Pharaoh

The high price of not listening: What Pharaoh teaches us about power and humility

Pharaoh ignored every warning until his nation collapsed. His mistake isn’t ancient, it’s painfully familiar today.

|ByMOSHE TARAGIN
Statue of a mans head wearing headphones.
The mask of Tutankhamun is projected during a digital exhibition in Bordeaux, France, in 2025.

Parashat Va'era: Between Pharaoh and Persia, pride before a fall

The Iranian regime, like Pharaoh, has long encouraged the belief that it is untouchable. Yet the protests reveal a profound rupture between the state and the society it purports to lead.

|ByMICHAEL FREUND
Parsha.

Parashat Va’era: Why being good is the secret strength we forget

Why does Moses step aside for Aaron during the first plagues? The answer reveals a profound Torah teaching about humility and gratitude.

|ByRABBI SHMUEL RABINOWITZ
The encounter at the burning bush lays the bedrock of monotheism. Illustrative.

Parashat Shemot: Learning God

The divine cannot be reduced to scientific explanation or empirical inquiry. God exists beyond the categories through which human beings normally understand reality.

|ByMOSHE TARAGIN

Archaeologists unearth 'ancient Egyptian Pompeii' near Luxor

The city was built more than 3,400 years ago during the opulent reign of Amenhotep III, one of Egypt's most powerful pharaohs.

APRIL 8, 2021ByREUTERS
A new archaeological discovery is seen in Luxor, Egypt, in this undated handout photo.

Parashat Va'era: When power meets empathy

People often use power, and when it is employed, it is not easy to overcome it. The Midrash teaches us that when power is met with empathy, consideration and compassion, it collapses and retreats.

JANUARY 14, 2021ByRABBI SHMUEL RABINOWITZ
THE FAMOUS Egyptian pyramids are a perfect example of ancient Egypt’s power and spiritual decay

Moses, a diplomatic negotiator ahead of his time

Moses’ goal is to take the people out of slavery and bring them to the land of Israel but he never states that.

JANUARY 8, 2021ByMICHAEL M. COHEN
The large tapestry in the Knesset by Marc Chagall of Moses receiving the Torah

Parashat Miketz: Days of love and hate – How do we cope?

“Will we find [anyone] like this, a man in whom there is the spirit of God?” (Genesis 41: 38).

DECEMBER 17, 2020ByRABBI SHMUEL RABINOWITZ
Ayman Hussien, a guard of Famine Stela, or "Rock of Starvation", sits near the rock, initially attributed to the reign of King Djoser (Third Dynasty), during a shortage of the Nile flood that led to a seven-year drought and famine, on the Nile's Sehel Island at Aswan, Egypt February 21, 2020

Coronavirus and the ten plagues

What if the plagues were relevant for all time?

APRIL 8, 2020ByFARANAK MARGOLESE
HIS FATAL error: ‘Moses Striking the Rock,’ Jacopo Tintoretto, 1563

Parashat Vayeshev: Who do we see in our reflection?

Often, our sins stem from an error in our self-image.

JANUARY 10, 2020ByRABBI SHMUEL RABINOWITZ
SHOLEM ALEICHEM at his desk in St. Petersburg in 1904BOYS SEE their re ections in a pool with gold sh in Ashdod

Cosmic-ray imaging finds hidden structure in Egypt's Great Pyramid

The findings come from a project called Scan Pyramids that relies on non-invasive scanning methods to probe the internal structure of the pyramids.

NOVEMBER 2, 2017ByREUTERS
A 3D artistic view of the chamber recently found in the pyramids.