Jonathan Sacks
ARTICLES BY: Jonathan Sacks
Parshat Beshalach: Rational Explanations for Miracles Don’t Take Away Their Wonders
The splitting of the Red Sea is engraved in Jewish memory. We recite it daily during the morning service, and we speak of it again...
Parshat Bo: The True Meaning of the Plague of Darkness
The ninth plague -- darkness -- comes shrouded in a darkness of its own. What is this plague doing here? It seems out of sequence....
Parshat Vaera: The God Who Acts in History
The Israelites were at their lowest ebb. They had been enslaved. A decree had been issued that every male child was to be killed. Moses...
The Story of Moses — and Why We Must Never Consider All People Our ‘Enemies’
She is one of the most unexpected heroes of the Hebrew Bible. Without her, Moses might not have lived. The whole story of the exodus...
Parshat Vayechi: If We Truly Change, Our Mistakes Can Become Our Merits
The scene that brings the book of Genesis to a close is intensely significant. Joseph’s brothers were terrified that, after the death of their father...
Parshat Vayigash: Does My Father Love Me?
It is one of the great questions we naturally ask each time we read the story of Joseph: Why did he not, at some time...
Parshat Mikketz: Talking to Non-Jews About God
The story of Joseph is one of those rare narratives in the Tanach in which a Jew comes to play a prominent part in a...
Parashat Vayeshev: Refusing Comfort and Keeping Hope
The deception has already taken place. Joseph has been sold into slavery. His brothers dipped his coat in blood. They bring it back to their...
Parshat Vayishlach: Physical Fear and Moral Distress
In this week's parsha, 22 years have passed since Jacob fled his brother, penniless and alone, and since Esau swore revenge for what he saw...
Parshat Vayetse: When the ‘I’ Is Silent
This week’s parsha relates a powerful, primal vision of prayer: Jacob, alone and far from home, lies down for the night, with only stones for a pillow....
Parshat Toldot: The Courage of Persistence
There is a strange passage in the life of Isaac, ominous in its foreshadowing of much of later Jewish history. Like Abraham, Isaac finds himself...
Parshat Chayei Sarah: On Judaism and Islam
The language of the Torah is, in Erich Auerbach’s famous phrase, “fraught with background.” Behind the events that are openly told are shadowy stories left...
Parshat Vayera: Sometimes We Must Put Humans Before God
God appeared to Abraham by the oaks of Mamre, as he sat at the entrance to his tent in the heat of the day. He...
Parshat Lech Lecha: Having the Strength to Move Forward Alone
Within the first words that God addresses to the bearer of a new covenant, there are already hints as to the nature of the heroism...
Women's March Co-Leader Tamika Mallory: Israel Has No Right to Exist 'at the Disposal' of the Palestinians
Donald Trump, the Syrian Kurds -- and 'Never Again'
Malaysia 'Disgusted' by Israel's Condemnation of PM Mohamed's 'Rabid Antisemitism,' Amid Ongoing Row Over Exclusion of Athletes
Father of Israeli Student Murdered in Australia: I Wanted to Be With Her More Time, but Someone Decided I Could Not
Trump Can't Devastate the Turkish Economy Because Bogus US Ally Qatar Will Save Erdogan Yet Again