Numbers 4:21-7:89
The roles of the Levites are further defined, emphasizing service, responsibility, and care for the sacred. The portion includes the priestly blessing, one of the most tender expressions of divine presence in the Torah. Naso balances order and intimacy, law and blessing.
In Moses, Parashat Beha'alotcha and Parashat Naso by Rabbi Nathan Lopes Cardozo
Why was Moshe denied entry into the Promised Land after forty years of sacrifice? Perhaps not as a punishment—but as a final gift. In this week’s essay, Rabbi Cardozo explores a deeply unsettling possibility: that peace itself can become dangerous when misunderstood.
Reflections on the Sotah Ritual
In Maimonides and Parashat Naso by Rabbi Nathan Lopes Cardozo
One of the most disturbing and mystifying rituals in the Torah is case of the Sotah—the woman suspected by her husband of adultery. What is this strange ritual all about?
The Law of the Nazir
In Halacha and Parashat Naso by Rabbi Nathan Lopes Cardozo
Many people feel the need to express their religious devotion through the acceptance of stringencies that conventional Jewish Law does not in actual fact require. But the Torah does not appear to condone such stringencies.
In Jewish Thought and Philosophy, Maimonides and Parashat Naso by Rabbi Nathan Lopes Cardozo
If anyone were to argue that traditional Judaism is guilty of too much dogma and not enough imaginative thought, a closer look at the multitude of rabbinical insights into the meaning of “God” and “revelation” would quickly disabuse him of such a notion.