This week’s parsha includes three very interesting and seemingly totally impractical laws: to listen to prophets, to appoint a king and to make three additional ‘cities of refuge’ for unintentional murderers bringing the total to nine. By Rabbi Tuvia Bolton • Full Article

This week’s double section begins with the commandment of ‘Shmita’. This means that farmers in Israel can work the land only six years in a row and then must stop for one year of rest in the seventh ‘Shmita’ year. Something like the commandment to rest on the Shabbat; first we work six days then on the seventh we rest. But here it seems to be written in the wrong order! • Full Article