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In tractate Kiddushin, the Babylonian Talmud discusses five things that parents are obligated to do for their children. These include two rituals requirements (to perform the rites of circumcision the traditional redemption ritual for first born boys), one moral education requirement (specifically, to teach children Torah), and two steps to prepare children for a successful life (to find them a spouse, and to teach them a trade). There exists, however, a divergent voice in the Talmud which interjects and adds to this list: A sixth obligation, according to this source, is to teach children to swim…

The 22nd chapter of Deuteronomy contains a commandment that is very brief, but that has been discussed at great length by Jewish commentators. Verses 6 and 7 of this chapter read: If you come across a bird’s nest beside the road, either in a tree or on the ground, and the mother is sitting on the young or on the eggs, do not take the mother with the young. You may take the young, but be sure to let the mother go, so that it may go well with you and you may have a long life. This mitzvah (which comes to be known as shiluach ha-ken, ‘the sending off of the nest’) represents one of the more important statements of Jewish ethics in the Torah.

The Talmud records this discussion:

“[One’s teacher]—this means a teacher who taught him wisdom, but not the teacher who taught him Scripture or Mishnah”—these are the words of Rabbi Meir. Rabbi Judah says: “Anyone from whom most of a person’s teaching comes [counts as his teacher.]” Rabbi Yosi says: “Even if a teacher only enlightened a student’s eyes with a single teaching, he counts as his teacher.”

Read on to learn more about what exactly it meant.

The Education Committee has decided to radically re-imagine how we run Temple Beth Or’s religious school; starting in the fall, we will be transforming our school to reflect this. In many ways, the model to which we are shifting is more camp-like, especially in that we are working hard to integrate activity and discussion into our students’ educational experience.

Even as Reform Jews define themselves in a vastly different fashion than Jews of earlier generations and different times (those who may have had compunction engaging openly in non-Jewish celebrations), we still work to discern when certain practices or behaviors might be beyond the pale. In particular, even in Reform Jewish dialogue, we still occasionally have lively disagreement about whether some non-Jewish customs or celebrations should be permitted…

Pirkei Avot, a well-known collection of rabbinic sayings, teaches us: “Who is rich? He who is happy with what he has.” Why then—I wonder—did I feel compelled to buy a Powerball ticket when the jackpot reached a tantalizing 1.5 billion dollars? By doing so, was I suggesting that I was not satisfied with what was mine? Was I, in buying a lottery ticket, showing that I am truly at odds with the ethos of Judaism?

Believe it or not, in the ancient world, there were people who considered sleep a fraught activity. In the Babylonian Talmud, the ancient rabbis state that ‘sleep is like one-sixtieth of death.’  However, while the rabbis might have considered sleep dangerous, they also saw in it important potential…