The Modern Orthodox Straw Man
By Avrohom Gordimer There are times when one must take a firm stand and stake out a principled position, or deal with what may be the nightmarish consequences of not standing strong. And there...
Category: Judaism
The Official Unofficial Response to the Unofficial Official Video
Who’s on first? I would score this as a victory for the team that batted second. It is thoroughly in good taste. It also, ironically, leaves no room for the genuine anti-charedi haters. It...
A Follow-Up to My Post on Gay Rights
The comments on my previous post on this subject make a number of useful points. In the aggregate, however, they do not deal with what I am getting at, namely that the gay rights...
The Rally Clip
[The clip has been removed from YouTube. Kudos to all those responsible, which includes those who realized how toxic the message was, and how counterproductive it was to the stated objectives of the atzeret...
“A Next Step” – Round Two
[YA – Dr. Finkelman submitted a long comment that can best be handled by turning it into a post, with my bracketed reactions to him embedded.] A handful of initial responses. As for social...
Response To “A Next Step”
Chevra – Let’s try to address your concerns serially. The phenomenal growth of the Orthodox community hardly touches the issue of the korbanos we lost to the heterodox movements. While Orthodoxy grew, that growth...
A Next Step in Debating Partnership Minyanim
By Chaim Saiman and Yoel Finkelman [Editor’s Note: Publishing what follows may seem out of character for Cross-Currents. While it does not violate our editorial policy, it does challenge what has become a theme...
Much Ado About “Ultra”
The Forward recently published an article of mine about the term “Ultra-Orthodox.” You can read it here . A response to it, by Professor Samuel Heilman, is here . And, finally, a rejoinder is...
Is There a Way to Deal with Gay Rights?
The Times Book Review of this past Sunday has a terrific piece by Fareed Zakaria on George F. Kennan’s diaries. In 1994, when Kennan was ninety, he noted America’s “pathological preoccupation with sex and...
On the making of Constitutional Arrangements
by Raphael Davidovich In the latest attempt to quell the ongoing culture wars in Israel, Israeli Justice Minister Tzipi Livni last year gave Law Professor Ruth Gavison a formidable task. Gavison was asked to...
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