By Gabe Katzman

So Jethro is quite eventful:

Jethro is Moses’ father-in-law. Jethro has heard God is this pretty cool dude performing miracles so he brings Moses’ wife Zipporah and her two sons from hometown Midian (thought to be northwest Arabian peninsula or Sudan) to the Sinai. Jethro prays to God and stuff and pulls Moses aside to tell him, “Bro, you do a lotta work here. Why not create a group of judges to do your hard work and they only bring important stuff to you?” Moses liked that idea and dapped up Jethro as Jethro returned home.

So the Israelites start wandering until they get to Mount Sinai. Moses tells everybody to wait for a sign from God. Suddenly a loud Shofar blasts a sound like this. It’s louder than anything anybody has ever heard ever (until South Africa 2010 World Cup). Clouds appear along with thunder and lightning and God shouts the ten commandments to Moses.

They are:

1) Belief in God.

2) Not to worship idols.

3) Not to take God’s name in vain.

4) To keep the Shabbat.

5) To honor parents.

6) Not to murder, 7) commit adultery, 8) steal, 9) bear false witness, or 10) covet another’s property.

I think this parsha is really cool, as well as not that cool. I think it’s got good messages from giving advice to living your life according to a set of rules. I don’t like that the advice Jethro gives is to set up a hierarchy. I think it’s really important to take a step back and look at the commandments. Personally, I think it’s very important to look at your life and make sure there is some purpose or some guidelines to base it off of. Think of something like a thesis statement or a lead in a newspaper

article that the rest of the writing refers back to. In addition, I think we need to think about Habonim Dror and always be contemplating whether our pillars are the commandments we want to educate based upon. I think it’s always important to be challenging any beliefs; reaffirming any beliefs is the key to strengthening them.

Now, here are a few questions to ponder: What are your ten commandments to live by? How can we apply the ten commandments to Habonim Dror? Is the hierarchy Jethro suggested for the judges undermining to the Jewish community at that time? Is hierarchy sometimes positive? How can we connect our communal commandments (or pillars) more as a movement?

I know I enjoy having a base set of pillars to educate upon, but I always try to investigate and take my own meaning.