Aviya Kushner is the Forward’s language columnist and the author of Wolf Lamb Bomb and The Grammar of God.
Aviya Kushner
By Aviya Kushner
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Culture Why Israel’s Word Of The Year Is ‘Perfect’
Each time I return to Israel, a new word greets me. I usually realize somewhere around baggage claim that a previously unused word is the word of the moment — because it’s plastered on advertisements of all kinds. Whatever the word is, I soon see and hear it everywhere, and I’m always amazed and amused…
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Culture The Bible’s Coming To Public School — At Least In Kentucky
A new law in Kentucky makes it legal to teach a Bible elective course in public schools as part of the social studies curriculum. The bill easily passed the State House and Senate, and was signed by Governor Matt Bevin. The video of Bevin signing the bill is currently the most popular video on WDRB,…
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Culture So, How Do You Observe Shabbat In Reykjavik?
Shabbat lasts three days in Reykjavik, Iceland, as I discovered when I found myself there for a writing conference. Shabbat began at 11:16 p.m. on Friday night, according to Chabad’s ever-helpful online calendar that lists candle-lighting times around the world, and finally ended at 1:27 on Sunday morning. Travelers to Iceland in summer often remark…
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Culture Why Do People Call Arson ‘Jewish Lightning’ — And Is It Anti-Semitic?
A highly-specific act of insurance fraud, explained.
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Culture What Do The Talmud And Torah Really Say About Trump’s Lies?
We are living in an age when world leaders regularly deny historical facts — and therefore, defining what the word “lie” means is an urgent concern. It’s also an ancient concern. Both the Torah and the Talmud seem a bit clairvoyant these days in their interest in delineating what a lie is, when it’s okay…
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Culture Israel’s Book Fair Cuts Are Devastating To Readers
Forty communities in Israel, all located far away from major cities, will not be participating in this year’s Shavua HaSefer, or “Week of the Book” program due to funding cuts — and the news has prompted an outcry from writers and community leaders who say this will be devastating to readers. Shavua HaSefer, a program…
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Culture How Did John Steinbeck And An Obama Staffer Get The Bible So Wrong?
Working for Barack Obama can be a career maker, but Hebrew readers have been puzzled by the explanation for the path that one former staffer took. The Chicago Sun-Times reports that Michael Slaby, whom the newspaper described as “among the key tech gurus for Barack Obama’s two presidential campaigns,” has founded a startup called Timshel…
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Fast Forward Booker Nominations For Oz and Grossman Bring Out Anti-Semitic Trolls
The tiny but close-knit world of Hebrew translation is cheering for David Grossman and Amos Oz and their respective translators, Jessica Cohen and Nicholas de Lange — but the anti-Semites on Twitter are jeering, and Amos Oz’s daughter stepped into the fray this morning with a pithy response. Grossman’s novel, “A Horse Walks into a…
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