Plagues Past and Present
It’s been some 700 years since the bubonic plague ravaged central Asia, killing millions of people. A decade or two later, in October, 1347, a ship from the Crimea docked in Messina, Sicily. Rats...
Category: Judaism
My Purim’s Highlight
My Purim’s highlight this year was an interaction I had with two little boys, no older than 8 or 9. The shul I attend is often visited by a number of “collectors” asking for...
Masquerading as Feminism
Due to circumstances beyond my control, I didn’t have a column in Hamodia this week, but thought I’d post a Purim-themed thought I wrote several years ago. A joyous and meaningful Purim to all!...
Pathologized Problems
It seems that a good part of my youth was spent in a mental asylum without walls. At least that’s how some mental health professionals might characterize it. Among the boys in my neighborhood...
A Misleading Morph
I’ll never forget coming across the phrase “the Holocaust” – complete with the definite article and capitalized second word – in, of all things, a translation of the Mishnah. More unnerving still was that...
Are Attacks on Curricula Related to Attacks on Jews?
A piece I wrote for the Jewish Telegraphic Agency about the dovetailing of anti-Orthodox sentiment and violence against visibly observant Jews is can be read here.
Abhorrent Action at a Distance
Direct physical attacks on Jews have, and for good reason, unfortunately, dominated the news in recent weeks. But there have been other kinds of attacks on innocent people who are perceived to be Jewish....
Anti-Anti Semitism
The well-known British doctor and pundit Jonathan Miller, who died last month, felt he had the solution to anti-Semitism. He was quoted in a 1985 book as asserting that, to end Jew-hatred, “the Jew...
The Small, Soft Sound of Teshuvah
Today’s young people are different. They do search for meaning and depth, but not in unconventional places or with charismatic spiritualists. They do so while enduring a roller coaster of highs and lows, aliyos and yeridos, moments of deep inspiration mixed with a lot of self doubt.
Why Jews Worry
Some racial or national stereotypes are outright falsehoods. Mexicans may take siestas (as do many Israelis) during the hottest time of the day, but all the workers from south of the border whom I’ve...
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