Power – Rabbi Jon 's Website and Blog

September 7, 2026

Looking Up (Rosh Hashanah 5780/2019)

This was one of my Divrei Torah for Rosh Hashanah in 2019 (5780). When I was 22 years old, a man looked up at me, and changed my life. This was connected to the thing that I thought was going to change my life that year, which was a Wexner Graduate Fellowship to go to… Continue reading

Calendar, Equality, Gratitude, Hakarat Hatov, High Holidays, Holidays, Leadership, Power, Rosh Hashanah, Teacher-Student Relationship, Torah, Young Jewish Adult

September 6, 2026

Atalanta (How To Approach the Metaphor of God as King)

This is a D’var Torah I shared in Shabbat services a few weeks before Rosh Hashanah on September 10, 2022. This is a reflection on the metaphor of malchut (kingship or royalty) for the Divine, which features so centrally in the prayers of the High Holy Days. The week I wrote this was also the… Continue reading

Calendar, Feminism, High Holidays, Holidays, Power, Rosh Hashanah, Theology, Yom Kippur

July 3, 2026

Celebrating America at 250 — Or, The Daughters of Tzelophechad Meet the Founding Fathers (Parashat Pinchas 5786, the 4th of July!)

This is the draft of my words for Shabbat morning, July 4, 2026, the day of America’s 250th anniversary! The parasha (reading in the Torah) is Pinchas, and my link to that is chapter 27 of Numbers. Chapter 27 of Numbers begins: They came up close, the daughters of Tzeloph’chad, son of Chefer, son of… Continue reading

Calendar, Conservative Judaism, Current Affairs, Equality, Feminism, Freedom, History, Holidays, Numbers, Parashat Hashavua, Pinchas, Power, USA

July 2, 2026

Hope in America — Data Points and Torah (Chukkat-Balak 5786/2026)

This was my D’var Torah for June 27, 2026, a week before America’s 250th anniversary, for Parashiyot Chukkat-Balak. Though I don’t reference it specifically, Parashat Balak is an interlude in the complaints of the wilderness, a reassurance from the outside that despite the challenges the people are experiencing they are fundamentally blessed and their project… Continue reading

Balak, Calendar, Chukkat, Current Affairs, Exodus, History, Holidays, Hope, Leadership, Miryam, Moshe, Numbers, Parashat Hashavua, Power, Torah, USA

December 10, 2025

From the “Archives”: Parashat Vayeshev and the 50th Anniversary of JFK’s Assassination

I am updating my site with what I take to be interesting Divrei Torah (“sermons”) of mine that I hadn’t shared before. This one, connected with the Torah reading of the current week, I shared in November 2013. As I studied this parasha in light of all the commemorations of President Kennedy this week, I… Continue reading

Current Affairs, Dreams/Dreaming, History, Inclusion, Leadership, Parashat Hashavua, Power, USA, Vayeshev

April 7, 2025

A Year of Jewish Ethics #14: Labor Justice, Part 1

The Jewish perspective on the responsibilities of employers reflects the story of our oppression in Egypt, shi’ibud mitzrayim. That oppression began as forced labor, and when the Torah teaches about wage workers, it often uses the same words that it uses to describe slavery. Jewish law recognizes the inherent dynamic between the one who pays… Continue reading

A Year of Jewish Ethics, Equality, Ethics, Exodus, Halacha, Justice, Middot, Power, Torah, Tzedek, Young Jewish Adult, Youth

March 20, 2025

More From College

Most of the new things the past few days are from the history of Zionism course. Some things that struck me… Given the gap in experience between Herzl and Eastern European Jews, I continue to be surprised how many showed up for the First Zionist Congress. Granted it was 1897, so the Chovevei Tzion groups… Continue reading

Art, College, History, Israel, Power

March 17, 2025

Another Week Back in College

I'm catching up on the whole week, after preparing for and celebrating Purim…. The week's notes in Lit and Arts were a lot about the successors of Charlemagne, and the disjuncture between the disintegration of their authority and their realm, and their self-representation in Christian books and architecture as Christ's designated earthly power. As I… Continue reading

Antisemitism, Art, Equality, Freedom, History, Inclusion, Israel, Jewish Education, Justice, Power, Study, Tzedek, Young Jewish Adult, Youth

March 12, 2025

Antisemitism, Our Security and Our Souls — Wisdom From the Book of Esther

This was Dvar Torah for Shabbat Zachor last weekend, March 8, 2025. Last year at this time, I coined a term for a brand-new approach to wellbeing. I called it EIST, for “Esther-Informed Spiritual Therapy.” The big idea is that the Purim story is the best mirror in entire Tanakh, the whole Bible, for Jews… Continue reading

Antisemitism, Community Relations, Current Affairs, Esther, Holidays, Jewish Education, Leadership, Parashat Hashavua, Patience, Power, Purim, Shabbat Zachor, USA, Young Jewish Adult, Youth

March 6, 2025

A Year of Jewish Ethics #12: Exodus and Freedom

In my overview of ethics and Exodus, you may have noticed I didn’t talk about one central idea: freedom! Well, the Jewish conception of freedom deserves its very own presentation. In Judaism freedom has many layers. The term for free people is b’nai chorin; a free person might be a bat chorin or a ben… Continue reading

A Year of Jewish Ethics, Beshalach, Ethics, Freedom, Justice, Middot, Parashat Hashavua, Power, Torah, Yitro, Young Jewish Adult, Youth

February 23, 2025

College: Historical Transitions

Professor Hall started his course with a terrific introduction, setting out the goal of the course: to figure out why in particular Great Britain, France, and Germany entered the modern age from similar medieval conditions but took such different political routes. Britain had a relatively nonviolent transition toward democracy. French made the transition with violence… Continue reading

Art, College, History, Inclusion, Israel, Power, Young Jewish Adult, Youth