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.

This evening we discuss the reassurance Moshe gives to the Jewish People in his last speech to them, that is spite of all the mistakes and failures of the past 40 years, they stand today, together, before God. Rabbi Zeff Leff explains that while as individuals each of us is directly accountable to God, as a Klal, the entity of the Jewish People, which is expressed by "Kulchem" - together, is eternal.

We see this is the narrative of Elisha and the Shunamite woman, who declines the prophets offer of help, as "In the midst of my people I dwell."

Then we analyze the last two Mitzvot of the Torah, Hakhel and writing a Torah, the two ways in which we are promised eternity as a People, collectively and individually.

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.

Our rabbis imagine a remarkable conversation before God creates human beings. Knowing what we would be capable of - cruelty, sin, rebellion, and failure - some of the angels argue that humanity should never be created. God creates us anyway, with the freedom to choose good or evil.

Why? Our rabbis point to Isaiah's description of God's extraordinary patience. Rabbi Jonathan Sacks explains that God gives us another chance, and then another - not because our failures don't matter, but because God refuses to believe that our failures define who we can become.

Rashi finds that same message in the opening words of this week's Parsha, Nitzavim. After forty years filled with sins, rebellions, and terrible mistakes, Moshe tells the Jewish people: Atem Nitzavim Hayom - "You are standing here today." After everything, here you still stand. God has not given up on you.

That is an extraordinary message as we approach Rosh Hashanah. We may look back at promises we didn't keep, changes we didn't make, and mistakes we repeated yet again, and begin to wonder whether we really can become different. But if God still believes we can choose differently, perhaps we should too.

God hasn't given up on us. Why should we?

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.

Sixteen religious Israeli soldiers refused an operational mission in Gaza because a female paramedic would accompany them in their armored vehicle. Their brigade rabbi had permitted it. They refused anyway. The mission was canceled, the soldiers were punished - and prominent religious and political voices defended them.

Daniel Gordis sees something much larger in this incident, and so do I. The Dati Leumi world with which I identify has built something extraordinary: a community deeply committed to Torah that also serves, leads and sacrifices for the State of Israel. But what happens when increasingly extreme voices claim that greater religious stringency makes them more authentically Jewish - even when responsible Halachic authority says otherwise? What happens when extremism starts calling itself Halacha?

The Mishnah and Talmud have a remarkably harsh term for precisely this danger: Chasid Shoteh - a "pious fool." One example is a man who allows a woman to drown rather than compromise his supposed religious standards by saving her. Sometimes what looks like greater piety is actually a betrayal of Torah and its values. And when religious extremism presents itself as authentic Judaism, those committed to Torah cannot afford to remain silent.

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.