of years, Jews have refused to surrender the question - even as we have refused to surrender our faith.

Rabbi Jonathan Sacks reminds us that this is one of the remarkable patterns of Jewish history. Again and again, after catastrophe, we have emerged shaken, scarred, limping - and begun again, rededicating ourselves to our mission and our faith.

I cannot reconcile everything I saw last night with HaTzur Tamim Po'alo. I cannot explain how God's ways are perfect when the world can contain such evil.

But perhaps faith does not begin when the contradiction disappears. Perhaps faith is what allows us to live with the contradiction - to question, to protest, to grieve, and still to trust.

This Shabbat we will hear Moshe say that God is perfect and just. After everything we have seen, those words can be terribly hard to say.

But we will.

Michael Whitman is the senior rabbi of ADATH Congregation in Hampstead, Quebec, and an adjunct professor at McGill University Faculty of Law. ADATH is a modern orthodox synagogue community in suburban Montreal, providing Judaism for the next generation. We take great pleasure in welcoming everyone with a warm smile, while sharing inspiration through prayer, study, and friendship.

Rabbi Whitman shares his thoughts and inspirations through online lectures and shiurim, which are available on:

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC5FLcsC6xz5TmkirT1qObkA

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/adathmichael/

Podcast - Mining the Riches of the Parsha:

Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/ca/podcast/mining-the-riches-of-the-parsha/id1479615142?fbclid=IwAR1c6YygRR6pvAKFvEmMGCcs0Y6hpmK8tXzPinbum8drqw2zLIo7c9SR-jc

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/3hWYhCG5GR8zygw4ZNsSmO

Please contact Rabbi Whitman ([email protected]) with any questions or feedback, or to receive a daily email, "Study with Rabbi Whitman Today," with current and past insights for that day, video, and audio, all in one short email sent directly to your inbox.

Hope sounds like something you either have or you don't. But scientists have discovered something remarkable: hope can be defined, measured - and increased.

In a fascinating conversation with Daniel Gordis, oncologist Dr. Benjamin Corn tells two stories that changed the way he understood hope. After more than 30 years practicing and teaching radiation oncology, Corn came to see hope not simply as an emotion or an encouraging word, but as something we can study and deliberately strengthen. And the tools developed through Life's Door are now available to people facing cancer and other profound challenges anywhere in the world.

But there is another part of Corn's story that moves me deeply. He says this work could only have developed as it did after he and his family made Aliyah. Hope is woven into the Israeli experience - so deeply that our national anthem is HaTikvah, "The Hope." At a time when Israel itself faces enormous difficulties, something rooted deeply in its soul is being offered to the world: not simply a message to be hopeful, but practical tools that can help us become more hopeful.

Life's Door: https://lifesdoor.org/

Michael Whitman is the senior rabbi of ADATH Congregation in Hampstead, Quebec, and an adjunct professor at McGill University Faculty of Law. ADATH is a modern orthodox synagogue community in suburban Montreal, providing Judaism for the next generation. We take great pleasure in welcoming everyone with a warm smile, while sharing inspiration through prayer, study, and friendship.

Rabbi Whitman shares his thoughts and inspirations through online lectures and shiurim, which are available on:

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC5FLcsC6xz5TmkirT1qObkA

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/adathmichael/

Podcast - Mining the Riches of the Parsha:

Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/ca/podcast/mining-the-riches-of-the-parsha/id1479615142?fbclid=IwAR1c6YygRR6pvAKFvEmMGCcs0Y6hpmK8tXzPinbum8drqw2zLIo7c9SR-jc

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/3hWYhCG5GR8zygw4ZNsSmO

Please contact Rabbi Whitman ([email protected]) with any questions or feedback, or to receive a daily email, "Study with Rabbi Whitman Today," with current and past insights for that day, video, and audio, all in one short email sent directly to your inbox.

This evening we sharpen the question of why we don't blow Shofar when the first day of Rosh Hashanah is Shabbat (like this year), adding to the difficulty in three levels. Then we present an approach based on the novel "Paradise" by Toni Morrison. The motto, "Beware the Furrow of His Brow" is what we refer to as proclaiming God as Melech, the sovereign whose laws must be fulfilled, while taking no chance for a mistake. According to Rabbi Meilech Biderman, the Tifrach bus driver learned this lesson the hard way. May the merit of our not blowing Shofar this Shabbat, stand in our stead for a happy, healthy, and sweet New Year.

Michael Whitman is the senior rabbi of ADATH Congregation in Hampstead, Quebec, and an adjunct professor at McGill University Faculty of Law. ADATH is a modern orthodox synagogue community in suburban Montreal, providing Judaism for the next generation. We take great pleasure in welcoming everyone with a warm smile, while sharing inspiration through prayer, study, and friendship.

Rabbi Whitman shares his thoughts and inspirations through online lectures and shiurim, which are available on:

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC5FLcsC6xz5TmkirT1qObkA

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/adathmichael/

Podcast - Mining the Riches of the Parsha:

Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/ca/podcast/mining-the-riches-of-the-parsha/id1479615142?fbclid=IwAR1c6YygRR6pvAKFvEmMGCcs0Y6hpmK8tXzPinbum8drqw2zLIo7c9SR-jc

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/3hWYhCG5GR8zygw4ZNsSmO

Please contact Rabbi Whitman ([email protected]) with any questions or feedback, or to receive a daily email, "Study with Rabbi Whitman Today," with current and past insights for that day, video, and audio, all in one short email sent directly to your inbox.

Rosh Hashanah asks us to have some difficult conversations with God - about accountability, expectations, disappointments, and the people we hope to become in the year ahead.

But Judaism doesn't send us into those conversations cold. First comes Ellul.

The letters of Ellul are famously understood as an acronym for Ani L'Dodi V'Dodi Li - "I am my beloved's, and my beloved is mine." Before Rosh Hashanah confronts us with judgment and accountability, Ellul gives us an entire month to establish something more fundamental: God loves us.

That changes how everything that follows is heard. Accountability within a loving relationship is different from judgment delivered at a distance. The difficult conversations of Rosh Hashanah are not evidence that God has rejected us. They take place precisely because the relationship matters.

And perhaps that is a model for every relationship that matters to us. Before telling someone what disappointed you, what needs to change, or what you hope for from them, make sure they know something first: I love you. Then the difficult conversation can be heard for what it is - not a threat to the relationship, but an expression of how much the relationship matters.

As 5786 comes to a close, I have deep gratitude for each of you who gives me the privilege of studying together. I wish you, your family, and our entire community a New Year of good health, security, spiritual growth, and blessing.

Shana Tova!

Michael Whitman is the senior rabbi of ADATH Congregation in Hampstead, Quebec, and an adjunct professor at McGill University Faculty of Law. ADATH is a modern orthodox synagogue community in suburban Montreal, providing Judaism for the next generation. We take great pleasure in welcoming everyone with a warm smile, while sharing inspiration through prayer, study, and friendship.

Rabbi Whitman shares his thoughts and inspirations through online lectures and shiurim, which are available on:

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC5FLcsC6xz5TmkirT1qObkA

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/adathmichael/

Podcast - Mining the Riches of the Parsha:

Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/ca/podcast/mining-the-riches-of-the-parsha/id1479615142?fbclid=IwAR1c6YygRR6pvAKFvEmMGCcs0Y6hpmK8tXzPinbum8drqw2zLIo7c9SR-jc

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/3hWYhCG5GR8zygw4ZNsSmO

Please contact Rabbi Whitman ([email protected]) with any questions or feedback, or to receive a daily email, "Study with Rabbi Whitman Today," with current and past insights for that day, video, and audio, all in one short email sent directly to your inbox.

Why do we still fast over the assassination of Gedalyah more than 2,500 years later? After the Babylonian destruction of Jerusalem and the exile of most of the Jewish People, Gedalyah was appointed governor over the small Jewish population that remained in the Land of Israel. His murder by another Jew was not only a political assassination - its aftermath led to the collapse of that remaining Jewish community and an even more complete rupture between the Jewish People and their Land.

But Gedalyah had been warned that someone intended to kill him. He refused to believe the accusation - and failed to protect himself. Our Sages derive from this tragedy a remarkably subtle principle: when we hear something damaging about another person, we should not accept it as true. But we should take seriously the possibility that it might be true and take reasonable precautions.

Rabbi Yisroel Reisman illustrates the other side of this principle with a wonderful story about two women and a box of cookies - and the anguish caused by assuming we know something that we really don't. Tzom Gedalyah teaches us to hold two difficult ideas at once: don't rush to judge another person, but don't ignore a warning either. We can protect ourselves without condemning someone before we know the truth.

Michael Whitman is the senior rabbi of ADATH Congregation in Hampstead, Quebec, and an adjunct professor at McGill University Faculty of Law. ADATH is a modern orthodox synagogue community in suburban Montreal, providing Judaism for the next generation. We take great pleasure in welcoming everyone with a warm smile, while sharing inspiration through prayer, study, and friendship.

Rabbi Whitman shares his thoughts and inspirations through online lectures and shiurim, which are available on:

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC5FLcsC6xz5TmkirT1qObkA

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/adathmichael/

Podcast - Mining the Riches of the Parsha:

Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/ca/podcast/mining-the-riches-of-the-parsha/id1479615142?fbclid=IwAR1c6YygRR6pvAKFvEmMGCcs0Y6hpmK8tXzPinbum8drqw2zLIo7c9SR-jc

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/3hWYhCG5GR8zygw4ZNsSmO

Please contact Rabbi Whitman ([email protected]) with any questions or feedback, or to receive a daily email, "Study with Rabbi Whitman Today," with current and past insights for that day, video, and audio, all in one short email sent directly to your inbox.

On Rosh Hashanah, we go to a body of flowing water and recite the words of the prophet Michah, asking God to cast our sins into the depths of the sea. What exactly are we asking God to do? Surely we cannot simply throw away what we have done.

The Torah reading for the first day of Rosh Hashanah offers an answer. In the story of Hagar and Yishmael, Rashi highlights the principle of Ba'asher Hu Sham - God judges a person as he is now, in this moment. Our past matters. We remain accountable for our sins and mistakes, and Teshuvah requires us to confront and correct them. But what we have done need not become who we are.

That is the extraordinary possibility embodied by Tashlich. Teshuvah is not pretending I didn't do it. Teshuvah is refusing to believe that because I did it, I must always be that person. Our sins can be cast away. They need not define us forever.

Michael Whitman is the senior rabbi of ADATH Congregation in Hampstead, Quebec, and an adjunct professor at McGill University Faculty of Law. ADATH is a modern orthodox synagogue community in suburban Montreal, providing Judaism for the next generation. We take great pleasure in welcoming everyone with a warm smile, while sharing inspiration through prayer, study, and friendship.

Rabbi Whitman shares his thoughts and inspirations through online lectures and shiurim, which are available on:

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC5FLcsC6xz5TmkirT1qObkA

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/adathmichael/

Podcast - Mining the Riches of the Parsha:

Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/ca/podcast/mining-the-riches-of-the-parsha/id1479615142?fbclid=IwAR1c6YygRR6pvAKFvEmMGCcs0Y6hpmK8tXzPinbum8drqw2zLIo7c9SR-jc

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/3hWYhCG5GR8zygw4ZNsSmO

Please contact Rabbi Whitman ([email protected]) with any questions or feedback, or to receive a daily email, "Study with Rabbi Whitman Today," with current and past insights for that day, video, and audio, all in one short email sent directly to your inbox.

Prayer doesn't always have to sound like what we think prayer is supposed to sound like.

I wish I prayed more often in my own words - informally, intimately, directly to God, saying what I actually think and feel. Three very different writers help me imagine what that might sound like: Rainer Maria Rilke, wondering not only what we need from God but what we might offer God; Regina Spektor, speaking to God with both intimacy and struggle; and Hanna Yerushalmi, expressing the extraordinary feeling of being personally known and cherished by God.

As we approach the High Holidays and enter some of the most ancient and structured prayers of the Jewish year, perhaps these very different voices can help us find our own voice within those prayers - and outside them. The words don't always have to sound like prayer. They have to allow us to speak to God personally, intimately, and genuinely.

Thanks to my beloved, creative, spectacular cousin, Judy Katz, for inspiring this.

Michael Whitman is the senior rabbi of ADATH Congregation in Hampstead, Quebec, and an adjunct professor at McGill University Faculty of Law. ADATH is a modern orthodox synagogue community in suburban Montreal, providing Judaism for the next generation. We take great pleasure in welcoming everyone with a warm smile, while sharing inspiration through prayer, study, and friendship.

Rabbi Whitman shares his thoughts and inspirations through online lectures and shiurim, which are available on:

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC5FLcsC6xz5TmkirT1qObkA

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/adathmichael/

Podcast - Mining the Riches of the Parsha:

Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/ca/podcast/mining-the-riches-of-the-parsha/id1479615142?fbclid=IwAR1c6YygRR6pvAKFvEmMGCcs0Y6hpmK8tXzPinbum8drqw2zLIo7c9SR-jc

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/3hWYhCG5GR8zygw4ZNsSmO

Please contact Rabbi Whitman ([email protected]) with any questions or feedback, or to receive a daily email, "Study with Rabbi Whitman Today," with current and past insights for that day, video, and audio, all in one short email sent directly to your inbox.

We shouldn't walk into something holy unprepared. And we certainly shouldn't walk into Rosh Hashanah cold.

Selichot is our preparation. At its heart is an astonishing passage in the Talmud: God promises to forgive the Jewish People when they do this prayer - the 13 Attributes of Mercy. The beautiful Piyutim of Selichot surround and lead us repeatedly back to these words, placing God's mercy, compassion, and forgiveness at the center of our preparation.

But remarkably, we cannot do this alone. The 13 Attributes require a minyan. Sivan Rahav Meir points to the tens of thousands of Jews of every kind who gather at midnight at the Kotel for Selichot - perhaps the greatest expression of Jewish unity in the world today. We prepare personally for Rosh Hashanah, but we approach God's mercy together.

Rabbi Shlomo Aviner reminds us of the Zohar's teaching that holiness requires preparation. Selichot gives us that opportunity now, before we stand before God on Rosh Hashanah.

Don't walk in cold.

Take a deep breath - and fill your lungs with holiness.

Michael Whitman is the senior rabbi of ADATH Congregation in Hampstead, Quebec, and an adjunct professor at McGill University Faculty of Law. ADATH is a modern orthodox synagogue community in suburban Montreal, providing Judaism for the next generation. We take great pleasure in welcoming everyone with a warm smile, while sharing inspiration through prayer, study, and friendship.

Rabbi Whitman shares his thoughts and inspirations through online lectures and shiurim, which are available on:

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC5FLcsC6xz5TmkirT1qObkA

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/adathmichael/

Podcast - Mining the Riches of the Parsha:

Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/ca/podcast/mining-the-riches-of-the-parsha/id1479615142?fbclid=IwAR1c6YygRR6pvAKFvEmMGCcs0Y6hpmK8tXzPinbum8drqw2zLIo7c9SR-jc

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/3hWYhCG5GR8zygw4ZNsSmO

Please contact Rabbi Whitman ([email protected]) with any questions or feedback, or to receive a daily email, "Study with Rabbi Whitman Today," with current and past insights for that day, video, and audio, all in one short email sent directly to your inbox.

Selichot can be studied. We can examine their words, their structure, and the Biblical events on which they draw. And we will.

But before we study Selichot, I think we need to feel them. Beginning Saturday night, we enter a different kind of prayer - more vulnerable, more urgent, more deeply pleading for God's mercy, compassion, and forgiveness. Understanding the words matters. But we also need to enter the emotional and spiritual world those words are trying to create.

For me, Eitan Katz's singing of "L'Maancha" does exactly that. In just two lines from Selichot, I hear the essence of what we are reaching for throughout this entire High Holiday season. So today I offer a brief introduction - and then Eitan Katz's beautiful performance - as a way to prepare ourselves not merely to say Selichot, but to enter Selichot.

Michael Whitman is the senior rabbi of ADATH Congregation in Hampstead, Quebec, and an adjunct professor at McGill University Faculty of Law. ADATH is a modern orthodox synagogue community in suburban Montreal, providing Judaism for the next generation. We take great pleasure in welcoming everyone with a warm smile, while sharing inspiration through prayer, study, and friendship.

Rabbi Whitman shares his thoughts and inspirations through online lectures and shiurim, which are available on:

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC5FLcsC6xz5TmkirT1qObkA

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/adathmichael/

Podcast - Mining the Riches of the Parsha:

Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/ca/podcast/mining-the-riches-of-the-parsha/id1479615142?fbclid=IwAR1c6YygRR6pvAKFvEmMGCcs0Y6hpmK8tXzPinbum8drqw2zLIo7c9SR-jc

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/3hWYhCG5GR8zygw4ZNsSmO

Please contact Rabbi Whitman ([email protected]) with any questions or feedback, or to receive a daily email, "Study with Rabbi Whitman Today," with current and past insights for that day, video, and audio, all in one short email sent directly to your inbox.