Rabbi Claude's Scribbles

William Shakespeare knew exactly how to crystallize human traits and experiences into timeless sound bites. In Twelfth Night, Act 2, Scene 5, Malvolio reads Maria's letter (believing it to have been written by Olivia's hand): "If this letter falls into your hands, think carefully about what it says. By my birth I rank above you, but don’t be afraid of my greatness. Some are born great, some achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon them...." This quote has been occupying my mind recently. Not because I think of myself as being great (in any of the dimensions described!) I am simply trying to understand how it can apply to the person we are going to meet for the first time in today's Parsha, namely Moses or as we know him - Moshe Rabeinu - Moshe our teacher. The so-called ‘Prince of Egypt’ appears to have ticked all three boxes! Exodus 2: A certain man of the house of Levi went and married a Levite woman. The woman conceived and bore a son; and whe

I recently thumbed through my old primary school report book. Do you remember those? Junior 4 (the final report), when I was 11 years old and seven months. Arithmetic: Beginning to develop some thought but needs much guidance. Geography: A slow worker. Tends to answer without sufficient elaboration. Writing: Letters not well formed. Craft: Average. Is satisfied with rather mediocre results. (Which is my favourite comment so far). Reading: Loves to read and reading aloud, is very expressive. My love of reading was not news to either myself or my parents, for in Infants 2 (when I was seven) my teacher wrote: "In reading, Claude has certainly shown very good progress and now enjoys reading his books". I may have been an 'F' student when it came to woodwork and needlecraft. Maths was never a strong point but from early on I discovered books and as a result the pleasure that emanates from reading them - and I haven't stopped lapping them up! I have been reading a

Last Monday, on the last day of Chanukah, my friend Lenny passed away before he’d reached his fifth decade. Whilst I refer to him as a friend, I didn't really know him that well but one thing I can say unequivocally is that I loved him and what's more, I know that Lenny loved me. Lenny loved everyone. Yehudah Leib ben Shlomo zl was a very special individual. His second name of 'Leib' is Yiddish for 'Lion'. He was literally named the 'Lion of Judah'. Taking this one step further, the word 'Lev' in Hebrew means 'heart' and I couldn't think of a more appropriate moniker to describe him. However, on Shabbat, we are not allowed to give hespedim, eulogies and so in his blessed memory, I would like to respectfully dedicate the following: Genesis 44: בראשית מ״ד:י״ (יח) וַיִּגַּ֨שׁ אֵלָ֜יו יְהוּדָ֗ה... (18) Then Yehudah approached him... These words appear at the very beginning of the Parsha and they are informing us that something extraord

Isn't Chanukah wonderful? We light our Chanukiyot to remind us of the miracle of the oil that lasted for eight days. We eat latkes and donuts to remind us of the miracle of the oil that lasted for eight days (and wonder if the real miracle of Chanukah is the fact that after 2000 years of lining our arteries with cholesterol, we are still around as a living, breathing nation)! We give presents to kids because of that other festival and that's partly why some people give Chanukah gelt, to differentiate it from its gentile neighbour. And we spin a dreidel because?...now that's a very good question! Why do we spin the dreidel? Tradition tells us that the Jews used dreidels when they were suffering under the harsh rule of the Selucids in Ancient Syria led by the evil Antiochus IV known as Epiphanes (which means 'the illustrious one ', a complete misnomer).   As they were forbidden from studying Torah Shel Baal Peh (the Oral Law) they used to keep these spinn

Shabbat Shalom dear friends. I feels wonderful to be back after my recent Covid infection and I would like to take this opportunity to thank you most sincerely on behalf of Stephnie, Benjamin and myself for your thoughtful messages and support during this challenging time for our family. I can't express how touched we were. This has not been an easy week for the rest of the world either. On Sunday, a Hamas terrorist in Jerusalem dressed up as a Charedi man, shot dead a young man, Eli Kay, zl who also happened to be the grandson of Rabbi Shlomo and Lynndy Levin of South Hampstead Shul and the nephew of Rabbis Eli and Baruch Levin, the latter being the Rabbi of Brondesbury Park.   By all accounts, Eli was a very special individual whose love of the land of Israel knew no bounds.   He had been a lone soldier who recently emigrated from South Africa and was on his way to the Kotel, where he was a guide.   He was carrying his tefillin when he was gunned down in cold blood. On that

"We are doing this not for ourselves but for our children and our children’s children, and those who will follow in their footsteps." Queen Elizabeth II - Speech to the COP26 Conference, 1st November 2021.   This week's Parsha has a very special place in my heart as it is my Bar Mitzvah sedra.   My Hebrew birthday was two days ago on 29th Mar-Cheshvan, which also happens that be the same date in October in the Gregorian calendar on which my parents were married…as I explained last week. In addition to its special personal status, I have always considered Toldot to be one of the seminal parshiot in the Torah as it describes in vivid detail the 'succession plan' of our Patriarchs following the death of Avraham at the end of last week's reading. In considering this, the name of the Parsha, ‘Toldot’ as a word is difficult to translate and although I have researched a number of different versions, the one that I was taught and that I have always under

  If I were to ask you to provide a definition of the Torah, how would you describe it? You could say that, on a superficial level, it was a history book.   Perhaps you might think of it as a guide to Jewish law and ritual.   A third idea might point to it being a manual of morality (or the lack of it, as described so vividly in last week’s Parsha when focussing on the men of Sodom).   But could you ever consider it to have elements of being a love story? I’m not necessarily referring to the relationship between our nation and Gd, although there is a deep bond that runs throughout the five books, even if it is sometimes difficult to comprehend why some events took place and whether these could be considered as pertaining to the kind of loving interaction that we can readily understand. But, looking at this week’s Parsha, I can come to no other conclusion other than its key ingredients can be summarised in one single word: Love. Chayei Sarah, literally ‘the life of Sarah’ is a

  Faith is not certainty.   Faith is the courage to live with uncertainty.   (Rabbi Sacks ztl) A few weeks ago, it was a lovely balmy afternoon and we were having a family lunch in our Sukkah.   I was explaining to Olivia, who has just turned four and Alexander, who will be two next month, that the reason we sit in the Sukkah is to remind us of the booths that Gd told us to inhabit when our ancestors were wandering around the desert. She turned to me and asked: "Daud, who is Gd?" I looked worriedly at Grandma Stephnie, hoping to elicit a suitable response, but she stared back, also not quite knowing what to say.   We both paused, took a breath and we both tried to give an explanation about what Gd is and what he does, but to be honest, nobody was any wiser at the end of our respective explanations.   She hadn't asked the 'what' question - that would have been easier - she'd asked the 'who' one! What struck us about the question, which not onl