Echoes of Eden: Sefer Bamidbar (English and Hebrew Edition)

Echoes of Eden: Sefer Bamidbar (English and Hebrew Edition)

The Jews journey from Mount Sinai to the Holy Land was filled with promise, but also fraught with hurdles. How would they deal with the threat of hostile nations, the tremors of internecine divisions, the challenge of forging a relationship with God once the unique conditions of Sinai were left behind? Plumbing the depths of Jewish sources, Rabbi Ari Kahn provides fascinating answers to age-old questions, infusing the parashah with fresh significance. Through provoking questions and intriguing insights, Rabbi Kahn continually inspires us to seek the Godly. Spies, Subversives and Other Scoundrels is the fourth in a five-volume work on the weekly Torah portion, published jointly by Gefen Publishing House and the OU. My friend and colleague Rabbi Ari Kahn is gifted with the natural ability to extract-combine-create Torah that provokes mind and heart to reach new levels of awe and appreciation of the beauty of the intertwining of the totality of Torah with itself. May the author continue to inspire us all with his beautiful creative works of Torah. -- Rabbi Yitzchak Berkovitz Rabbi Ari Kahn has proven himself to be both a profound thinker and gifted communicator. These combined talents have made him uniquely successful in communicating the depth and relevance of Torah to thousands of Jews from all over the world. --Rabbi Noah Weinberg Friends, there is nothing exactly like this work on the market and I high recommend it for several reasons. First, it represents the best tradition of what I can term 'Intellectual Modern Orthodoxy' of the sort one finds among the best students of the Rav and Rav Aharon. Second, it is eminently readable in articulate, colloquial English, despite the depth of its ideas. Third, it is made to be studied. Rabbi Kahn has done something I wish others would copy; he provides citations from the rabbinic sources and classical to which he refers, with the original text and his own careful translations below the text. Going away for Shabbos? Pack this book in your bag. You can read the essays and then review the sources to which Rabbi Kahn's presentation refers. Fourth, Rabbi Kahn is an astute reader of the text with a broad mastery of rabbinic literature. His choices are always good. Fifth, he is a master teacher. Nothing here is trite or unsophisticated. Thinking readers will profit enormously. I only review books that I love. I love Echoes of Eden and cannot wait to learn more from Rabbi Kahn. The book is published by Gefen and OU Press. As ever, their work befits the superior content within its covers. -- Rabbi Ozer Glickman, Facebook post Fuses information, interpretation and insight. -- Rabbi Aharon Lichtenstein Rabbi Ari Kahn received his rabbinic ordination from Yeshiva University's Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Theological Seminary, where he studied with Rabbi Yosef Dov Soloveitchik. He graduated Yeshiva University with a BA in psychology and an MS degree in Talmud. He is the director of Foreign Student Programs at Bar-Ilan University in Israel and is a senior educator at the Aish HaTorah College for Jewish Studies and Matan. Rabbi Kahn is also vice president of Migdal Ohr Institutions in Israel, He has authored over two hundred articles on the weekly parshah and holidays, with a readership in excess of ten thousand. He is also the author of Explorations, an in-depth analysis of the weekly Torah reading, and Emanations, an in-depth analysis of the Jewish holidays. Rabbi Kahn is also a renowned speaker and has lectured worldwide. He has lived in Israel since 1984 with his wife Naomi and five children.