Author: Yaakov Menken

2

A Dubious Milestone

Less than two weeks ago, I mentioned that the akismet spam blocker included in WordPress had trapped over 80,000 spams to our blog comments. We just hit 100,000. It’s an honor we could do...

36

Honesty on Patrilineal Descent

Most would agree that the single most consistent and dangerous flashpoint in the Orthodox-Heterodox divide is the issue of “Who is a Jew.” Much of the animosity and anger that the heterodox feel about...

22

UK Soldiers in Captivity

There’s little time to write during the holiday, of course, but the news of the moment surrounds the British marines and naval personnel captured and then recently released by Iran. The news reports say...

23

A Tale of Two Synagogues

While the byline may be mine, both the title and much of the content herein were contributed by Rabbi Dovid Katz, of Beth Abraham Congregation here in Baltimore. His drasha this morning related to...

2

Enhancing SiteRecommender

Fighting web comment spam continues to be a major issue with popular blogs. We installed the ‘akismet’ tool for WordPress on January 2, 2006, and by July 14 it had trapped over 10,000 spams....

17

So What Do We Think About Non-Orthodox Jews?

A week ago, Agudath Israel proudly announced that Scholastic Library Publishing was recalling and reprinting an educational book for middle-grade children. “Enchantment of the World” is a series on “a country’s history, people and...

6

But If You’re Going to be Jewish About It…

Today’s mail included a cylindrical package from the Forward. In addition to a commemorative poster, said package contained the following “Dear Friends” invitation to advertise in their upcoming commemorative issue: As you are undoubtedly...

80

The Wonders of Leaving Observance

An alert reader caught it on Friday, but in case you didn’t get to see it, it was featured on the JPost all weekend: a celebration of the “former haredim who broke out of...

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