Shabbat Reading

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When I decided to make Friday my regular blogging day, a number of people said to me--"So you're doing parashat hashavua?"  "Parashat hashavua" means "the weekly Torah portion."  It also describes weekly lessons or commentary on the Torah portion that many rabbis write or--more commonly now--post on the Internet.

So "no," I have not been doing "parashat hashavua" on this blog.  This is partly because I like the freedom of taking on all kinds of topics outside the weekly Torah portion.  But it is also because there is a wealth of high-quality, weekly Torah learning already available.  I would like to share some of my favorites.

1)  Reform Voices of Torah.  The Union for Reform Judaism (URJ) has a long-running weekly Torah commentary, featuring perspectives by two different Reform rabbis (or cantors or educators) each week.  Rabbi Shankman wrote a piece for them just last week.  They also have an archive of more than ten years of commentaries for each portion.

2)  Torah from JTS.  The Jewish Theological Seminary, the Conservative rabbinical school in New York, posts parashat hashavua commentary by faculty members.  This is the one I read every week.  This site also provides the complete text of the Torah portion and Haftarah portion in English, which is great for a quick review.

3)  Torah Sparks.  Very accessible, with lots of discussion questions.  This comes from the United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism (USCJ), the Conservative equivalent of the URJ.

4)  Bar Ilan University Parashat Hashavua Study Center.  Not for the faint of heart!  These essays are written by faculty members at Bar Ilan, an Orthodox university in Israel.  Some are accessible, some horrifically technical.  But if you want to make the effort, they make terrific connections between the Torah and later Rabbinic texts and Jewish thought. 

5)  Haaretz.  For an easier Israeli take, try Portion of the Week from Haaretz, one of Israel's major daily newspapers.  There's no permanent link for future weeks, but you can always go to their "Week's End" section and scroll down until you see the "Portion of the Week" article.  Can you believe this appears in a regular (secular) newspaper?  Only in Israel...

Of course, you probably aren't going to check out all of these every week.  (I don't.)  But taking a little time on Friday or Saturday to study parashat hashavua is a deeply traditional way to stay connected to the Torah cycle and a meaningful ritual that I highly recommend.

Shabbat shalom.

For Discussion:  Is there a weekly Torah commentary you read online that I missed?  Let us know in the comments.