The Eidah would have requested the same of any employee, regardless of skin color, whose Jewish status required further investigation in the view of its rabbis. Conversely, if an Ethiopian converted with the rabbinical court of the Eidah Ha-Hareidit, the Badatz would have absolutely no hesitation whatsoever about his or her handling wine.
When Justice Anthony Kennedy announced his retirement from the Supreme Court, many immediately predicted the worst. NPR’s Nina Totenberg, channeling R.E.M., proclaimed it “the end of the world as we know it.” After President Trump nominated Judge Brett...
An article I wrote for Haaretz, which was published earlier this week, about attacks on some Chassidic yeshivos for the limitations of their secular studies programs, can be read here. If you don’t subscribe...
Hamodia opted to not publish my column submission for this week, but I share it here. The two thirds of the American populace that objected to the policy of removing children from their illegal...
A “scandalous letter” in the files of Israel’s official rabbinate “reflects ignorance,” delivers “a severe blow” to Israel’s relations with Diaspora Jewry and “abandons the religious system in Israel to haredi hands.” Thus spake...
The first ordination banquet of the Hebrew Union College of Reform Judaism did not go smoothly. A group of invited rabbis opened their menus, realized that the first course was to be little-neck clams, and immediately left. Fast forward 125 years, and once again the abandonment of Jewish values was too profound for some of those invited to bear.
While Democrats and Republicans were trading verbal punches – and misinformation – about immigrant children last week, an adult immigrant riveted the attention of a crowd, and then the world, as he saved a...
An article I wrote for Haaretz about Israel’s official rabbinate “blacklisting” some American rabbis, disallowing their vouching for people’s Jewish credentials can be read here. Even if you’re not a Haaretz subscriber or registrant, if...
In a recent, now infamous, speech PA President Mahmoud Abbas turned his attention to history’s favorite target: the Jews. This is no surprise, as the very name “Palestine” has always served to dissociate the Jews from their homeland.
I had the honor of making two public presentations in recent days, one to second grade students at the impressive Yeshiva Beth Yehudah in Southfield, Michigan; and the other, to students and members of...
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