In fact, because I am very time conscious and want to make the most of every moment, I make it a practice to remove my watch before I light the candles as if to suggest that for this brief period, my life must transcend time.

I love going to synagogue on Friday night and being swept in the melodies. Everyone seems more friendly and unburdened by the week and ready to be taken elsewhere.

I took to religion at about age 12 it was very hard for me to be Sabbath observant as a kid in a home which was not Sabbath observant. I think my parents thought the whole Jewish thing was a phase.

In order to survive, the human race must defend itself.

If we are indeed created in God's image, then we, too, must create and then we, too, must rest.

I don't read or write SF for cutting edge ideas I read and write it for the storytelling, and every story is new. So have I brought anything new to it? Only in so far as no-one before has written about the characters I've invented in their particular situation.

In every life there is a challenge. For every challenge that I take on, if I follow through, I accomplish. When I have accomplished, then I have achieved. If I achieve, than I can proudly say I did my job well.

I love lighting Shabbat candles at the onset of Shabbat. It helps me create a strong and firm demarcation of time.

For me, study is a divine and daily imperative, and I study a page of Talmud daily so that I am not only teaching. My teaching is constantly being fed by my learning.

If our writing is worth anything at all, then we have to put ourselves into it.

I would advise anyone who is at the start of a rest ritual like the Sabbath, to take it slowly and grow incrementally into it. Recognize that it will be hard at first. It's a discipline but then it is a true and deep joy.