Ta Shma

There is a cemetery in Woodbridge, NJ in which my dad is buried. Though I live states away and rarely visit, I think about it often. It takes shape before me. I imagine the place where my dad is buried and it pulls on me. Parashat Hayyei Sarah tells the story of not only Sarah’s burial but Avraham’s as well. When Sarah dies, Avraham negotiates to purchase a plot of land in Hebron upon which to bury Sarah. Avraham buys the land that we call Me’arat ha-Makhpelah fr...

What does it mean to be free? Is freedom simply the ability to do what we want, or is there something deeper at stake? The Maharal of Prague offers a profound understanding of slavery and redemption that challenges our assumptions and invites us to consider some essential questions: What defines us? What holds us back? And what does it mean to live freely? Through his teachings, we’ll explore what freedom might mean thousands of years after God took the Israelites out of Egypt. Recorded at Ha...

Prayer in Jewish tradition is most commonly expressed in spoken words. But in Parashat VaYera, Avraham, Hagar, and Yishmael each have a moment of being heard and seen in the presence of the Divine in which their thoughts are unspoken—but which our tradition understands as an archetype of prayer.

Join Hadar's rashei yeshiva, R. Aviva Richman and R. Ethan Tucker, for a unique debate as they spar with the text — and with one another. Was the binding of Isaac the peak moment of Abraham's faith journey — or did he fail his calling in the most spectacular way possible? Is the akeidah a model for what faith demands of us, or a nightmare we're meant to learn from? This memorial Rabbi Jonathan D. Levine keynote was given in September 2026. Source sheet: https://mechonhadar.s...

A core thread running through Jewish tradition is a continuous yearning toward a promised future. In our holy texts, the Prophets preach to a people in exile of a day in which they will be gathered together again in their land with God. In our davening, we pray for the future rebuilding of Jerusalem and the Holy Temple. Each week when we observe Shabbat, we imagine it as a taste of the more perfect world-to-come. We live in the reality of now—and we are always waiting ...