A group of young American Reform Jews recently sent a letter to Reform leader Eric Yoffie, requesting that the movement “condemn the IDF’s killing of unarmed Lebanese and Palestinian civilians, as well as its...
One of our avid readers brought the following quote to my attention. It doesn’t say anything we don’t already know, but it should humble us mere mortals who would never put things so elegantly...
In an article on Jewish World Review this morning, Caroline Glick discusses the latest possible media hoax — Israel’s “attack” on a Reuters camera crew. You can read the details there, but in brief,...
With the beginning of the Hebrew month of Elul, the Shofar blasts sound at the conclusion of the morning prayers. As described by Maimonides, these blasts arouse us from the slumber and force us...
Usually I post my thoughts, and then sit back and watch readers pick them apart — or, as is more often the case, pick one another apart over matters having only a tangential relationship...
A few days ago, Rabbi Menken offered his reasons for blogging, and essentially his raison d’etre for Cross-Currents. I respectfully dissent. I will beg the forgiveness of readers who turn to these pages looking...
It was the Alter of Novarodok who said: “The accepted wisdom is that worldly people have this world, while the people of Torah have the World-to-Come. He who learns Musar knows that the worldly...
Mathematicians don’t easily get excited. When my Shabbos-after-mincha chavrusa (Torah study partner) Dr Barry Simon told me with some urgency that I must read a fascinating article in the current issue of the New...
Whether or not Israel actually lost the war, the recent Israel/Lebanon war surely resulted in a less than preferred outcome for the Jewish people. Young Jewish souls were lost. Soldiers remain kidnapped. Property was...
Just a handful of years ago, a number of orthodoxies were taken for granted by many. Global anti-Semitism (outside of the Arab world) was on the decline. Given events of the Holocaust, Jews still...
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