Rabbi Jeffrey K. Salkin is the co-founder/co-director of Wisdom Without Walls: an online salon for Jewish ideas. He is the author of the recently published Inviting God In: A Guide to Jewish Prayer (CCAR Press).
Jeffrey K. Salkin
By Jeffrey K. Salkin
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Opinion The coronavirus is transforming Judaism
If you attended religious school, you’ve probably heard this story: It was the first century of the Common Era. The Romans had destroyed Jerusalem, and with it, Judean independence. In utter despair, the Jews smuggled their leader, Yochanan ben Zakkai, out of Jerusalem in a coffin. He leaped out of the coffin, and hailed the…
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Culture Inside The 1949 Westchester KKK Attack Where Rioters Chanted ‘We’re Hitler’s Boys’
This article was originally published on September 2, 2009. It was re-published for the 70th anniversary of the Peekskill Riots on August 26, 2019, and lightly edited to reflect the new anniversary of the event. Peekskill, New York, on the bank of the Hudson River, was home to L. Frank Baum, the author of “The…
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Community Where Have All Of The Reform Synagogues Gone?
It was like entering my own personal Holy of Holies. That was how I felt this past weekend, as I visited the URJ Camp Eisner in Great Barrington, Massachusetts. The occasion: the wedding of the son of beloved friends, who themselves have become like family. But, on a deeper level, it was an act of…
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Community Larry David: Pretty, Pretty, Pretty Tasteless
A different version of this essay appeared in the blog Martini Judaism: for those who want to be shaken and stirred, published Religion News Service. What is the sound of America cringing? Larry David now knows. And, it’s not pretty. This last Saturday night, comedian Larry David was the guest host on NBC’s “Saturday Night…
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Opinion Where Is The Jewish Outcry On Chechnya?
The matzah crumbs are still on the tablecloth on the dining room table. The leftover charoset still sits in the refrigerator. The haggadot from the seder still sit in a corner of the kitchen counter. The text from the haggadah cries out to us: “In every generation, a person must see himself or herself as…
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Opinion The Political Rabbi’s Survival Guide
On my desk, there is a small black and white photograph depicting the late Rabbi Arthur Lelyveld of Cleveland, his face bloody from a beating that he suffered at the hands of segregationists in Hattiesburg, Mississippi, during the Freedom Summer of 1964. It is now more than a half century later, and from what I…
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Community Is Donald Trump a Closet Leftist?
Let’s face it: social conservatives always had suspicions about President Donald Trump. They looked at his marital history, his media persona, his vulgarity — and they concluded that Donald Trump was not a true conservative. In fact, some of the strongest and enduring critiques of him have come from social conservatives, such as David Brooks…
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Letters Letter to the Editor: Jared Kushner Reveals The Fissures In American Judaism
In his recent column in the Forward (“How Could Modern Orthodox Judaism Produce Jared Kushner?” ) Beinart examines Jared’s recent, little-more-than-a-week long record as a member of the Trump administration. He looks at what the administration has thus far produced, and how Jared has stood by and watched it happen. In Beinart’s telling, Jared is…
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Opinion Was Maduro’s abduction a ‘Zionist’ plot? The accusation is unfounded — and incredibly telling
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