This page is a first attempt to share my derekh, my path of living and learning in Jewish life.
With Torah and Love is the name I’ve given to the theological and spiritual orientation that shapes how I study, teach, pray, make decisions, and show up in community. It emerged from art, my writing, and a perspective.
It’s a framework of presence, conscience, and responsibility, rooted in Tradition, open to transformation, and committed to building a life of Torah that is spiritually honest and ethically alive.
Over the years, I’ve found that people often ask not just what I believe, but how I approach the sacred:
These principles are the beginning of an answer. They’re living truths, anchored in Torah, shaped by experience, and still emerging.
This isn’t a creed. It’s a derekh.
It’s the kind of Torah I hope to live, and the kind I hope to share.
Principle:
God draws close not to those with perfect faith or perfect answers, but to those who show up honestly. Presence, not performance, is what makes room for the sacred.
Sources:
“God is close to all who call out, to all who call out in truth.”
(Psalms 145:18)
Commentary:
This verse sits at the heart of how I understand Judaism, theology, and spiritual life. I don’t believe that proximity to the Divine comes from mastery, status, or having the right answers.
It comes from spiritual honesty.
When we reach out with integrity, with our questions, contradictions, hopes, and even silence, we are already inside the relationship. That’s what this verse promises: not reward for perfection, but closeness rooted in integrity.
In my work, I try to create spaces where people can bring their whole selves, not just the parts they think are “enough.” And I try to do the same. I’ve found again and again that it is in the moments of sincerity, whether in study, prayer, grief, or joy, that something sacred unfolds. We don’t need to be certain to be present. We don’t need to be experts to be real.
Practice Implications:
We approach Torah, prayer, and mitzvot as opportunities for sincerity, not performance.
Our spiritual standard is not certainty, but integrity. We measure presence, not perfection.
We are responsible for cultivating spaces where truthfulness is welcomed, not penalized.
Principle:
Torah is not frozen in time or sealed away in heaven. It becomes Torah when we engage it, wrestle with it, study it, live with it, in the complexity of real life. It emerges through relationships and actual encounters with the world.
Sources:
“Torah is not in heaven…”
(Deuteronomy 30:12, Bava Metzia 59b)“It is very close to you, in your mouth and in your heart, to do it.”
(Deuteronomy 30:14, Eruvin 54a–55a)
Commentary:
I don’t believe Torah is something we inherit just to preserve. I believe we inherit it to engage it.
The Tradition is sacred, layered, and enduring, but it’s not finished. It’s not static. Torah becomes real when it’s studied with care, challenged with conscience, and lived with intention. Rabbi Yitzhak, in Eruvin, teaches that Torah becomes close when it’s “in your mouth and in your heart,” not just memorized, but internalized and ready to be lived. That’s the Torah I believe in: not one that is untouchable, but one that emerges from the encounter.
The rabbis also remind us: the Torah is not in heaven. It is in our hands. It is here. Which means we are responsible for how it lives, and how it moves forward.
Torah and God are a part of a sacred conversation that requests our partnership. It stretches us in the space between Tradition and conscience, between text and learner. That’s where meaning is forged, and transformation takes root.
Practice Implications:
We learn Torah not just to understand it, but to be changed by it.
We make space for complexity, disagreement, and growth as essential features of Torah, not signs of failure.
We hold our learning with reverence and humility, and trust that something holy emerges when we stay in relationship with it.
Principle:
Torah was given to help us grow spiritually, ethically, and relationally. We are responsible for carrying it forward in ways that cultivate integrity, healing, and justice.
Sources:
“What does God ask of you? Only to do justice, love kindness, and walk humbly with your God.”
(Micah 6:8)“The righteous say little and do much.”
(Bava Metzia 87a)“The entire Torah stands upon justice, lovingkindness, and humility.”
(Makkot 24a)
Commentary:
I believe Torah, in the broad sense, is sacred, but mediated through flawed human beings.
Some ways we’ve taught it uplift and transform, while others reflect the wounds and limitations of the times that produced them. That’s not a failure of the system. It’s part of what it means to inherit something real, human, and holy.
But if Torah is going to live through us, we are responsible for how we carry it. And I believe we are called to carry it in a way that leads toward wholeness.
Our journey beside Torah is not about perfection. It’s about direction. It invites us to grow more honest, more compassionate, more accountable, more alive. We ask: is this helping us become more of who we are called to be? Is this helping us repair the world, even a little?
We are not only inheritors. We are stewards.
Practice Implications:
We interpret and apply Torah with an eye toward how it will actually impact people.
Parts of Torah challenge us, and we stay in that discomfort with integrity.
