The Tanakh Podcast

Do we rely on God because we expect everything to turn out okay; or do we rely in God because attachment to God is simply life itself?

This Psalm is one of the most commonly recited Psalms in times of trouble, sickness, or distress. It is also recited during the Ten Penitential Days between Rosh Hashannah and Yom Kippur.

In every generation, "since my youth, the haters, the assailants have attacked me, but they will never prevail against me." This is a song about anti-Semitism and Jewish survival.

This Mizmor offers the Godfearing person individual and national blessings. We discuss the images of the vine and the olive tree, the family and the nation.

Today we study the chapter with an eye to the year we have experienced. Wishing everyone a Shanna Tova!

This Psalm sung on Shabbat and festive moments before Birkhat Hamazon. It starts with the joy of the return to Zion. But then it requests of God: "Return our captives! Have we returned or not? And if we are so joyous, why are we crying?

"Jerusalem has mountains surrounding it, and God surrounds His people now and forevermore" We examine this statement both topographically and historically. Has Jerusalem always been protected by God "now and forevermore"?

This is the song of what might have been, the chorus of Jewish survival, the symphony of thangsgiving to God for having our back throughout the millennia and not allowing our enemies to succeed in destroying the Jewish People, in thwarting the designs of anti-Semites and would be destroyers.

What can a slave expect from his master? In this podcast we relate chapter 123 to our Rosh Hashanna liturgy.

This beautiful and colourful chapter describes the excitement of a pilgrims journey to Jerusalem and the sights that they encounter. It ends with a three-fold prayer for peace.