Your Ears So Big You Make Dumbo Jealous (Yom Kippur 5777)

"Your ears so big, you make Dumbo jealous." Or "Your ears so small, you can't hear when people insult you." Or "Your ears aren't so big ... for a basset hound." These are the kinds of casual insults you hear on a school yard (or, this year, on the presidential campaign). 

Given the features on my face, I received my share of insults in school, such as: "Is that your nose, or a ski jump?" And "Is that your nose, or did someone park a blimp on your face?"

Sure these make us chuckle, but they aren't funny.

Dreaming of the Year Ahead: Essential Lessons From Shimon Peres z"l (Rosh Hashanah 5777)

At this season, the Jewish new year (“Rosh Hashanah”) exhorts us to dream big. It is a time to reflect on the year that has ended and to dedicate ourselves toward returning to the best of ourselves, deepening relationships that are dear to us, meeting the profound needs of others, and reaching the highest ideals of Torah. Those are huge aspirations. The juxtaposition this weekend of the Friday funeral for Shimon Peres, former prime minister and president of Israel, the Saturday Torah reading, and the start of Rosh Hashanah on Sunday night call to mind powerful lessons about these aspirations.

Shimon Peres believed deeply in the power of dreams and imagination. He said, “We should use our imagination more than our memory.” Using our imagination more than our memories is precisely what this Jewish season is about. We don’t discard our memories; we use them to animate our aspirations. We reflect on the year that is ending -- through our memories -- in order to inspire our dreams for the year ahead -- our imagination.