Seeing Like Sir David

Late one night, a trip to the chemist for a sick child leads Rabbi Shlomo Levin into an unexpected conversation with theSikh pharmacist on duty, all about how to keep a beard under control. It was hardly a deep theological exchange, yet it revealed something important: whatever our religious differences, our everyday concerns are often the same. Areflection on looking beyond appearances, and on what we miss when the outside eclipses the inside.Substack: https://rabbishlomolevin.substack.comInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/rabbishlomolevinX: https://x.com/RabbiSLevinFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/rabbishlomolevinLinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/rabbishlomolevinTikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@rabbishlomolevin

In the early 1960s, script readers at Elstree Studios dismissed Ian Fleming's Bond novels as too ridiculous to film. A rival studio made Dr. No instead, and the franchise has since grossed morethan £15 billion. Rabbi Shlomo Levin argues the readers weren't wrong about the facts. They simply couldn't make the leap from what is to what could be. A reflection on excessive caution, from the wrong job held too long to the conversation we never have, and on the cost of playing it safe.Substack: https://rabbishlomolevin.substack.comInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/rabbishlomolevinX: https://x.com/RabbiSLevinFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/rabbishlomolevinLinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/rabbishlomolevinTikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@rabbishlomolevin

When a lorry sent to fill a pothole in Somerset fell straight into it, the scene became an impromptu tourist attraction. Rabbi Shlomo Levin wonders whether this comic own goal says something deeper about how we so often fall into the very potholes we set out to fix. Substack: https://rabbishlomolevin.substack.comInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/rabbishlomolevinX: https://x.com/RabbiSLevinFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/rabbishlomolevinLinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/rabbishlomolevinTikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@rabbishlomolevin

Alone in the sea off the Cape at 18, Rabbi Shlomo Levin saw a dorsal fin racing towards him. Momentslater, a dolphin surfaced beside him, smiling and ready to play. Prompted by David Attenborough's100th birthday, he reflects on that encounter and on the wonder Sir David has shared with us fordecades. How do we find the wonders all around us? A reflection on looking, and on truly seeing.Substack: https://rabbishlomolevin.substack.comInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/rabbishlomolevinX: https://x.com/RabbiSLevinFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/rabbishlomolevinLinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/rabbishlomolevinTikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@rabbishlomolevin

Growing up in apartheid South Africa, Rabbi Shlomo Levinwatched two buses climb the same hill on the same foggy morning - one new and half empty, the faces at its windows silent; the other overcrowded and falling apart, and alive with ninety voices singing in harmony. The question it raised has stayed with him for a lifetime: why wasn't it the other way around? A reflection on wealth, hardship, and where happiness actually comes from. Substack: https://rabbishlomolevin.substack.comInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/rabbishlomolevinX: https://x.com/RabbiSLevinFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/rabbishlomolevinLinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/rabbishlomolevinTikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@rabbishlomolevin

It calls him by name, knows all about him, and even wisheshim a good Sabbath in Hebrew. Rabbi Shlomo Levin traces a decades-long relationship with his computer - from floppy disks to AI - and asks what remains missing. However well a machine simulates warmth, he argues, it cannot supply the thing we recognise instantly in another person and cannot quite define.Substack: https://rabbishlomolevin.substack.comInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/rabbishlomolevinX: https://x.com/RabbiSLevinFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/rabbishlomolevinLinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/rabbishlomolevinTikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@rabbishlomolevin

A banana duct-taped to a gallery wall sold for $120,000 - until a man walked up and ate it, then calmly explained that he was an artist and this was a performance piece. Rabbi Shlomo Levin uses the story, alongside Aaron's account of the golden calf, to examine how quickly we reframe our own actions after the fact, and what that habit costs us.Substack: https://rabbishlomolevin.substack.comInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/rabbishlomolevinX: https://x.com/RabbiSLevinFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/rabbishlomolevinLinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/rabbishlomolevinTikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@rabbishlomolevin

Why are we drawn to what we can't quite see? Rabbi ShlomoLevin reflects on a house he passes on his walks - almost entirely hidden behind trees, and far more intriguing than the grand homes standing fully exposed beside it. A meditation on dignity, on what we choose to hold back, and on why what is most precious about a person can never really be displayed.Substack: https://rabbishlomolevin.substack.comInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/rabbishlomolevinX: https://x.com/RabbiSLevinFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/rabbishlomolevinLinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/rabbishlomolevinTikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@rabbishlomolevin

On a beautiful day in one of London's best parks, almosteveryone was staring at their phone instead of the view. Rabbi Shlomo Levin shares what happened when he spotted one man reading a book on a bench - a congregant observing the Jewish Sabbath's break from technology - and asks whether the rest of us need a Sabbath to reclaim the same thing.Substack: https://rabbishlomolevin.substack.comInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/rabbishlomolevinX: https://x.com/RabbiSLevinFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/rabbishlomolevinLinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/rabbishlomolevinTikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@rabbishlomolevin

What happens when you ask children to rewrite the TenCommandments in their own words? Rabbi Shlomo Levin shares the hilarious and surprisingly profound answers from a Sunday school exercise - and connects them to Passover's Four Children, and what they teach us about parenting the child in front of you, not the one you hoped for. Substack: https://rabbishlomolevin.substack.comInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/rabbishlomolevinX: https://x.com/RabbiSLevinFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/rabbishlomolevinLinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/rabbishlomolevinTikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@rabbishlomolevin