Modern Torah

This episode was recorded in May 2021, and somehow never published. So I'm delivering it now, in November 2021, because the world can never have enough Torah.

I’m not a rabbi, so every week, I look at our Torah portion and try to put it in conversation with the world around me. Judaism is rich in tradition, and each of us deserves the chance to find our own meaning in the text. Whether you’re studying Torah daily, or taking a moment to prepare for Shabbat, I hope you’ll make these ten minutes of Torah part of your week.

You can learn more about me, and my work, on my website – www.nathanjvaughan.com

New episodes weekly, anywhere you get Jewish podcasts.

Subscribe on: Apple | Spotify | Amazon | Google | iHeart

Go deeper with my sources on Sefaria.

This week, as the Torah returns to the theme of counting, in Parshat Bamidbar, the world seems to have more to count than ever—infection rates to be sure, but also global vaccine programs. And if you’re focused on Israel you might be tracking rockets fired from Gaza, interceptions by the Iron Dome. Of course, you might also be tracking Palestinian casualties in Gaza and the West Bank, the number of seconds you have to chuck a teargas canister before the vapors envelope you, and the number of houses demolished by Israel, to make way for new Jewish neighborhoods.

I thought long and hard about whether I wanted to say anything about Israel on this podcast. It’s just so divisive. But I was encouraged by a favorite quote of mine, from Pirkei Avot, attributed to Rabbi Tarphon. 

“You are not obligated to finish the work of repairing the world, but neither are you free to neglect it.”

So here it goes.

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I'm not a rabbi, so every week I look at our Torah portion and try to put it in conversation with the modern world around me. Judaism is rich in tradition, and each of us deserves the chance to find our own meaning in the text. Just remember, like the text itself says, “there’s nothing new under the sun.”

Modern Torah is published every week on Friday mornings, anywhere you get your podcasts. Learn more about me and any of my other podcasts at www.moderntorah.com.

I’m not a rabbi, so every week, I look at our Torah portion and try to put it in conversation with the world around me. Judaism is rich in tradition, and each of us deserves the chance to find our own meaning in the text. Whether you’re studying Torah daily, or taking a moment to prepare for Shabbat, I hope you’ll make these ten minutes of Torah part of your week.

You can learn more about me, and my work, on my website – www.nathanjvaughan.com

New episodes weekly, anywhere you get Jewish podcasts.

Subscribe on: Apple | Spotify | Amazon | Google | iHeart

Go deeper with my sources on Sefaria.

Some weeks it’s hard to wrap my head around the world, and how it seems to perfectly line up with the week’s Torah portion. This week was one of those weeks.

I’ve been reading Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer, in the same week the Torah presented the laws of shmitta in Parshat Behar. The shmitta tradition is all about our cyclical obligation to treat the Earth with integrity, trading the produce of our toil rather than the land itself, and I found it impossible to read both texts in the same week.

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I'm not a rabbi, so every week I look at our Torah portion and try to put it in conversation with the modern world around me. Judaism is rich in tradition, and each of us deserves the chance to find our own meaning in the text. Just remember, like the text itself says, “there’s nothing new under the sun.”

Modern Torah is published every week on Friday mornings, anywhere you get your podcasts. Learn more about me and any of my other podcasts at www.moderntorah.com.

I’m not a rabbi, so every week, I look at our Torah portion and try to put it in conversation with the world around me. Judaism is rich in tradition, and each of us deserves the chance to find our own meaning in the text. Whether you’re studying Torah daily, or taking a moment to prepare for Shabbat, I hope you’ll make these ten minutes of Torah part of your week.

You can learn more about me, and my work, on my website – www.nathanjvaughan.com

New episodes weekly, anywhere you get Jewish podcasts.

Subscribe on: Apple | Spotify | Amazon | Google | iHeart

Go deeper with my sources on Sefaria.

I had a plan this week, to weave the complicated and problematic language we find in the Torah into a metaphor about the ebbs and flows of the Jewish people's eternal fight for social justice. But then I put off writing this for a few days, and I read the news instead, and it became harder and harder to talk about embracing new perspectives, or waiting out the seasonal flows of our fight for social justice, when we seem to eternally stuck in this cycle of violence.

I'm not a rabbi, so every week I look at our Torah portion and try to put it in conversation with the modern world around me. Judaism is rich in tradition, and each of us deserves the chance to find our own meaning in the text. Just remember, like the text itself says, “there’s nothing new under the sun.”

Modern Torah is published every week on Friday mornings, anywhere you get your podcasts. Learn more about me and any of my other podcasts at www.moderntorah.com.

I’m not a rabbi, so every week, I look at our Torah portion and try to put it in conversation with the world around me. Judaism is rich in tradition, and each of us deserves the chance to find our own meaning in the text. Whether you’re studying Torah daily, or taking a moment to prepare for Shabbat, I hope you’ll make these ten minutes of Torah part of your week.

You can learn more about me, and my work, on my website – www.nathanjvaughan.com

New episodes weekly, anywhere you get Jewish podcasts.

Subscribe on: Apple | Spotify | Amazon | Google | iHeart

Go deeper with my sources on Sefaria.

This week has been a full week, and to be honest, I'm shocked that this episode is actually being released. I wrote, recorded, and produced it in a single day, and I'm not even sure if it makes sense, so if you're reading this and you give it a listen, let me know!

This week, the Torah offers another double Torah portion, Achrei Mot & Kedushim, which are both about creating holy community, in different ways. At the beginning of Achrei Mot, and in response to the deaths of Aaron's sons Nadav and Avihu (which we read about earlier in the Torah),  G-d offers a strict set of laws regarding who is, and is not, allowed to approach the Holy of Holies in the Tabernacle, and pull back the curtain which covers its entrance, when, and for what purpose.

It got me thinking this week, especially after my first COVID shot, about the layers of illusion that have to exist to make a society function, and about another curtain that was famously pulled back, by a dog named Toto in a land called Oz.

I'm not a rabbi, so every week I look at our Torah portion and try to put it in conversation with the modern world around me. Judaism is rich in tradition, and each of us deserves the chance to find our own meaning in the text. Just remember, like the text itself says, “there’s nothing new under the sun.”

Learn more about me and any of my other podcasts at www.moderntorah.com.

I’m not a rabbi, so every week, I look at our Torah portion and try to put it in conversation with the world around me. Judaism is rich in tradition, and each of us deserves the chance to find our own meaning in the text. Whether you’re studying Torah daily, or taking a moment to prepare for Shabbat, I hope you’ll make these ten minutes of Torah part of your week.

You can learn more about me, and my work, on my website – www.nathanjvaughan.com

New episodes weekly, anywhere you get Jewish podcasts.

Subscribe on: Apple | Spotify | Amazon | Google | iHeart

Go deeper with my sources on Sefaria.

Recently, the Arkansas legislature overrode their conservative Christian governor's veto of a bill, now state law, that criminalizes gender-affirming healthcare for children. The state government, effectively, has legislated away the ability of compassionate healthcare providers to support trans kids in the Arkansas. It's a dramatic contrast to the Jewish approach, which connects back to this week's Torah portion, Tazria-Metzora, which details the laws of purification for women who have given birth to a male or female child, but gives no instructions for what to do if the physical sex of the baby is indeterminate, a conversation that leads the rabbis to develop a rather sophisticated concept of gender fluidity.

I'm not a rabbi, so every week I look at our Torah portion and try to put it in conversation with the modern world around me. Judaism is rich in tradition, and each of us deserves the chance to find our own meaning in the text. Just remember, like the text itself says, “there’s nothing new under the sun.”

Learn more about me and any of my other podcasts at www.moderntorah.com.

I’m not a rabbi, so every week, I look at our Torah portion and try to put it in conversation with the world around me. Judaism is rich in tradition, and each of us deserves the chance to find our own meaning in the text. Whether you’re studying Torah daily, or taking a moment to prepare for Shabbat, I hope you’ll make these ten minutes of Torah part of your week.

You can learn more about me, and my work, on my website – www.nathanjvaughan.com

New episodes weekly, anywhere you get Jewish podcasts.

Subscribe on: Apple | Spotify | Amazon | Google | iHeart

Go deeper with my sources on Sefaria.

John Prine died a year ago this week, and I wrote this week's episode on the anniversary of his death. This week's Torah portion, Parshat Shmini, features the deaths of Nadav and Avihu who, as Ibn Ezra comments, died before G-d doing something they thought was acceptable before G-d. They had made a mistake and deviated from the instructions G-d gave them. Ibn Ezra's commentary reminded me of John Prine's song That's The Way The World Goes Round and a story he often told about a moment of confusion on stage with a fan in the crowd who wanted him to sing The Happy Enchilada Song.

I'm not a rabbi, so every week I look at our Torah portion and try to put it in conversation with the modern world around me. Judaism is rich in tradition, and each of us deserves the chance to find our own meaning in the text. Just remember, like the text itself says, “there’s nothing new under the sun.”

Learn more about me and any of my other podcasts at www.moderntorah.com.

I’m not a rabbi, so every week, I look at our Torah portion and try to put it in conversation with the world around me. Judaism is rich in tradition, and each of us deserves the chance to find our own meaning in the text. Whether you’re studying Torah daily, or taking a moment to prepare for Shabbat, I hope you’ll make these ten minutes of Torah part of your week.

You can learn more about me, and my work, on my website – www.nathanjvaughan.com

New episodes weekly, anywhere you get Jewish podcasts.

Subscribe on: Apple | Spotify | Amazon | Google | iHeart

Go deeper with my sources on Sefaria.

By the time this episode airs, we'll have already celebrated our second year of socially distanced Seders. Passover is all about seeing yourself as a participant in the exodus from Egypt, and applying that experience to improving our world today. That intention has led to a slew of games, toys, and content designed to make the Seder more approachable and more fun, especially for children.

While there's lots to choose from, for Jews my age there's one piece of content that rises above all the rest—The Rugrat's Passover Special. This year, as we can see the light at the end of the pandemic, and perhaps struggling to feel like we can get there, the story of Grandpa Boris Kropotkin being locked in his attic seemed more relatable than ever.

Chag Pesach Sameach & Shabbat Shalom.

I'm not a rabbi, so every week I look at our Torah portion and try to put it in conversation with the modern world around me. Judaism is rich in tradition, and each of us deserves the chance to find our own meaning in the text. Just remember, like the text itself says, “there’s nothing new under the sun.”

Learn more about me and any of my other podcasts at www.moderntorah.com.

I’m not a rabbi, so every week, I look at our Torah portion and try to put it in conversation with the world around me. Judaism is rich in tradition, and each of us deserves the chance to find our own meaning in the text. Whether you’re studying Torah daily, or taking a moment to prepare for Shabbat, I hope you’ll make these ten minutes of Torah part of your week.

You can learn more about me, and my work, on my website – www.nathanjvaughan.com

New episodes weekly, anywhere you get Jewish podcasts.

Subscribe on: Apple | Spotify | Amazon | Google | iHeart

Go deeper with my sources on Sefaria.

As they wandered  the desert, the Israelites  carried the Tabernacle, and all its holy objects, so they could offer the sacrifices G-d had required of them. The Tabernacle provided a venue for these offerings, as the priests burned some or all of the sacrifices brought to them by the people. 

Fire was an essential component to the Israelites ritual sacrifices, and in this week’s Torah portion, Tzav, G-d commands the Israelite people to build a perpetual fire, never to be put out, under any circumstances. 

I’m not a rabbi, so every week, I look at our Torah portion and try to put it in conversation with the world around me. Judaism is rich in tradition, and each of us deserves the chance to find our own meaning in the text. Whether you’re studying Torah daily, or taking a moment to prepare for Shabbat, I hope you’ll make these ten minutes of Torah part of your week.

You can learn more about me, and my work, on my website – www.nathanjvaughan.com

New episodes weekly, anywhere you get Jewish podcasts.

Subscribe on: Apple | Spotify | Amazon | Google | iHeart

Go deeper with my sources on Sefaria.

This week's Torah portion, Vayikra, kicks off the Book of Leviticus with a familiar feeling theme—G-d calling to Moses and delivering a set of instructions. In this case, G-d delivers detailed instructions for the sacrifices Aaron, his sons, and their priestly descendants will perform on behalf of the Israelite people. These sacrifices are the Israelite's main means of communicating with G-d, but since the destruction of the First and later Second Temples, the Jewish people have been unable to communicate with G-d through sacrifices. So we turned to prayer.

This week though, I'm talking a lot less about Judaism than I normally do, because while the Jewish people turned to prayer and ritual as our primary means of communicating with G-d, other religions have evolved out of Judaism, and created their own means of talking to G-d.

So this week, if you'll indulge me, and in celebration of my 50th episode of Modern Torah, I'm exploring the idea of being called by G-d and searching for a means to respond. In particular, I'm taking hard look at the Puritan Christian theology that has so dramatically affected social policy and culture in the United States. I hope you'll stick with me, and definitely let me know what you think!

I'm not a rabbi, so every week I try to put the Torah in conversation with the modern world around me. Sometimes it's hard, and sometimes it's easy, and I hope it's valuable to you. You can learn more about me and any of my podcasts at my website. 

Modern Torah is published weekly, on Friday mornings, anywhere you get your podcasts.
 
Shabbat Shalom. :)

I’m not a rabbi, so every week, I look at our Torah portion and try to put it in conversation with the world around me. Judaism is rich in tradition, and each of us deserves the chance to find our own meaning in the text. Whether you’re studying Torah daily, or taking a moment to prepare for Shabbat, I hope you’ll make these ten minutes of Torah part of your week.

You can learn more about me, and my work, on my website – www.nathanjvaughan.com

New episodes weekly, anywhere you get Jewish podcasts.

Subscribe on: Apple | Spotify | Amazon | Google | iHeart

Go deeper with my sources on Sefaria.