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Quiet

This week's portion: going forth into something new

This week we're reading parashat Lekh Lekha, the story which begins with God's injunction to Abraham to go forth (or, perhaps, to go to himself) on what is now the paradigmatic Jewish journey of becoming.

The journey metaphor was rich in antiquity, and it speaks clearly and strongly to us today as well. Unsurprisingly, it's the focus of what I wrote this week for Radical Torah.

I'm not sure the kind of journey God invites Abraham (and, by extension, all of us) to take is ever "finished" either. Each one of us is always going forth from her land, the place of her birth, the house of her father. My land: the physical place where I feel at-home, the landscape I know intimately in every season, which in some sense I know best because I allow myself to leave and return. The place of my birth: my origin-point, physical and spiritual, the locus of my awakening. The house of my father: the interconnected web of my family, the community that shelters me and also allows me to reach beyond the limits of what's familiar and known.

Read the whole thing here: Going forth into something new.


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