Danica Bergagnini

S.T.A.R.’s upcoming exciting events:

• Teen Late Night @ Speedzone

This Shabbat:

• Friday Candle Lighting: 7:35 pm
• Shabbat Ends: 8:46 pm

Torah Message:

This week we complete the synagogue reading of the fourth of the Five Books of the Torah, Bamidbar — “In the desert.”

What is the theme of the Book of Bamidbar?

The captivity of the Jewish People in Egypt was more than just physical bondage. On a deeper level Egypt represents the enslavement of the power of speech. Egypt not only enslaved the bodies of the Jewish People, it put in chains the major weapon of the Jewish People — speech. Thus, the Torah writes that the Jewish People “cried out” to G-d. It never writes that they “prayed.” For in Egypt, speech itself was bound.

The power of speech is synonymous with the power to give direction. The word dabar can mean a leader or a director in Hebrew, as in “One leader for a generation, and not two leaders.”