Rabbi Yossi Newfield grew up in the heart of the Chabad-Lubavitch community in Crown Heights, Brooklyn. He is currently working on a memoir on his formative years within the Chabad Movement.
Yossi Newfield
By Yossi Newfield
-
Yiddish World Chaim Grade’s last Yiddish novel ‘Sons and Daughters’ finally available in English
The book can be seen as a Holocaust memorial, as its events seem to foreshadow the upcoming annihilation of Polish Jewry
-
Yiddish World The British Chief Rabbi that never was
Rabbi Louis Jacobs was ostracized by the British Orthodox rabbinate but his view of Jewish theology resonated for me
-
Yiddish World I was sure the sun revolved around the Earth. That’s what they taught us in yeshiva.
To get a secular education, my grandmother had to tutor me in basic English and math
-
Yiddish World Former rabbinical student recalls the moment his belief in the Lubavitcher Rebbe vanished
Yossi Newfield was a firm believer until a former teacher pointed out what Maimonides had written about the requirements for the messiah.
-
Yiddish World How I, a Chabadnik, discovered Chaim Grade’s novels
In the Chabad yeshiva in Crown Heights, where I was a student in the early 1980s, Yiddish literature was non-existent. Sure, we spoke Yiddish in school and we read the text of the Rebbe’s Yiddish sermons, but Yiddish literature was never mentioned. Then again, we didn’t read English literature either. We studied the Torah, Talmud,…
-
Culture The Night We Lost The Messiah Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson
The balcony curtains suddenly parted. The Rebbe sat motionless surrounded by his three trusted rabbinical aides. On cue, the singing and chanting began: “Long live our Master, Teacher and Rebbe, King Messiah, Forever and Ever!” Hundreds of men dressed in black suits stood shoulder to shoulder on the synagogue floor craning their necks towards the…
-
Community My father had an MD from Harvard. How could he deprive me of an education?
When I was 14 years old, my father gave me a small, tattered book that was printed in 1829 by the Maskilim, the Jewish secular intellectuals. The book was part of a journal published by the Enlightenment Movement in Eastern Europe called “Bikurei Haitim.” When my father gave me the book, I was attending Oholei…
-
Community NYC Is Cracking Down On Yeshivas — And The Satmar Rebbe Has Declared War
For years now, the Hasidic community has feigned compliance with New York State Education laws. While Hasidic yeshivot don’t typically provide much secular education at all, they have at least claimed that they were complying with the law. However, a recent speech by the Satmar Rebbe Aron Teitelbaum disabuses once and for all the notion…
Explore
Most Popular
- 1
Fast Forward Unarmed man who tackled Bondi Beach Hanukkah attacker identified as Ahmed al-Ahmed
- 2
Opinion I grew up believing Australia was the best place to be Jewish. This Hanukkah shooting forces a reckoning I do not want.
- 3
News Holocaust denier Nick Fuentes admits ‘at least 6 million’ Jews were killed in Nazi Germany
- 4
Fast Forward Hanukkah shooting leaves at least 15 dead at Australia’s most popular beach
In Case You Missed It
-
News Australia’s Jewish community is defined by Holocaust survivors, Yiddishkeit, and immigrants
-
Opinion Australia welcomed my family’s Holocaust survivors — and Bondi Beach soon became a symbol of renewal for me
-
Fast Forward Sydney Opera House lit by giant menorah as vigils for Bondi Beach victims take place across Australia
-
Fast Forward Columbia professor Mahmood Mamdani, father of NYC Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani, criticizes university over antisemitism and protests
-
Shop the Forward Store
100% of profits support our journalism
