The story is well known – David the boy, in his first famous battle, kills the Philistine giant Goliath: “And there went out a champion out of the camp of the Philistines, named Goliath, of Gath, whose height was six cubits and a span … And the staff of his spear was like a weaver’s […]

I love my country. I grew up in it. I walked its paths. I drove on its roads. I visited the many historical places of my people, located there. I am proud of its achievements. I love my people. I was born one of them. I contributed to their progress. We are an ancient nation […]

We used to be few. We, humans, that is. The Biblical story talks about Adam and Eve, but even real science agrees that at certain times the Homo Sapiens population was tiny. And then we became many. Very many. It is a nasty characteristic of evolution that makes the successful ones numerous, and eventually – […]

The religious argument is that the prophecies that appear in the Bible (Old and/or New Testament, depending on one’s religion) were fulfilled precisely. In fact, the fulfillment of the prophecies is, in the opinion of many believers, “proof” that God controls history. So here’s a little about biblical prophecy: The study of the biblical text […]

“Sukkah” is the Hebrew word for a hut (as in “Pizza Hut”) – a small house, typically temporary and wooden, in someone’s territory. “Sukkot” is the plural of “Sukkah”, i.e. “huts”. One of the most interesting Jewish holidays is Sukkot. We often refer to it as the “Gathering Festival”, following the Biblical phrase: “Also in […]

The recent couple of weeks have been chaotic in Israel. Even though the struggle against Covid-19 seemed to succeed – new challenges have popped, in particular the war against Hamas in the Gaza Strip and its implications inside Israel on the relationships between Jews and Arabs. This is not the proper place to describe the […]

One of the common religious claims about “creation” is that the world was created some 6,000 years ago with all the known scientific evidence already built into it. Sort of “God is trying us”. This claim of retroactive creation makes little sense, and is already discussed here. An interesting method of tackling this issue is […]

Today is the Jewish holiday of Shavuot. Supposedly the day in which the “Torah” was “given” to the people of Israel. According to the tradition, it was since passed between generations without changes, and its verdicts and commandments always kept… well, mostly. So, ancient holidays like “Pesach” (Passover) and “Sukkot” have always been celebrated since, […]

One of the most interesting holidays in the Jewish calendar is ‘Sukkot’, when religious Jewish people (as well as many secular kids) spend time in small wooden huts near their homes. This is also known as the “Collection Festival”, following the old Biblical command: “Also in the fifteenth day of the seventh month, when ye […]

One of my “hobbies”, sort of speak, is to find funny contradictions or conclusions from the Scriptures. Some of them are quite obvious to find, such as the in the differences between the first two chapters of Genesis. Others are hidden somewhere and require comparing some pieces of text that are not necessarily adjacent. Rest […]