Jonathan Sacks

Before any of the deaths are mentioned we read about the strange ritual of the red heifer, which purified people who had been in contact with death – the archetypal source of impurity. That ritual, often deemed incomprehensible, is in fact deeply symbolic...

Moses sent twelve men to spy out the land. The men were leaders, princes of their tribes, people of distinction. Yet ten of them came back with a demoralising report.

After all that had happened – the miracles, the exodus, the division of the sea, food from heaven, water from a rock, the revelation at Sinai and the covenant that went with it – the people, yet again, were complaining about the food. And not because they...

Make those you meet feel important, especially the people whom others tend to take for granted.

The Torah, with great realism, is telling us something counterintuitive and of great significance: The journey from is always easier than the journey to.

Think of what you posses not as something you own but as something you hold in trust for the benefit, not only of you and your family, but also of others.

What did Jacob add to the Jewish experience?

We live life looking forward but we understand it only by looking back.

A reasonable case could be made that Joseph was the first economist. But why the predominance of Jews in economics in the modern age?

Abraham was chosen to be a parental role model. But how can a man who banished his son Ishmael, sending him off with his mother Hagar into the desert, where they nearly died, be thought of as an exemplary father? And how could a man who was willing to sac...