THE ABRAHAM J. HESCHEL CENTER FOR CATHOLIC-JEWISH RELATIONS THE JOHN PAUL II CATHOLIC UNIVERSITY OF LUBLIN

I'm betting many people are thinking, "Shmini Atzeret?! Never heard of it. But Simchat Torah, that I've heard about". It's a paradox that this celebration, which is all about the Torah, isn't mentioned in the Torah itself.First, it's important to understand that, like Catholics, Jews follow a calendar of… Read more… »

The week-long holiday of Sukkot has ended, and we return to our homes. But stop right there. Literally! There's ANOTHER holiday, one certainly connected to Sukkot, but a separate holiday in its own right. And that's what makes Shmini Atzeret – literally, the eighth day of assembly or the… Read more… »

In today’s Gospel, we are listening to Matthew’s second parable on the vineyard; in Matthew 21 there will be another one, immediately following the one we are reading today. Listening to the parable, we can imagine a small farm in first-century Palestine, where grape vines are grown; we see… Read more… »

Yom Kippur has ended, with our intense, deep, intimate day of searching ourselves and being close with God. Ideally, we end this day of atonement feeling loved, secure and at peace. We return home and everything feels right with the world.But in Israel, and in Jewish communities around the… Read more… »

I think that everyone already knows that Yom Kippur is the Day of Atonement. But let’s speak a little bit about what atonement is, and how we got to this special day.First of all, Yom Kippur in the Bible. It is important to know that it looks very different… Read more… »

The role of the penitents, of the ones who return to God’s ways (baalei tshuva - בעלי תשובה) in the New Testament and the Jewish sources. In the parable of the workers in the vineyard in the Gospel according to Matthew, chapter 20, Jesus talks about the answer of… Read more… »

“How many times do I have to forgive my brother who sins against me?” Asks Peter. “Give me a number! After that I won’t be obliged anymore…”This is the risk of religion, of any religion: the desire for boundaries, for a clear knowledge of being in or out, right… Read more… »

Creation and judgementRosh Hashanah, literally "head of the year", is the first day of the Jewish new year. In the Bible, it is called Yom Truah, the day of the trumpets. This day commemorates the creation of the world and man but it also remembers God's judgment. According to… Read more… »

Matthew 18:15-20, part of Matthew’s fourth discourse on community organization, provides the context for Jesus’s instruction to Peter to forgive an offending brother or sister “seventy times seven” (18:22). The context is important, for it indicates that Jesus is not coercing people who have been hurt to forgive. Nor… Read more… »

The first apostle struggled with anxiety and even fear throughout his life. The Evangelists emphasize this fact several times. Anxiety is revealed very clearly in the scene of Peter's calling. Peter asks: "Depart from me, Lord, for I am a sinful man!" (Luke 5:8). Another time when the apostle… Read more… »

The reading of the Gospel of Matthew chapter 16 verse 19, reminds us of Matthew 18, 18: "Amen, I say to you, whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven".The relationships and the bond between heavens… Read more… »

A Canaanite woman, and therefore a Gentile, asks Jesus to heal her daughter.Jesus says that he was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. He adds, "It is not right to take the food of the children and throw it to the dogs." And she… Read more… »

Greetings from Jerusalem, about 130 km from the Sea of Galilee, where the episode from Matthew took place. It stands to reason that the story belongs to the initial core of the tradition and, thus, before it was put in writing in Greek, it had been transmitted orally in… Read more… »

Today's verses of the Gospel describe the transfiguration of Jesus in front of his closest disciples on a high mountain. The text does not explicitly name the mountain, but early Christian tradition from around 200 AD, attested by Origen and later by Cyril of Jerusalem, Epiphanius and Jerome, situates… Read more… »

This week’s Gospel reading includes the famous parable that likens the kingdom of heaven to a treasure buried in a field, which a person finds, hides again, and then joyfully sells all that he has, to buy that field and possess that treasure. The parable makes me think of a… Read more… »

Tishah B’Av in history and in Jewish traditionThe First Temple was destroyed during the Babylonian invasion in 586 B.C. The rabbis teach that the cause of its fall was the people's spiritual laziness. Midrash Eichah Rabbasi 1:35 relates the following story: “A man would approach his friend in Jerusalem… Read more… »

The Lord Jesus continues teaching in parables in today's Gospel. He talks about sowing good seed and the weeds growing beside it. We also hear about a mustard seed and a bit of yeast put into the dough. The content of these parables intertwines and constitutes a teaching of… Read more… »

In today’s commentary we will try to find a parallel between the New Testament and the Hebrew Bible on the subject of serving spiritual leaders and their close disciples. In Judaism, the concept of serving the leaders and their wise disciples is an important one and has a significant… Read more… »

It is striking and fascinating to read the Gospel of Matthew on June 18th - in Hebrew, as it includes so many references and contexts to the Hebrew Bible, the Rabbinic Mishnaic teachings as well as to Jewish scholars and thinkers. In Matthew 9:36 we read: At the sight… Read more… »

The main focus of the feast of Corpus Christi is the gift of the Eucharist. Literally in Greek the word means “thanksgiving.” Jesus instituted the Eucharist at the Last Supper, which happened during a Passover meal. Thanks to the Jewish tradition of Birkat Hamazon prayer (a thanksgiving blessing for… Read more… »

The Book of Acts tells that the apostles and others gathered to celebrate Pentecost or Shavuot (Weeks) – a core Jewish holiday occurring seven weeks after the Passover. By the 1st century CE, this feast, originally with a primarily agricultural meaning, became associated with the gift of the Torah… Read more… »

Shavuot is a time of thanksgiving for the first fruits of the spring harvest. It is also a time of a great gratitude to God for His Covenant of love, for receiving of the Torah and the Ten Commandments. It is a time of spiritual rebirth and the awakening… Read more… »

On the Seventh Sunday of Easter we read the conclusion of the Gospel according to Mathew. This end is in fact a beginning, especially for Jesus’ disciples. The Evangelist describes the event after Resurrection and transports us to Galilee, the venue of Jesus’ last meeting with His disciples.Why Galilee… Read more… »

In the Gospel reading for this Sunday we are confronted by a rather strange situation. We read and hear the Gospel in translation into whatever language: French, Polish, English, but there’s this one word that often doesn’t get translated and instead is kept in Greek: Paraclete.And while I don’t… Read more… »