Michael Carasik

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Oct 4, 2023, 5:49 AM

V’zot ha-Bracha: Reprise

This weekend — in Israel, on Saturday; on the Diaspora schedule, on Sunday — we are reading Parashat V'zot ha-Bracha, the last of the 54 weekly Torah readings, and the only one of the 54 that is not a...

Sep 20, 2023, 5:09 AM

Ha’azinu: Heaven and Earth on the Witness Stand

This week we are reading Deuteronomy 32, a chapter that’s almost entirely composed of a long poem that goes by the name of its first word, הַאֲזִ֥ינוּ. (If you’re scoring at home, ha’azinu is the Hiphil imperative of אזן aleph-z-n, the same...

Sep 6, 2023, 6:54 AM

Nitzavim-Vayelech: Don’t Be Eccentric

This week, another double reading will take us from early in Deuteronomy 29 all the way through the end of chapter 31, as we get closer and closer to the end of the Torah as a whole. There are...

Aug 30, 2023, 5:08 AM

Ki Tavo: Big Trouble

This week’s topic is the Little Credo, vv. 5–10 of Deuteronomy 26, the credo recited ki tavo, “when you enter” the land that your God YHWH is giving you. What happens then? You bring the first fruits of the soil...

Aug 23, 2023, 5:53 PM

Ki Tetze: Commodification

Two weeks ago, we talked about a hapax legomenon, a word that occurs only once in the Bible. You might have thought it would be pretty unlikely we would be talking about another one so soon — and we’re...

Aug 16, 2023, 5:38 AM

Shoftim: Reforming the Ancient Israelite Judicial System

In the summer of 1787, about half a mile from my house in Philadelphia, a group of men got together and wrote the constitution of the United States — or should I say an amazing group of men. When...

Aug 9, 2023, 5:36 AM

Re’eh: A Voluntary Tax

This week’s topic is in Deut 16:10, and it is the word מִסַּ֛ת missat — a hapax legomenon. “Hapax legomenon” (ἅπαξ λεγόμενον) is Hellenistic Greek for a word that is “said once.” It’s a word that is found just once...

Aug 2, 2023, 3:19 AM

Ekev: The Israelite Speaks of Rivers

This week, I’d like to talk about rivers. I’ll start with the conclusions of an article by Yoel Elitzur, originally presented at the 14th World Congress of Jewish Studies in Jerusalem, in 2005. It's an article about the Hebrew words נהר...

Jul 26, 2023, 12:27 AM

Va-etchanan: The Sabbath in Stereo

This week’s reading is the one that contains Moses’ repetition of the Ten Commandments, and I'm going to look at one of the ten, the Sabbath commandment, and compare it with the same commandment as recorded in Exodus 20....

Jul 24, 2023, 11:19 PM

By the Reflecting Pool

After a mini-protest in Washington last week while President Herzog was on his way to speak to Congress, I walked over to the Lincoln Memorial – just past the Reflecting Pool on America's National Mall – and read some...

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About Me

Michael Carasik has a Ph.D. in Bible and the Ancient Near East from Brandeis University and taught for many years at the University of Pennsylvania. He is the creator of the Commentators’ Bible and has been a congregational Torah reader, blogger, and podcaster about the Bible. You can read a longer version of this essay at torahtalk.substack.com and follow Michael's close reading of Genesis at michaelcarasik.substack.com.

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