Rabbi Claude's Scribbles

I’d like you to imagine that you have been miraculously whisked back in time to Egypt and have metamorphosed into a Hebrew slave.  You see no end to your misery.  Unbeknownst to you Moshe Rabbeinu, who you haven’t heard of, has just encountered Gd at the Burning Bush on Mount Horeb hundreds of miles away. After a hard day’s work, you attend a secret meeting along with the Princes of the twelve tribes (the ones we read about in Parashot Bemidbar and Naso).  You are a respected member of the Va’ad (committee) whose aim is to elect a leader that will represent your interests to the Royal Court. In hushed voices (because you don’t want the guards to hear), you formulate a plan to elect a leader.  Designated members of each tribe inscribe the advertisement on clay tablets and these will be passed around the respective Elders.  Soon, nominations will take place to put forward a few candidates from each tribe and through the process, eventually, the person who most impresses the committee

 I love questions! People ask me questions the whole time and there are fewer thrilling experiences than when a member of my community in Staines poses a conundrum to me that I can't readily answer. These are some of my favourite moments. Such a situation occurred last week as we were enjoying a delicious kiddush following the Shabbat morning service. The gentleman was holding a fish ball and I was gradually making my way through a (very naughty) rather large piece of chocolate cream cake when he shared this thought: "Rabbi Claude?" "Yes?" "May I ask you a question?" "Of course. I'll try my best to answer you." "Regarding the spies, what did they do wrong? Why were they punished? They went to the land of Israel and simply reported back what they had seen. They were being honest. Why should they and the rest of their generation end up wandering the desert until they had died out?" Another member of the community p

"Nostalgia isn't what it used to be" Peter De Vries (1959)                                                                           Stephnie has a nickname for me. She calls me an 'old soul' (S-O-U-L not S-O-L-E which would mean something very different) because I have long had a love for music and classic Hollywood films that mostly predate me. Give me a choice of watching the latest 'Fast and Furious' sequel ('X' which came out last month) or an old Humphrey Bogart film and I won't think twice before opting for the latter. Could it be the fact that old movies had something they called 'star quality' in addition to carefully written plots and screenplays that were intricately crafted to tell a story rather than lose their way amongst a myriad of eye-popping special effects? These productions still come to fore every now and again when you have a filmmaker who cares for the artistic merits of his or her film project. However, try