Conversions of Convenience, or Conversions of Commitment?
Lost in all the incendiary rhetoric are some basic facts about the conversion procedures of most US Reform and Conservative rabbis.
Author: Emanuel Feldman
Haiti and the Mind of G-d
I am not able to worship a G-d Whose ways are all crystal clear to me – attributed to the Kotzker Rebbe (1787-1859) The ways of G-d are hidden and mysterious; they have never...
Real Money
The late senator Everett Dirksen of Illinois once famously said to Lyndon Johnson about the national debt: “A few billion here, a few billion there and before you know it, you’re talking real money…”...
Spiritual Fast Food
Were it not so sad, the image of the pop singer teaching Kabbala to the Yankee third baseman could be a comic invention – the once-impregnable fortress of Kabbala overrun by fools and miscreants. The unkindest cut of all is that the headlines link Kabbala with two individuals who are not even Jewish and certainly have no Judaic learning whatsoever, who cannot read or understand a Hebrew word, who cannot even pronounce the word “Kabbala” correctly, who know nothing of its provenance, and whose closest encounter with things Jewish is the corner deli.
How to reply when the doorbell rings
Many years ago, while a rabbi in Atlanta, I answered a knock on my door one Shabbat afternoon. Standing in front of me was a fine-looking couple – obviously non-Jewish. “Shabbat Shalom, rabbi,” they...
The Power of Temptation
The news these days is not at all new. It centers on man’s eternal struggle with temptation, and his occasional spectacular failings – as exemplified by ex-Gov. Eliot Spitzer of New York. The Talmudic...
As Pure as the Driven Snow
There is nothing like an early morning snow. The brown winter earth is covered by a stunning white tablecloth – pure, clean, and unsullied. As the day goes on, the snow becomes victim to...
Atonement Monopoly
At first I thought it was a joke. A Jerusalem shopping mall recently issued a glossy magazine supplement featuring its latest glitzy fashions. In the centerfold, in honor of Yom Kippur, was a Hebrew-language...
Sorry Seems to be the Hardest Word
If a Jewish Rip Van Winkle (Rip van Finkle?) were to awaken today and read the papers, he would wonder if he had ever really been asleep. Names that were in the headlines when...
The Road from Euphoria
Mired as we are in the depths of a national funk of disillusion, it is difficult to imagine the ecstasy and euphoria that swept across Israel exactly 40 years ago in the afterglow of...
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