Philologos
By Philologos
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Culture Mixing in Diabolical Circles
Jack Rosenthal of Mamaroneck, N.Y., writes to me about the Satanic image of the Jew in medieval Christian culture and, specifically, about the words “Mephistopheles” and “Satan.” “Satan,” of course, comes from the Bible, most familiarly from the Book of Job, and Mr. Rosenthal proposes a Hebrew etymology for “Mephistopheles,” as well. This he does…
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Culture One Image To Make Man and Woman?
Probably no section of the Bible has more exercised the interpretative powers of its readers than the opening chapters of the Book of Genesis, with which we again begin the annual cycle of Torah readings on Simchat Torah — and, arguably, no two verses in these chapters have aroused more discussion over the ages than…
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Culture This Side of the River Jordan
It’s obviously a losing battle, but I can’t help carrying on with the fight. Every time I see an item in the newspaper, like Jackson Diehl’s September 13 column on the current Israeli-Palestinian peace talks in The Washington Post, or Roger Cohen’s column on the same subject in the September 14 New York Times, I…
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News Signed, Sealed, Delivered
?atima tova ? literally ?a good seal? ? we wish each other before and on Yom Kippur, just as we say on Rosh Hashanah, l?shana tova tikatev, ?May you be written down for a good year.? This is, of course, a reference to the Jewish belief that on Rosh Hashanah, God writes down everyone?s fate…
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Culture B’Sha’a Tovah!
Congratulations, we’re expecting! That’s because the Jewish year 5771 that has just started is a “pregnant year,” a shana me’uberet in Hebrew. (Ubar in Hebrew is a fetus or embryo.) In other words, it’s a leap year, one in which the 12 regular months, six of 29 days and six of 30, “give birth” to…
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Culture Jews’ Houses Ain’t Castles: They’re Shuls
Chuck Meyer of Ewing, N.J., writes to ask why a Jewish house of worship is known as a synagogue. The word “synagogue” is originally a Greek one first found in the New Testament. It comes from the verb synagein, “to bring together or gather,” and is a translation of the Hebrew bet-k’neset, “a house [or…
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Culture A Cordoban Chord
Michael Hecht writes: “A timely article might be about the implications of the name Cordoba House for the proposed Islamic center at Ground Zero. Is it perhaps intended as the name of the once — and future — capital of Islamic Spain?” ” photo-credit=”Image by WIKI COMMONS” src=”https://images.forwardcdn.com/image/675x/center/images/cropped/mosquecordoba-082510-1425716335.jpg”] By “future capital,” Mr. Hecht is, I…
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Culture Conservative? Moi?
I learned from the August 6 issue of the Forward that Conservative Judaism is thinking of a name change. Once the largest of the three major American Jewish denominations, the movement has fallen on hard times. It has long been a truism that, sandwiched between Orthodox Judaism on one side and Reform Judaism on the…
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Fast Forward Why some Satmar Hasidic leaders endorsed Zohran Mamdani as mayor, stunning many Jewish voters
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