Scribe, the Forward’s curated contributor network, is a place for showcasing personal experiences and perspective from across our Jewish communities. Here you will find a wide array of reflections on Jewish issues, life-cycle events, spirituality, culture and more.
Community
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You say matzah — and matzo and matzuh and matzee and more
Readers respond to our editor-in-chief’s column about a Passover copy-editing conundrum
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The Perils Of Coffee-Cup Diplomacy
The recently reported David Project merger with Hillel can only help the Hillel movement which has so far failed to effectively deal with the ideological assault against Israel and its Jewish supporters on campus. Sadly, however, this new development will not fundamentally change the ugly situation on the quads or in the lecture halls. To…
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Prepent Day 14: Checking In With Yourself
How are you from 1-10? This is one of my mother’s check in questions that can infuriate at times but regardless – always helpful. When it comes to relations between us and our parents there’s a lot going on including remorse, regret, and room for repair. Whatever your relation to whomever you identify as your…
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Why Is Mayor DeBlasio Turning A Blind Eye To The Hasidic Education Crisis In Our City?
I grew up illiterate and uneducated and I am a graduate of a premier Hasidic Jewish Day school in Crown Heights, Brooklyn. Hasidic Day schools are similar to Sunday schools, with one big difference — they run all week long. I learned nothing relevant to the 21st century modern workforce at school. At age 26,…
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Prepent Day 13: Thank Someone Today
Last unofficial day of summer and here in the USA it’s Labor Day, honoring the labor of all the workers and all those whose dedicated work makes sure my life runs as smoothly as possible from morning commute to perfect salad and a hundred other daily blessings I rarely if ever pause to consider, let…
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Prepent Day 12: It’s Time To Draw A Family Map
Draw a current family map, a simple drawing. Like little kids bring home from school and you get their version of who’s who in the constellation, who’s absent or surprisingly huge, who is holding hands. On this first day of a new week and last weekend of summer, focus on family, whatever that means to…
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Seriously, Billy Joel: The Yellow Stars Have Got To Go.
When I was four years old, my family immigrated to America from the USSR. I was born in Kaunas, Lithuania to Jewish parents who filled my childhood with vivid stories of horrendous anti-Semitism and raised me to be an unapologetic Zionist. To me, Judaism went hand in hand with a love and respect for the…
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Prepent Day 10+11: Bloodlines
I am a sum of my ancestors, combined DNA and cherished beliefs of generations. Bloodline. What of the sins of the fathers upon their sons? What of ancestral wisdoms to continue and which to discard? In this annual re-configuration of who I am and what can I do better I wonder: What of my inherited…
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Selective Outrage And The Damnable Jewish Silence On Gaza
August marked a year since the publication of the Black Lives Movement platform — and the controversy it generated among Jewish American organizations. A new coalition of over 50 African American organizations released a series of far-reaching “policy demands for black power, freedom and justice.” The demands included an end to the criminalization and killing…
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Palestinian School Demolitions Are Destroying Israel’s Future
My parents had always taught me that education was a Jewish value. As a child, their insistence worked a little too well — I could never sleep the night before the first day of school. My notebooks were already in my backpack, and I was so excited to learn. This summer, I met Palestinian mothers…
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For One Holocaust Survivor, A Lifetime Of Activism Began With Homemade Cookies
On June 9, two German law enforcement agents arrived at my mother’s Minnesota apartment. As one of the last remaining survivors of the Stutthof concentration camp, she could provide testimony to help determine whether to pursue an indictment against a former Nazi SS guard. For more than four hours, the investigators questioned my mother on…
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Prepent Day 9: Life Lessons From Disneyland
Life lessons from hanging with kids in Disneyland to begin our graceful descent from summer into the fall and a new year of heights and depths and simple pleasures: Test my terrors more often by pushing myself beyond the safety of my comfort zone. Every one of those scary rides is a test of our…
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Yiddish „דאָס לעבן רופֿט“ — אַ ליד פֿון מאָראַלישער קלאָרקייט פֿאַר אונדזערע צײַטן‘Life Calls’ — a Yiddish poem of moral clarity for our times
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