Category: Judaism

I am jealous of the scholarship of Dr Marc Shapiro – even when I often disagree with his conclusions. He never lets the reader down in amassing a huge amount of relevant material regarding...

A Test of Wills An ancient Midrash recounts a conversation between Ishmael and Isaac. Ishmael asserts his superiority over Isaac on the grounds that his circumcision took place at 13, when he was fully...

My host for Shabbos lunch on a recent trip to Baltimore told me a story that I have already repeated many times. After high school, Shlomo learned for two years in Yeshivat Kerem B’Yavneh...

[Editor’s note: Steve Brizel is a frequent commenter to Cross-Currents, besides being a regular presence on Beyond Teshuva and Hirhurim. (As a long-time NCSY stalwart, and a regular mispallel at the shul of an...

The Old Gray Lady isn’t cute when she’s angry. Quite the opposite, in fact. The New York Times editorial page’s longstanding antagonism to the Bush Administration is well documented. Still, the only dignified editorial...

All of us in the Cross-Currents community should be appreciative of Rabbi Angel’s courteous and professional manner in continuing this discussion. For readers familiar with forums that are little more than soapboxes for the...

[Editor’s note: An earlier post took issue with some of the ideas expressed in an article in the Forward by Rabbi Angel. He requested an opportunity to respond, which of course was gladly granted.]...

I can’t say that I didn’t find the YES commercial insanely funny. That is not to my credit. There is so much mockery of Torah, of traditional values in the clip that by right,...

Many of us will have come across presentations of Hanukah that portray it as the anniversary of the ultimate victory of Jewish history – that of Judaism over the secular culture of the time....

At the height of the ongoing controversy over shmita observance, an editorial appeared in this paper (“Shmita pragmatism,” Sept. 18) celebrating the heter mechira as the essential manifestation “of the religious Zionist ethos.” The...