Rabbi Zechariah Fendel z”l
I note with great sadness the petirah last week of Rabbi Zechariah Fendel z”l. In the days before Artscroll made everything accessible to us, Rabbi Fendel was one of the first to understand the...
Jewish Traits Gone Bad
I have long suspected that the Jewish stereotypes invoked by comedians, impolite pundits, and anti-Semites contain some grain of truth. After all, even a powerfully positive middah, or personal trait, can, if mangled or...
Sarah Palin and the State of Halachic Discourse
Last week, Sarah Palin went from looking very bad to looking very victimized. How and why that happened may shed some light on the conduct of an internecine dispute in progress on organ donation...
Bar Kamtza Should Not Have Been Invited to This Event Either:
On Brain Death, Cardiac Death, Defining Halakhic Death, and Trying to Hurt Torah Jews Who Disagree with You Dov Fischer Fair-minded people are torn by the subject of when a dying person has passed...
Do We Really Need Another Round of Shafran v. Rosenblum?
One of my wittier friends commented that my recent exchange with Avi Shafran on President Obama’s Israel policy struck him as a mental health issue. “I mean its not like you and Avi are...
Getting a Second Opinion
We are all poorer for not realizing that greater gain is to be had from meeting another point of view than from exulting in having one’s own opinions duly seconded.
Missed Message
My dear and esteemed friend Jonathan Rosenblum has taken me to task in Yated Ne’eman for an Ami Magazine essay I wrote entitled “Our Not So Humble Opinions.” My thesis was that it behooves...
No Monopolies on Altruism
A response to my piece on Meyer Dagan was too thought-provoking to languish in a combox, so I am elevating it to full post status: Dear Rabbi Adlerstein: I was very moved by your...
Heidi and Mendy – the Lomdus
Making the best of a bad situation is almost a capsule summary of galus history. One tool that we have used effectively is turning every new challenge into a forum for Torah discussion. The...
We Need Mashiach Now!
by Dovid Landesman Is it possible to function as an independent community without mashiach? Or, are there problems and dilemmas that remain unsolvable before his arrival? The Talmud (Ketubot 111a) recounts that there are...