Genesis | A Parsha Companion

Author: Rabbi David Fohrman

How are we meant to wrestle with a story like the Akeidah, Abraham’s fateful journey to offer Isaac back to God? If you were Rebecca’s lawyer, how might you defend her choice to command her son to deceive his father? Is it possible that the sale of Joseph was the greatest crime…never committed?

In this first of five Parsha Companions, Rabbi David Fohrman delves into these and other intriguing conundrums, using a unique set of tools. He asks questions that, in hindsight, seem like they were staring you in the face the whole time. He discerns nuance. He detects patterns in the original Hebrew that – once you see them – seem to leap off the page. And he shows how many of these discoveries, astoundingly, aren’t really “new" at all – but were suggested, thousands of years ago, by the ancient sages of the Talmud and Midrash themselves.

Underneath Rabbi Fohrman’s way of approaching biblical text lies a simple conviction: Inasmuch as reading a book is like having a conversation with its author, reading the Bible is like having a conversation with our Creator. Therefore, when we read the Torah, we should do it the way we should converse with those who are deeply important to us: Stop talking so much; slow down…and just listen.

In Genesis: A Parsha Companion, Rabbi Fohrman helps the reader really listen to the Torah – carefully, lovingly, and attentively. The reader’s reward is the chance to perceive the richness in the Torah many of us had never imagined was there, and to be touched deeply by a close encounter with the words of our Maker.