The Helicopter Left Behind
I think that now, weeks since the mortal remains of this generation’s most reviled mass-murderer were offered to fish and crustaceans, it’s safe to bring up an important Jewish thought that should have occurred...
Category: General
A Well-Trained Seal
The article below, reprinted with permission from the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, was distributed by that news service to its subscribers. There is something ironic, to put it politely, about an effort championing ethics that...
Black Like Us
The Chasam Sofer (Rabbi Moshe Sofer, 1762–1839) probably never saw a black person. There weren’t likely very many in 19th century central Europe. But he certainly knew they existed. After all, they are mentioned...
Vehi SheAmda, How do you pronounce it?
How do you sing the paragraph in the Hagaddah Vehi SheAmda? Is it Vehi SheAmda LavoSeinu (Ashkenazic) or LavoTeinu (Sefardic) pronunciation ? In Israel a duet, that has BOTH pronunciations simultaneously has become very...
Springtime for Hamas
It wasn’t reported as a stand-alone piece in The New York Times or Washington Post for some reason, but on March 19 Hamas security agents raided the Gaza offices of Reuters, seized reporters’ cameras,...
A Song From Beyond
My dear mother, of blessed memory, has been gone for 22 years. Her yahrtzeit, the Jewish anniversary of her passing, 22 Adar I, fell on a Shabbos this year, several weeks ago. All who...
Ice Storm Insight
Most of us have paused at the fact that, at least from our limited perspective, Hashem seems to present two very different “faces”: on the one hand, He is the Merciful Lifegiver, the Forgiver of sin and Bestower of blessings; on the other, the Lawgiver.
Mindless Purity
Mama Jean, I realized, had sensed what the rabbis of the Talmud teach: that a person’s true character is evident in “his cup”—in how he acts when intoxicated. She had perceived Klal Yisrael.
Agudath Israel Statement on Brutal Murders in Itamar
March 14, 2010 STATEMENT OF AGUDATH ISRAEL OF AMERICA REGARDING THE BRUTAL MURDERS IN ITAMAR Every person with a Jewish heart—in fact every person with an unsullied human heart—feels only sorrow, anguish and outrage...
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