One, two, three, four days; we bridge the Exodus to the revelation at Sinai by marking time's passage, seven time seven weeks, and all this is rooted in the harvest and its special sacrifices of barley on Pesach and wheat on Shavuos. How?

This mitzvah takes us back to the beginning of time, to Bereishis. Adam sinned and was sentenced to a life of backbreaking labor in the field. Such a life, long as it may be, is likened to just one day that ends with death: fleeting, ephemeral, and devoid of meaning. If he won’t learn to count his days, man will never find his way back to the Tree of Life.

Like Adam all people. The holiday that celebrates freedom from slavery is followed immediately by the harvest season, and with it the grave danger of never-ending work; counting the days protects from this hazard and leads to receiving the Torah, the true Tree of Life.  

For this episode's sources, click here

Please take a moment to subscribe and leave a review on Apple Podcasts. Thanks for listening!

You can email Rabbi Burton with questions or comments at [email protected]

Why does Hashem test people? Isn’t the outcome known to Him in advance?

One of the “greatest problems in the Torah” according to the Rambam, the idea of trials is given various explanations by the great Jewish thinkers. But all the reasons only serve to justify an imperfect relationship between man and the Divine, for omniscient God indeed has no need for trials; they only have a function within a world controlled through divine beings who lack perfect knowledge – the angels.

For this episode's sources, click here

Please take a moment to subscribe and leave a review on Apple Podcasts. Thanks for listening!

You can email Rabbi Burton with questions or comments at [email protected]

Many people think of the Second Temple as a replay of the first: the Jewish nation returned to the holy land to rebuild the great house of worship and revelation. But it was nothing of the sort. In that pivotal era, prophecy ceased, the divine presence did not return to its sanctuary, and the period of the Oral Law began.

All this, Chazal hint, is linked to the ascendancy of the Greek Empire. The development of Greek wisdom marked a broad shift in the focus of human consciousness. Even the way that God makes Himself known changed: prophetic image was replaced with intellect and revelation with deduction, and man became creator of divine law. 

For this episode's sources, click here

Please take a moment to subscribe and leave a review on Apple Podcasts. Thanks for listening!

You can email Rabbi Burton with questions or comments at [email protected]

The story of man eating from the Tree of Knowledge is the fundamental, foundational story of mankind, of humanity’s capacity for perfection or failure. It is the key for us to understand ourselves – but what does it mean? What would man be without knowing good and evil, and how does this knowledge lead to his downfall?

In the Rambam’s understanding, the crux of matter is the quality of man’s intellect. Instead of making decisions based on the value judgment of knowing good from evil, man could and should make decisions based on discerning truth from falsehood: through intellect alone. This faculty is represented by the Tree of Life, for truth and intellect are eternal. Man's eternal perfection depends on perfecting pure intellect; to the extent that he does not, he is merely another mortal animal. 

This profound idea lies at the heart of the Rambam's whole system of philosophy. 

For this episode's sources, click here

Please take a moment to subscribe and leave a review on Apple Podcasts. Thanks for listening!

You can email Rabbi Burton with questions or comments at [email protected]

Evil – what is it? Where does it come from? Is it real? Will it last forever?

The Rambam and the Mekubalim teach diametrically opposed approaches to the ancient problem of evil in a good God's world. According to Rambam, evil has no real existence, being merely the lack of good. God's creation is absolutely good – although we don't always understand its goodness – and much of the evils we face are man-made. In this optimistic philosophy all of us, here and now, partake fully of Hashem's goodness in His perfect world.

In contrast, the Mekubalim teach that evil is real, indeed very important. There is a metaphysical reality to this force that opposes good – but only for the time being; our mission is to overcome and overpower it and thereby perfect a currently imperfect world.

For this episode's sources, click here

Please take a moment to subscribe and leave a review on Apple Podcasts. Thanks for listening!

You can email Rabbi Burton with questions or comments at [email protected]

Why is Shabbos so central to the Torah? What is signified by abstaining from work?

This simple practice contains the most profound declaration of faith and, Chazal teach, purifies its observers from all sin. Rooted in the creation story and man's original, root transgression of knowing evil along with good, Shabbos proclaims the pure goodness and faultlessness of God's universe – work is unnecessary in a perfect world; by recognizing this perfection, man repudiates evil and commits himself to the service of the good.

All this and more is alluded to in the psalm that ushers in the holiness of Shabbos, the "song for the Shabbos day."

For this episode's sources, click here

Please take a moment to subscribe and leave a review on Apple Podcasts. Thanks for listening!

You can email Rabbi Burton with questions or comments at [email protected]

Why is the mitzvah of matzah so important? How could a food be so fundamental to redemption and its remembrance? 

The story of Avraham, Lot and Sodom allude to the secrets of this simple bread. Sodom, like Mitzrayim, was economically secure, supplied with water from a river, while the land of Israel depends on rain, Hashem's heavenly blessing liable to be withheld if not earned by doing His will. The bread of Mitzrayim is the food of pride and insolence: economic security engenders haughtiness, root of all Sodom's evil, while the bread of affliction is the food of Hashem's land, reminding us of the ever-present possibility of hunger if we lose Hashem's favor. 

To eat and be aware that all sustenance is a heavenly gift that can be denied – that is central to our relationship with Hashem and characteristic of His holy land, and also at the heart of Sh'ma and Tefillin.

For this episode's sources, click here

Please take a moment to subscribe and leave a review on Apple Podcasts. Thanks for listening!

You can email Rabbi Burton with questions or comments at [email protected]

The significance of The Resurrection is a matter of dispute: according to Rambam, it merely serves as the greatest miracle – the dead will come back to life, live and die again, while perfect, eternal reward is purely spiritual; according to the Mekubalim, resurrection is the ultimate and everlasting reward. This dispute is rooted in a fundamental debate about physicality: Rambam maintains that only spiritual and intellectual perfection are truly ideal; the Mekubalim teach that the ideal reality is one of bodily and physical perfection, for eternity.

For this episode's sources, click here

Please take a moment to subscribe and leave a review on Apple Podcasts. Thanks for listening!

You can email Rabbi Burton with questions or comments at [email protected]

Why do bad things happen to good people?

This ancient question about how to make sense of all the senselessness is dealt with cryptically by Chazal, who put it at the heart of the human condition. Our lived experience is comprised alternatively of understanding Hashem and not understanding Him; these are two paths of life, two types of relationship with the Master of the Universe who is sometimes revealed and sometimes hidden, and these paths themselves are contingent on two forms of worship – the path of complete righteousness and the path of repentance.

For this episode's sources, click here

Please take a moment to subscribe and leave a review on Apple Podcasts. Thanks for listening!

You can email Rabbi Burton with questions or comments at [email protected]

Two problems trouble people regarding prayer: first, how does it work (can our opinions influence God?), and second – but it doesn't! Of course, if you can't answer the first problem, you can't begin to solve the second; understanding how prayer works is the key to making it work.

Explore what the great Torah thinkers taught about this central practice called the "worship of the mind." Prayer, they tell us, is rooted in an understanding of Hashem and His ways. We contemplate Hashem and His actions, and articulate how He would act according to our conception. This meditation is the foundation of our relationship with Him; to the extent that He desires to relate with us, our words of prayer define the framework of that relationship and, when they are accepted and fulfilled, enable us to discern Him through His actions, further strengthening our relationship.

For this episode's sources, click here

Please take a moment to subscribe and leave a review on Apple Podcasts. Thanks for listening!

You can email Rabbi Burton with questions or comments at [email protected]