Two issues arise in the Torah portion for this week that challenge our notions of where and when God is found.
Terumah, or “donated gifts,” are required of the people on their desert journey from Egypt to the Land of Israel in order to build a place that the Law can be housed while the people […]
This morning I spent an hour at Poly Prep, a high school in Bay Ridge I’ve been visiting every year for the last ten years or so, to explain Judaism to a World Religions class of juniors and seniors.
The teacher has become a fine acquaintance, a wonderfully warm and good hearted guy who lets me […]
Yesterday I led a Shabbat discussion over at the Kane Street Synagogue in Cobble Hill as part of a new initiative there called Synaplex.
Basically, the idea of Synaplex is to create, as it sounds, multiple offerings on Shabbat morning. In this model, no longer is one given the single choice of services […]
If I were writing aliyah propaganda for young Jews who are inclined to get themselves involved with contemporary issues in Israel through their interest in social action, I’d highlight two stories from this weekend’s Haaretz.
One is an interview with Tzvia Greenfield, an orthodox woman and professor of philosophy who is running for the Knesset on […]
David Remnick’s article in this week’s New Yorker on the Hamas rise to power is a must read and in New Yorker’s website, you can read an interview with Remnick about the story.
Though not the first to write about this complicated development in the conflict between Israel and Palestine, Remnick puts the key […]
Mostly listening.
That’s how I describe my transitional work as I begin to actively think through the days leading up to my becoming Senior Rabbi at Beth Elohim.
Mostly listening, combined with optimistic talk of all the potential for making Jewish life in this community both fun and meaningful.
Many synagogues, like the one I’m going to work […]
One particular game of connect the dots that’s of interest is the dual occurrence of yesterday’s Supreme Court decision to hear the Bush Administration’s appeal on late term abortions and Jewish Women Watching’s PR activist gimmick sending vibrators to Jewish communal leaders to create a “buzz” about reproductive rights.
Lest anyone doubt where Justice Roberts and […]
Ruth Messinger of the AJWS, who has been teamed with Nicholas Kristof of the NYTimes to keep the genocide in Darfur on the radar screen of American political activism, announced this week the date for the Save Darfur Rally in Washington April 30th of this year.
I intend to do what I can to see that […]
George Mosse’s history class in Madison was the first place that I saw and understood in close detail the complicated nature of anti-semitic cartoons.
In one of Mosse’s great works, Toward the Final Solution: A History of European Racism, he analyzes a variety of illustrations of Jews from the 18th, 19th and 20th centuries which […]
One of my “Jethros” was a philosophy professor at the University of Wisconsin named Patrick Riley. Let’s assume, for the sake of argument, that he was raised a Catholic. I have a suspicion that he wasn’t a practicing Catholic any longer and instead found his meaning in Political Philosophy, which he taught with […]