Category Archives: Uncategorized

parshat ha’azinu (deuteronomy 32)

Join Geoffrey Stern and Rabbi Adam Mintz on Clubhouse Friday September 17th at 4:00pm (ET). With the Yom Kippur liturgy fresh in our minds we explore a disturbing, persistent and infantile argument for forgiveness… that God forgive us for His sake. Using equal measure of Chutzpa and shaming, we argue that God, as our Father and as our Creator is ultimately responsible for our sins, the sins of his children/creations. We ask: How does God Respond? How should we respond?

Friday September 17th at 4:00pm Eastern Time

Link to Sefaria source sheet: www.sefaria.org/sheets/347781

Listen below to last week’s Clubhouse meeting: The Aleph Bet Revolution

parshat vayeilech (deuteronomy 31)

Join Geoffrey Stern and Rabbi Adam Mintz on Clubhouse Friday September 10th at 4:00pm (ET) as we review the septennial Hakhēl convocation where the Torah is read publicly every seven years. We use this as an opportunity to explore the revolutionary nature of the Hebrew Alphabet from both a social and technological perspective. In so doing, we may shed some light on the proliferation of alphabetical acrostics in the Psalms, later liturgy, piyyutim and especially on the High Holidays.

Friday September 10th at 4:00pm Eastern Time

Link to Sefaria source sheet: www.sefaria.org/sheets/346294

Listen below to last week’s Clubhouse meeting: Not in Heaven

parshat nitzavim (deuteronomy 30)

Join Geoffrey Stern and Rabbi Adam Mintz on Clubhouse Friday September3rd at 4:00pm (ET) as we explore the verse in Deuteronomy 30 that proclaims that the Torah is not in Heaven. We explore it in context and in the agada. We take a literary journey into the iconic story of the oven of akhnai.

Friday September 3rd at 4:00pm Eastern Time

Link to Sefaria source sheet: www.sefaria.org/sheets/345182

Listen below to last week’s Clubhouse meeting: Chosen

parshat ki tavo (deuteronomy 26)

Join Geoffrey Stern and Rabbi Adam Mintz on Clubhouse Friday August 27th at 4:00pm (ET) as we explore the roots of the concept of the Chosen People looking at the Favored sons and wives of Genesis and at the concept of Covenant and antecedent Hittite suzerainty treaties. Was Tevya right and should God choose someone else for a change?

Friday August 27th at 4:00pm Eastern Time

Link to Sefaria source sheet: www.sefaria.org/sheets/343219

Listen below to last week’s Clubhouse meeting: Listening to the Lyrics of Jewish Law

parshat ki teitzei (deuteronomy 21 and 23)

Join Geoffrey Stern and Rabbi Adam Mintz on Clubhouse Friday August 20th at 4:00pm (ET) as we ask: “When was the last time you listened to the lyrics, poetry and sounds of the mitzvot?” אַשְׁרֵי אִישׁ שֶׁיִּשְׁמַע לְמִצְוֹתֶיךָ “Happy is the one who listens to the mitzvot” We are told that there never was nor ever will be a case of the Biblical Rebellious Son. That we are simply to be rewarded for its study and listening to the nuances of its halachot. We explore, with the help of Haim Nachman Bialik, how all of the commandments provide similar rewards for those willing to listen to their lyrical nature.

Friday August 20th at 4:00pm Eastern Time

Link to Sefaria source sheet: www.sefaria.org/sheets/342083

Listen below to last week’s Clubhouse meeting: You Are Not My Boss

parshat shoftim (deuteronomy 17)

Join Geoffrey Stern and Rabbi Adam Mintz on Clubhouse Friday August 13th at 4:00pm (ET) as we explore the Torah’s disgust for the monarchy and how this rejection sheds light on the New Year Festival and it’s powerful message.

Friday August 13th at 4:00pm Eastern Time

Link to Sefaria source sheet: www.sefaria.org/sheets/340788

Listen below to last week’s Clubhouse meeting: Kashrut, Yashrut and the Flesh of Desire

parshat re’eh (Deuteronomy 12)

Join Geoffrey Stern and Rabbi Adam Mintz on Clubhouse Friday August 6th at 4:00pm (ET) as we explore the development of the Hebrew Bible and Rabbinic Judaism’s approach to vegetarianism, carnivorism and Kashrut – the ethics of animal slaughter

Friday August 6th at 4:00pm Eastern Time

Link to Sefaria source sheet: www.sefaria.org/sheets/340004

Listen below to last week’s Clubhouse meeting: Practicing Judaism in and out of your back yard

parshat eikev (Deuteronomy 11)

Join Geoffrey Stern and Rabbi Adam Mintz on Clubhouse Friday July 30th at 4:00pm (ET) as we wonder whether the practice of Judaism outside of the land of Israel just that…. practice? We explore a Rabbinic opinion that the land of Israel is so central to the religion of Israel that the religion can only be observed in the Land. In so doing we question whether the practice of Judaism in and outside of Israel is different in kind rather than degree and what this says about the nature and relationship between the two communities?

Friday July 30th at 4:00pm Eastern Time

Link to Sefaria source sheet: www.sefaria.org/sheets/338763

Listen below to last week’s Clubhouse meeting: Shema Yisrael and the Struggle against Cheap Faith