For Hashem News Today

From the blog of Stephen S. Carver at The Times of Israel

Parshat Eikev Inspiration: “Not by bread alone does man live, rather by everything that emanates from the mouth of G-d does man live… For Hashem, your God, is bringing you to a good land … a land of wheat, barley, grape, fig, and pomegranate; a land of oil-olives and date-honey; a land where you will eat bread without poverty…” My neighbor’s fig trees are bursting with ripe figs, so I made a figgy bread pudding with date syrup drizzle.

Speechless When a day of glory turns into a day of unspeakable loss, there is only one reaction for the religious Jew In the face of unthinkable tragedy, the Torah relates, “Vayidom Aharon — and Aharon became speechless.” Aharon did not become merely silent, for silence implies that a person has words but chooses not to express them. Vayidom implies becoming mute, meaning that the person has lost the power of speech. The Hebrew word vayidom shares a root with “domeim,” which is an in...