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A few days ago, I found an interesting piece written by Rabbi David Golinkin about the origins of the Dreidel and its connection to Hanukkah. According to Rabbi Golinkin, in the past, some Rabbis claimed that the Dreidel was used by children as they were doing their best to fool the Greeks. …
In 1951, the American writer Ray Bradbury published a short story called “The Fog Horn.” It told the story of two guys working at a remote lighthouse in Lonesome Bay. As the night came in and the fog began to thicken, the workers added to the lighthouse the use of a horn to guide the pos…
In his book When all you ever wanted isn’t enough, Rabbi Harold Kushner shares that, years ago, he “was sitting on a beach one summer day, watching two children, a boy and a girl, playing in the sand. They were hard at work building an elaborate sand castle by the water’s edge, with ga…
In 1982, Rabbi David Hartman wrote a powerful essay titled, “Auschwitz or Sinai?” There, Hartman asks himself about the defining event that should be shaping our Jewish identities today.
During a big part of the last seventy-five years, the Shoah took that role. In the aftermath of…
There is no doubt that, if you are a child, your favorite part of the Passover Seder is related to the Afikoman. Technically speaking, Afikoman is not a very Jewish word. Like Karpas – which is Greek for fresh raw vegetables or for what we define as hors d’ouvres – Afikoman is one of …
In the Talmud, the basic unit of meaningful learning is the chevrutah, or studying with a partner. All throughout the classic Jewish sources we see Rabbis coming together to discuss different topics. The most famous of these rabbinic pairs was the one put together by Hillel and Shammai. The…
At times, the Talmud can be a bit technical. Pages over pages with discussions that can test the patience of those willing to spend some time learning from this ancient fountain of wisdom. Sometimes it can be hard to just keep it up. And yet, in the midst of so much argument and debate o…
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Not every Sunday a Rabbi walks into a church, let alone to get his third shot of the vaccine against Covid-19. However that is exactly what happened a few weeks ago when I walked the few blocks from home to Blakemore United Methodist Church to get my booster. At first, I didn…
Among the many different challenges facing contemporary American Judaism, I believe that our biggest threat is related to what we know as Jewish literacy. It is true that antisemitism is on the rise and that assimilation is growing as well. Although we live probably in the best of times to …
