Parshat Ve’etchanan contains some of the most iconic passages in the Torah—including Moses’ retelling of the Ten Commandments and the Shema. As Moses continues his final address to the Israelites, he revisits earlier moments with new urgency and emotion, inviting us to hear the familiar in a different key. And yet, for all its poetry, the parsha delivers precious little new information. What do we do with passages of Torah that loop back in on themselves? What can we glean when we feel we already know what is going on? How can the familiar surprise us? We will discuss these questions while looking in depth at the first few aliyot of the parsha.

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Abby Fisher (they/them) is an educator and playwright currently studying for Rabbinic Ordination at Hebrew College. Last summer, their original play, which explores queer coming of age in a Torah-centered community premiered off Broadway at New York City's The Tank theater. Their writing has appeared in The Huffington Post, Lilith Magazine, The Jewish Daily Forward, and The Jewish Women's Archive. Abby's approach to text is curiosity-driven, letting questions arise and drive us through the material. In particular, Abby loves to learn aggadic (story-based) passages of Talmud, which showcase how the rabbis made meaning from the mundane. Let's go on a Torah adventure together!