Let’s Not Cry Anti-Semitism
The trail of anti-Semitism is long and bloody; irrational hatred towards the Jewish people permeated Europe, Asia and North Africa back through ancient times. Nonetheless, one should not be overly hasty to fall back...
In Judaism, Love Doesn’t Always Win
In their rejoicing over the recent Supreme Court same-sex marriage decision, various Jewish groups grievously misrepresented Judaism. An essay of mine about the Jewish religious tradition’s true take on homosexuality and the formalization of...
Rabbi Weiss: Please Don’t Confuse Form with Substance
Winds of secession are in the air. Rabbi Avi Weiss and his disciple, Rabbi Shmuel Herzfeld, yesterday announced their immediate resignation from the Rabbinical Council of America, and Rabbi Weiss subsequently issued a broad...
The New Jacobinism
Rabbi Eli Baruch Shulman Historians wonder about the difference in outcome between the American Revolution, which resulted in a liberal democracy, and the French Revolution, which resulted in terror and tyranny. Why was the...
SCOTUS on Same-Gender: What It Means; What It Doesn’t
1) It is not true that five members of the Supreme Court conspired to do an end-run against the will of the public and the sense of the Constitution. Well, maybe the Constitution, if...
Agudath Israel Statement on Supreme Court marriage ruling
June 26, 2015 Agudath Israel of America issued the following statement in reaction to today’s 5-4 Supreme Court ruling that states are constitutionally required to permit and recognize marriages between members of the same...
Oren Gets Ornery
It’s axiomatic that diplomats must be, well, diplomatic. That might explain why Michael Oren, a current member of the Knesset (Kulanu) but who served as ambassador of Israel to the United States from 2009...
Michael Oren’s New Book and the Mendacity of the Media
What, should Cross-Currents be the only one out there not to review Michael Oren’s new book before it even hits the stores? Especially after one of our readers, Stefanie Argamon, was nice enough to...
Thoughtless Jewish Jeers
I’m trying to understand the sort of mindlessness that expressed itself in the jeering of Treasury Secretary Jacob (“Jack”) Lew by some Jews at a recent gathering. The third Jerusalem Post Annual Conference which...
Agudath Israel Statement on Charleston Murders
June 17, 2015 STATEMENT FROM AGUDATH ISRAEL OF AMERICA ON THE MURDERS IN CHARLESTON The deaths of nine people at the hand of a gunman at Charleston’s Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church is not...