Rabbi Cohen’s Writings

Dear Friends, This week’s Torah portion, Vayigash, marks the moment when Joseph finally reveals himself to his brothers. It is a profound turning point in the moral development of one of the Torah’s most complicated and often overlooked figures: Judah. Judah was hardly a paradigm of moral courage [...]

Dear Friends, One of the quiet truths of Hanukkah is that its beauty comes from fragility. A candle is not powerful because it lasts forever but because it doesn’t. We light it anyway and enjoy it for however long we can. This year, Raina and I opened a box [...]

Dear Friends, For reasons I’ll explain shortly, I’ve been thinking about one particular aspect of the upcoming Hanukkah festival more than usual this year—the latke. As is so often the case in Jewish life, it is the food—the smells and the tastes—that evoke memories of holidays long past. [...]

Dear Friends, Back in rabbinic school one of my teachers described his approach to Jewish ritual in a way that has stayed with me ever since. There were, he said, the practices he observed and then there were the practices he did not observe… yet. He pictured the [...]