Category: Judaism

Since Rosh HaShanah, we have said the beautiful prayer Avinu Malkenu – our Father, our King – numerous times. Painfully aware of our inadequacies, we approach God, our benevolent father and ruler, and beg...

by William Kolbrener The Rosh Hashana musaf prayer is the longest prayer in the liturgical cycle. In addition to the sections of the t’filah which characterize the other prayers from the High Holidays, there...

I was terribly saddened by the memoir of R.Tzvi Meisels, ztz”l describing his blowing shofar in Auschwitz in 1944. I have, however, questions which really bother me. So began a challenge from Dr.Tzvia Greenfield,...

It was an exercise in purely fanciful speculation, but it led to much productive discussion of what it means to be mamlich Hashem – to coronate G-d on Rosh Hashanah. I asked my guests...

Rav Dessler, following the Vilna Gaon, learns the opening words of ya’aleh ve’yavo as descriptive of a process of ascent that brings our neshama ever closer to HaKadosh Baruch Hu. The seven terms of...

From the memoirs of Rabbi Zvi Hirsch Meisels, ztz”l describing Rosh Hashanah 1944: “The experience of one transport that left Auschwitz is seared in my memory. With the grace of HASHEM I was miraculously...

My other favorite publication, Jewish Action, just released its fall issue. It contains a revisiting of the Codes controversy, in the form of a Sarah Shapiro interview with Harold Gans. (I’ve been trying to...

The more important something is to us, writes the Avnei Nezer, the greater the preparation we will devote to it. Athletes prior to a major competition or an important game, for instance, will train...

Not much competition, really. Eveybody wins. For many of us, no yom tov is properly observed without some immersion in the special works that lead to a deeper appreciation of the special quality of...

We owe much to Rabbi Eli Teitelbaum. Not just because he gave us an excuse to stop talking about Noah Feldman. Not really for the substance of his remarks, either. Many readers of CC...