Readers will enjoy Rabbi Dr. Nachum Amsel’s 2025 301-page book, “Jewish Values in the Torah Portion,” published by Gefen Publishing House. Rabbi Amsel writes interestingly and openly about subjects that will fascinate readers.

Rabbi Amsel is the Director of Education at Rabbi Berel Wein’s Destiny Foundation, which aims to excite and entertain people with Jewish history.

He devotes each of his fifty-four chapters to the fifty-four portions Jews read weekly from the Torah each year. Rather than attempting to prove he is a scholar, what he does not need to confirm, or tell readers mystical or sermonic lessons, he devotes each chapter of generally five pages to a single fundamental Jewish value, which he examines at length insightfully.

Among the fifty-four values Rabbi Amsel discusses are how to live forever, whether Judaism is a culture or religion, the attitude to less observant Jews, the primacy of the Land of Israel, keeping a Jewish name, the Jewish attitude to animals, God, prophecy, lying, dreams, war, revenge, time, jealousy, holiness, birthdays, family, and antisemitism.

For example, the biblical portion Behar examines eight Jewish thoughts that prohibit making people feel bad. It gives examples from various Jewish sources, such as the biblical and talmudic commentator Rashi, born in 1040.

Rashi tells readers the lesson of

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