Torah Portion: Ekev (Dueteronomy 7:12-11:26)
Hi, my name is Emily Hoff, I am a 5th grader
and have been a student at the Davis Academy for 5 years. I have two siblings
at Davis, also. Sadie is in 4th
grade and Jeremy is in 2nd grade.
I am going to give a D’var Torah, which will connect
this week’s Torah Portion to our daily lives.
The Parsha I am talking about today is Ekev from the 5th
book of the Torah, Deuteronomy or in Hebrew, D’varim.
I am going to start with a quotation from the Parsha. “Impress
My words upon your very heart. Bind them as a sign on your hand and let them
serve as a symbol on your forehead, and teach them to your children.”
This quotation reminds me of the V’ahavta, which
happens to be my mom’s most favorite prayer.
This prayer talks about making “God’s Mark” on everything. To me, this
means show kindness to others and make the word a better place. It also means
that if you see anything or anyone, you see good and beauty in it. For example,
when I see my best friends, I see beauty in them and that makes me feel good.
As a 5th grader, I am learning about
slavery in social studies. Eventually my classmates and I will go on a Civil
Rights Trip to Birmingham, Alabama as well. We all learned that the world needed
kindness at both these times. Today, we can strive to be kind people and make
our world a better place. At Davis we have opportunities to practice being kind
by doing Mitzvot like making blankets for Scottish Rite, being book buddies to
preschool kids, and at class meetings and all around school.
The rock band “incubus” performs a song called “if not now, when”. The members of this band are Jewish and Rabbi
Micah reminded me that the name of this song comes directly from an ancient
rabbi named, Rabbi Hillel. It seems that
whether in the Torah, in our daily lives, or even in rock music, Jews are
trying to teach kindness.
Thank you for coming and have a great meeting!
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