Weekly Message

16 October 2025

In this week’s parashah, B’reisheet, God asks two questions of humanity. After Adam and Eve have eaten from the tree of knowledge, God asks Adam “Ayekah — Where are you?”  Later, after Cain has killed his brother Abel, God asks Cain “Ay Hevel ahikhah — Where is Abel your brother?”

As Rabbi Kanter taught on Yom Kippur, these are the two essential questions that we struggle with during the Days of Awe:  Where do we stand in relation to God, and where do we stand in relation to the people around us? Perhaps the Torah presents us with those questions here, at the very beginning of its narrative, to remind us that they are the essence of God’s call to us throughout the year. The deepest mitzvah, which underlies all other mitzvot, is to understand that we are accountable. All else flows from that.

Every Shabbat, we try to quiet the noise in our lives so that we can hear the still small voice that whispers those two questions:  Where are you? and Where are your brothers and sisters?