Do We All Believe in the Same G-d? Do Muslims?
Back in the old days, America’s religious checkerboard came in only two colors – Jewish and Christian. This was never true, of course, but we liked to think it was. The perception left room...
Hashem Helps the Givers
In 1971, a Chassidishe yungerman with $500 in extra money from his wedding decided to start a gemach. By the late ‘80s, that gemach was lending over ten million dollars a year. How did...
A bad idea that won’t go away
Recent years have witnessed repeated pleas for liberalization of the standards of conversion to Judaism. Most often those demands center on the State of Israel where the Chief Rabbinate still maintains authority over conversions...
Hypocrisy, Thy Name is Meretz
Another gem from Jameel: The winter session of the Knesset is now in session. MK Chaim Oron (Meretz) ascended the podium of Israel’s parliament and proposed a new law: Any person who attempts to...
Not Always Divine
The horrific murder of five Amish schoolgirls and the response to those murders by the Amish community has attracted extensive news coverage and inspired much meaningful commentary. Perhaps the most thought provoking interchange centered...
Look what the wind blew in
Today, Hoshana Raba — the seventh day of Sukkos — is the anniversary of the day all the sukkos in North Miami Beach blew away, exactly one year ago. Three days earlier, the weather...
Pre-Hoshana Rabba Apologies
Before the gates and books are closed on Hoshana Rabba, I would like to make the following amends. 1) Apologies to Rahel Jaskow . Yaakov Menken and others were unfairly harsh with Rahel Jaskow...
An Unworldly Stillness
We each have our own memory highlights of the recently concluded Days of Awe: the Shofar of Rosh Hashana; the magnificent symphony of that day’s Musaf Amida; penetrating prayers like “Who shall live and...
Was Ezra haredi?
Was Biblical Ezra the Scribe ultra-Orthodox? What lies behind this seemingly silly question is a set of serious questions: When did Torah-observant Jewry divide into Orthodox, modern Orthodox, ultra-Orthodox, etc.? Were Moshe Rabbenu, Ezra...
A Jewish Answer to Neturei Karta
This answer was just posted to JewishAnswers yesterday. I don’t know who wrote it, but it could have been most anyone in the JewishAnswers group. I would be interested to know what you think...