Rabbi Jay Michaelson is a contributing columnist for the Forward and for Rolling Stone. He is the author of 10 books, and won the 2023 New York Society for Professional Journalists award for opinion writing.
Jay MichaelsonContributing Columnist
By Jay Michaelson
-
Culture A Modest Proposal
For several decades, opposition to circumcision has been building in the United States and within the American Jewish community. This year, the people of San Francisco will see on their ballots a proposed ordinance banning circumcision entirely, with no exception for religious Jews or Muslims. As others have written in these pages already, this measure…
-
Culture The Mississippi Floods: Punishment From an Angry God?
Is God punishing the Deep South? In the first half of May, a series of devastating tornadoes ripped through Alabama, and as this article goes to press, swaths of greater Memphis, Tenn., are underwater, and levees are being released all along the Mississippi River. Not surprisingly, the usual voices of theodicy have currently fallen silent….
-
The Schmooze Monday Music: Prime Time for Eprhyme
At the New York release party for Eprhyme’s first CD a few years ago, the audience was an unusual blend of angel-headed Jewish hipsters bopping along to neo-Hasidic hip-hop, along with a smaller African-American crowd which was there to check out the new record drop. Eprhyme straddled two communities — the New-Jew one, and the…
-
Culture The Four ‘Sons’ as Characters From ‘Glee’
On a Tuesday night in April, millions of people will gather together for the tale of four Jewish children, each of whom embodies contemporary Jewish consciousness in a different way. The evening is filled with song, multiple narratives and insights into Jewish identity. I’m talking, of course, about the award-winning Fox television series “Glee.” For…
-
Culture For John Zorn, It’s Jewish Music as Bitches Brew
Is there a more vital Jewish composer than John Zorn right now? If there is, I don’t know who. Zorn’s amazing, postmodern, rockin’-swingin’-classical-noisy Masada Marathon, held March 30 at New York City Opera, was yet another stamp of mainstream approval for this 30-year fixture of the downtown New York music scene, who performed in his…
-
Culture ‘Why Is Your Haggadah Different From Others?’
Reporting on the new Haggadot of the year is among my favorite roles here at the Forward. Each year, a new trove appears. And each year, we learn something new about the American Jewish experience. It’s no surprise, then, that the most exciting new Haggadah of the year isn’t a book at all, but an…
-
Culture Not for the Sake of Heaven
Passover is coming, and with it, the season of questions. We Jews have long prided ourselves on asking good questions — even more than on providing adequate answers. We prize debates that go on forever. And, of course, we answer questions with still more questions. Inquiry, discourse, communication: These are some of the core values…
-
Culture Gay and Orthodox: And Cleaving Strongly to Both
In January, I went to a shabbaton with 140 lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender Orthodox Jews. Yes, Virginia, there are gay Orthodox Jews. There always have been. And while I have been working in the LGBT Jewish community for many years, I saw more courage, endurance and strength that weekend than I ever have before….
Explore
Most Popular
- 1
Opinion The group behind Project 2025 has a plan to protect Jews. It will do the opposite.
- 2
News Texas schools want to add Queen Esther to the curriculum. Here’s why Jews (and many Christians) are opposed.
- 3
Film & TV Bonhoeffer biopic tells of a pastor turned would-be Hitler assassin — but is the story true?
- 4
News What Mike Huckabee’s ‘Kids Guide to Israel’ says about his views
In Case You Missed It
-
Opinion My pre-Thanksgiving challenge: hugging a turkey
-
Opinion Israel’s boycott of Haaretz is straight out of the authoritarian playbook
-
Fast Forward Killing of Israeli rabbi in UAE could strengthen ties between Israel and Arab neighbors, experts say
-
Opinion Despair is not a strategy. Here are 4 things those mourning the election results can do right now.
-
Shop the Forward Store
100% of profits support our journalism
