Not Bound by Victimhood
Parashat Re’eh – Gainesville In 1981, I was in my last year of college in Toronto and, out of the blue, appeared a 20 year-old who galvanized the entire country. His name was Terry Fox and he had developed an osteosarcoma in his leg with then needed to be amputated. Out of his experience he…
MORAL BEAUTY
PARSHAT EKEIV – GAINESVILLE One of the interesting ways of reading the Bible is trying to figure out the meanings of words. It’s not always so easy. For instance, the word Shalom is one that everyone knows. We all know it means ‘peace.’ But what, exactly, does that mean? If you look at the Russian…
Lifne Mshurat HaDin – Torah is So Much More
Parashat Vaetchanan – Gainesville Some years ago, a colleague of Stella’s did something totally human: she tripped at her front door. When she came to the Orthodox Jewish day school she was teaching at, the rabbis asked her what happened and in a flash they came to her house to inspect….not the bottom of the…
Varuka Salt Will Never Be a Builder
Parashat Devarim – Gainesville Let’s go back to near the book of Numbers and play a little Columbo episode. Remember the story of the spies that Moses sent into the Land of Israel? Well, in our parasha this week, Moses recalls that episode. But when we put on our detective Columbo eyes, we see some…
Let Them Eat Brioche is Not a Negotiation
Parashat Mattot-Maseh 2025Rabbi Cy Stanway – Shir Shalom – Gainesville Florida Mattot: Let them Eat Brioche is not a NegotiationJuly 25 – GainesvilleRabbi Cy Stanway You all know the expression; two Jews, three opinions. It usually elicits a chuckle because we know its true. Jews seem to occupy something of a Twilight Zone in their…
Balak – God Laughs
Rabbi Cy StanwayShir Shalom – GainesvilleJuly 11, 2025 There is an old saying that what makes God laugh is seeing our plans for the future or, as John Lennon once said, ‘Life is what happens while you are making other plans.’ It might be more accurate to say, rather, that what makes God really laugh…
Parashat Chukat
No More Hiding… GAINESVILLE – JULY 4 2025 When I was at camp many years ago, one of the standard exercises we used to do was the now familiar ‘are you a Jewish American or an American Jew’? Disregarding the fact that I was Canadian, it was an interesting exercise. Of course, to this day,…
Korach’s Foible
Dvar for June 25 Korach The Torah portion this week is one of the most confusing in the entire Torah. Its words are clear and the narrative is straightforward. So what’s the problem? First, let’s go over the text a bit. Korach is a priest and, as a priest, is already in a privileged position in the…
The Strangest Rosh Hashanna: Rosh Hashanna Morning 2020/5781
As you may know, I try to find Jewish content and Jewish meaning in everything. There always seems to be a Jewish moment in even the most secular of things. I have found Jewish moments in baseball. After all, what is the whole point of baseball except finding your way back home? And isn’t that…
Beautiful Brokenness
Yom Kippur Morning 2023 Rabbi Cy Stanway I want to share a true story[1] with you: In 1975, in Cologne, Germany, there was an ambitious high school student who loved jazz music when no one else around here seemed to have any interest. And so at 16 she basically became a concert promoter, and she got…
