Arafat’s Posthumous Victory
Something about the scene struck me as completely incongruous. The members of the second Am Echad delegation – a group of concerned American Jews representing a wide spectrum of American Orthodoxy – were gathered...
What the snake knew
The woman said to the Serpent, . . . “Of the fruit of the tree which is in the center of the garden, G-d has said: ‘You shall neither eat of it nor touch...
A visit to Sochaczew
Last week, I fulfilled a long-held desire – to visit the ruins of the Jewish cemetery in Sochaczew, a town some 40 miles west of Warsaw. With a Jewish population of over 3000 prior...
Ann Coulter and the Jewish Problem
Those not hiding in a cave or immersed entirely in Torah study for the past two days — and in either case, why would you then be reading Cross-Currents? — are undoubtedly aware that...
Star Power
The symbol commonly known as the Magen David (“Shield of David”) or more colloquially as the “Jewish Star,” is the subject of an unusual responsum written by Rabbi Moshe Feinstein in 1968 (Igrot Moshe,...
Is a Blog the Ultimate Bully Pulpit?
I don’t know, but I sure hope so. That way I can hype a new weekly shiur on a sefer very close to heart: Nesivos Shalom. I don’t fully understand why people don’t just...
Stop Jack Wertheimer – I
Stop him before he writes again. At least that’s what they must be saying up in Morningside Heights in the inner sanctum of the Conservative movement, in the wake of his latest Commentary salvo,...
John Hagee and the Future Course of American Jewry
It is remarkable that the staunch defender of middle of the road American Judaism, the prim and proper Hadassah Magazine, would do a positive interview with John Hagee (October, pg. 32; not yet online)....
So Who Was Behind 9/11, Dick?
Dancing this past Simchas Torah to Toras Hashem Temimah, we arrived at the words “eidus Hashem ne’emanah, machkimas pesi” and the following occurred to me: Elsewhere, the possuk defines a pesi as a “ma’amin...
Our lives in our hands on Sukkos
A little-known rabbinical source explores the relationship between Rosh HaShanah, Yom Kippur and Sukkos: Said Rebbi El’ozor ben Meriom: why do we make a sukkah after Yom Kippur? To teach that since on Rosh...