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.
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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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‘In all of the pain I am reminded why I became a rabbi in the first place’
“Like I told you, it’s an honor.” With these words, Jimmy Breslin concluded his famous New York Herald Tribune column after the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. While every other journalist covered our nation in mourning, Breslin wrote about Clifton Pollard, the gravedigger who prepared President Kennedy’s grave. He made the small big, told…
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‘Still fruitful in the fullness of age.’ Five steps toward birthday fulfillment, even in a pandemic
I just turned 70. I knew it would be a hard birthday because my husband died almost two years ago, just one month short of his 71st birthday. So I planned to celebrate quietly by flying to Portland where my grandchildren live — ages 5 and 3 — and send their parents away for the…
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‘Could it be that I happened to have found an underutilized type of ventilator?’
Normally, my usual duties as a congregational rabbi have absolutely nothing to do with the provisioning of medical equipment. But these are extraordinary times. Our highest principle in Judaism is pikuach nefesh, “saving a life.” And what has kept me up at night throughout this crisis are these ventilators. Last week, a widely reported New…
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‘Slowly, a blood-red swastika was drawn across my screen.’ Zoombombing emphasizes the importance of remembering the Shoah
Tuesday April 21st felt just like any other day: rotating between quarantine baking and home improvement projects in an effort to procrastinate writing my graduate school thesis. Days merge into weeks as Saturday morning sleep-ins become indistinguishable from Monday morning blues. On this day, however, I would celebrate Holocaust Remembrance Day – the annual day…
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My mother was a Holocaust survivor, but she was always more worried about my happiness.
My 93-year-old mom, who survived the Holocaust, died of COVID-19 in an assisted living facility in New Jersey on April 5. I found out she was dead from a text with the words Baruch Dayan Haemet, the Jewish blessing at the time of death. Only days earlier, my nephew called to tell me she had…
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‘Believing in God means understanding that violence and cruelty are a violation of His will’
From time immemorial, even at a very primitive level of human development, people understood that there are extremely powerful forces controlling everything in the world around them. And so they developed primitive polytheistic religions – the beliefs in idols and spirits. On reaching a much higher level of human development, our ancestors, the ancient Hebrew/Jewish…
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No, that wasn’t me at a crowded Rabbi’s funeral in Brooklyn
True I may be one of the only Orthodox Jews you know — but no, I was not at that funeral. I was actually participating in a Jewish leadership class (over Zoom) where we were talking about shame —specifically shame within the Jewish community. Often, though we are proud to associate our Jewish identities with…
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‘We were in uncharted territory,’ burying my friend in the time of social distancing
Two weeks ago, my friend — a pillar of our community, a father, a husband, and a true mensch — who was successfully fighting cancer, fell sick with coronavirus, and died just 24 hours later. Mourning his loss and comforting his family proved to be some of the most difficult moments of my 28-year career…
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‘I want to leave home less and less.’
As the sixth week of the stay-at-home order in California begins, I realize that I’ve become deranged and must be suffering from a Coronavirus pandemic-induced Stockholm syndrome because I keep thinking: I don’t want the quarantine to end. Outside my home’s bubble is tragedy: Thousands upon tens of thousands of lives lost to this insidious…
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‘In the Torah, name changes signify moments of transformation.’ In the lives of transgender Jews, they are just as powerful
Names are powerful in Judaism. In the Torah, name changes signify moments of transformation; our Jewish ancestors Avraham, Sarah, and Yisrael each received new names as part of their journeys. As a child, Spencer Kaseff struggled with self-loathing. Assigned female at birth, but unsure of his gender identity, Spencer was deeply sensitive and spent a…
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‘Is there a more dread-filled psalm than Psalm 88?’ Finding meaning in the trauma of this moment
Is there a more dread-filled psalm than Psalm 88? In this relatively little-known work, the Bible manages to capture perfectly the isolation and misery of those whose lives are upended by illness. In our current coronavirus crisis the ancient words take on new resonance. If you’ve been suffering with COVID-19 or are terrified for a…
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