The Mexican novelist Carlos Fuentes taught a course that I took one year in college, and I still savor his exploration of magical realism with our class. One of his grand themes was the elliptical nature of time. Some cultures, he claimed, view time in cyclical terms, with each development merely a return to a…

 Newborn babies are miraculous to see, and even more remarkable to hold. To let their tiny fingers curl around your pinkie and breathe in their new-to-the-world fragrance is divine, but sometimes this pleasure isn’t possible. A few days ago I met a newborn so small that even his parents can’t hold him—at just 2 lbs, this…

Shabbat Parah, Cow Shabbat, is one of our more perplexing customs. We chant the passage describing the red heifer ritual in Numbers 19, and then read Ezekiel’s prophecy of a re-purification of Israel, which has been sullied in exile, and which will now receive a new heart and new spirit, returning them to their land…