Philologos
By Philologos
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News Vexing Question of Celery vs. Parsley on the Seder Plate
The table is set; your Seder plate is ready, and on it is everything you need: the matzos, the ?shank bone,? the hardboiled egg, the ?bitter herb? of a horseradish root, the ?aroset or sweet condiment, and the karpas or celery. Or is it parsley? Of course, Jews wouldn?t be Jews if they agreed about…
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Culture Palestine Might Still Be A Better Name Than Israel
‘He’s not going to give up one inch of Eretz Israel,” New York Times columnist Roger Cohen quotes Israeli political scientist Shlomo Avineri as saying of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on February 15. And Cohen adds, by way of explanation, “Eretz Israel is a biblical term widely used to refer to the area between the…
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Culture What’s Jewish and Has Rubbery Purplish-Red Leaves?
What’s purple, crawls without legs, and is of the Mosaic persuasion? I hope you give up, because if you’re still trying to guess, I shouldn’t be telling you that it’s a Wandering Jew. Where mine originally came from, I have no idea. I only know that it’s been in my garden for a long time,…
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Culture Why Israel Is a World Leader in Catchy Political Party Names
A Forward reader who modestly asks to remain anonymous writes: “As an American Jew, my sources of information on Israeli politics are from English-language publications, the Forward being one of them. During the recent elections in Israel, I read about the Jewish Home party — and also about the Habayit Hayehudi [“Jewish Home” in Hebrew]…
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Culture Prisoner X and the Letter of Mystery
By now, unless you’re the type that refuses to follow the news (not that I blame you, but in that case, why are you reading this newspaper?), you know who “Prisoner X” is. Called “Mr. X” by the Israeli news service Ynet, which originally broke the story of his suicide in a high-security Israeli prison…
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Culture Just How Orthodox Are They?
For old-time readers of this newspaper, Seth Lipsky needs no introduction: Lipsky was the English Forward’s founder and first publisher back in 1990, and continued to direct it for most of the decade. His voice continues to be heard on the politically conservative side of the ledger, and in a January 20 column in the…
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Culture Lowliest Guards on the Israeli Totem Pole
Two headlines dominated a page of The Marker, the economic section of the Israeli newspaper Haaretz, on January 29. The first, captioning a straight news item, read (in my English translation): “Hershkovitz Stuns Finance Ministry: Fires Deputy.” The second, introducing a commentary on this development by correspondent Nehemia Strassler, declared: “Instead of Tackling Problems —…
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Culture Redemption of the First Shorn
Forward reader Susan Rogol writes: “I receive many invitations to the ceremony of cutting the hair of a boy who has reached the age of 3, and I do not understand why it is referred to as an ‘upsherenish’ rather than an ‘upsheren.’ I always associate the Yiddish suffix “-nish” with something negative, as in…
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Fast Forward Why neo-Nazis marched in Ohio this weekend, and almost every weekend in the US
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Opinion The group behind Project 2025 has a plan to protect Jews. It will do the opposite.
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Opinion Just about every interpretation of Trump’s narrow election victory is wrong
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News Texas schools want to add Queen Esther to the curriculum. Here’s why Jews (and many Christians) are opposed.
In Case You Missed It
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Fast Forward Rep. Ritchie Torres, outspoken pro-Israel advocate, is dropping hints that he could run for NY governor
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Fast Forward Ursula Haverbeck, infamous German Holocaust denier known as ‘Nazi grandma,’ dies at 96
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Fast Forward A Jewish museum in Tulsa held a funeral for remains of Holocaust victims it kept for years
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Sports Texas A&M’s Sam Salz cherishes his first taste of DI college football — and the opportunity to inspire fellow Orthodox Jews
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