- The tribe of Dan camped to the north of the Mishkan under a flag carrying the symbol of a snake. Rabbi Tzvi Price explains Dan’s seemingly unrelated associations with snakes, law and idolatry.

- Rabbi Gil Student posted a link to a Jewish Family Law Conference to be held at Fordham University Law School on February 7-8. The conference sessions seem designed to cater to the full spectrum of religious philosophies. Since I’m unable to comment on the general tenor of the conference, I am simply posting the link to Hirhurim. If I hear anything new about it, I will pass along the information.

- The one thing everyone can agree on about taxes is that it shapes behavior. Rick Newman proposes 13 great taxes that should be imposed to improve our social wellbeing, including the Jesus Tax (after Lloyd Blankfein, the Goldman CEO) to be paid by any individual who says he’s acting on God’s behalf but can’t prove it; the Overexposure Tax, to be paid by any president who shows up on TV more than five times per week; and the Twitter Tax, a $1 tax on every pointless Tweet.

I suppose some principled right-wingers might argue that the Jesus Tax and the Overexposure Tax constitute double taxation and would violate substantive due process if they thought substantive due process was a constitutional right rather than an oxymoron.