Musings on the Passing of an Isha Gedolah
by Dovid Kornreich I was waiting until the passing of her Sheloshim to see what the blogworld would have to say about Rebbetzin Batsheva Kanievsky’s life and unique impact on the Chareidi world before...
Category: Morality
The Legacy of Alter Chanoch Jeger, a”h
Two months ago, I spent Shabbos with my friend Rabbi Aryeh Zev Ginsburg and his family in Cedarhurst. We were joined by the Ginzburgs’ daughter Ilana and son-in-law Yudi Jeger, and their children Alter...
Running, Racism and Resentment
When I recounted seeing a small group of unusually dressed men in shul last Sunday in Staten Island and realizing that they were trying to catch a minyan before participating in the New York...
Exercising the Empathy Muscle
Politicians are often subject to derision, often for good reason. Recently, though, a Catholic cleric hurled an unusual and creative insult at local politicos: They are like Jews. Edward Gilbert, the leader of the...
The Ugly Side of Idealism
On the tenth anniversary of 9/11, P.J. O’Rourke described the mass murder as “an act of idealism.” Not idealism as we colloquially use the term to refer to the ability to place other values...
Celebrating Diversity
I was also at a Shiva this week — a member of our community lost his brother, who lived in Israel, after a long illness. Their family is from Iraq, and praying in his...
Rewriting the Past
Bar Ilan University Milton scholar William Kolbrener has a profound meditation on Yom Kippur and teshuva (repentance) in his new collection of essays, Open Minded Torah. He begins by noting a profound distinction between...
Meaningless Ritual
The original founders of the “Jewish Friends of Reform,” in Germany of 1843, invited to join them “all who do not accord any authority or obligatory power to the confused and frequently meaningless rabbinical...
Litigious Society, or Litigious Road to Anarchy?
Here is a short course on how you personally can help destroy the economy. First, find an obscure clause in a federal regulation which legally prohibits something in the business to consumer relationship, although...
Who Will Live?
Shortly after the end of World War II, a modern-looking young man, sporting a large chup, was brought to the Klausenberger Rebbe zt”l, in one of the displaced persons camps. “I heard that before...
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