This is the Forward’s coverage of Jewish culture where you’ll learn about the latest (and sometimes earliest) in Jewish art, music (including of course Bob Dylan and Leonard Cohen), film, theater, books as well as the secret Jewish history of…
Culture
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At 79, a Grad Student Who Is Tackling Transit Problems
In most ways, Ralph Montview is a typical graduate student. On a recent weekday, he looked tired after a late night of proofing his master’s thesis, “Elements for Design of a Public Transit System.” His apartment in Anaheim, Calif., was messy, with books and papers piled on every available surface. He even jokingly insinuated that…
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Eco-Friendly Nuptials
Kate Harrison and Barry Muchnick knew that when they got married, their wedding ceremony would need to reflect their environmentalism. After all, they had met at the Yale University School of Forestry and Environmental Studies. “We really tried to green everything,” said Harrison of her 2007 outdoor wedding in Garrison, N.Y., “and we tried to…
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A Tree Evangelist Who Connects Heaven and Earth
During a Sabbath evening service one Friday in February, Seth Goldstein and his 9-year-old son, Ozi, sat with their eyes closed in the synagogue in Olympia, Wash., where Goldstein is the rabbi. From the bimah, Nalini Nadkarni asked congregants to imagine a tree that was important to them. She described the maple trees that had…
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June 25, 2010
100 Years Ago in the Forward Last week, 29-year-old East Third Street resident Dvoyre Ortshent abandoned her husband and five children and fled to Philadelphia with her lover, Julius Hillesberg, who had lived with the couple as a boarder. This week, the two were arrested as they were discovered buying foodstuffs in a Locust Street…
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Synagogues in the Garden
In the early 13th century, Rabbi Isaac ben Moses of Vienna wrote, “…whoever pays attention to a beautiful tree doesn’t concentrate on his study and interrupts it. All the more so in prayer, which needs greater concentration; one cannot concentrate as required when looking at trees drawn on the wall.” Today, with the “greening” of…
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Death at the Doorbell
The world, as we know it, ended in May. At least that was the proposition of the New York Philharmonic. Building toward the end of his first year as the orchestra’s new music director, Alan Gilbert envisioned a spectacular presentation: a fully staged New York premiere of “Le Grand Macabre” (French slang for “the Grim…
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Watch: Forward Columnist Jay Michaelson on American Jews and Israel
WNBC’s “The Debrief with David Ushery” talks to Forward columnist Jay Michaelson about what Michaelson sees as American Jews’ growing disconnect from Israel. He also weighs in on the comments that ended Helen Thomas’ career:
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Books YIVO Encyclopedia Launches Online Edition
Geese were a staple of Jewish life in Eastern Europe and Jewish women knew how to get the most out of their fowl of choice. The feathers were sold as quills for writing and stuffing for bedding, fat used as an alternative to butter or the Jewish version of lard, and the birds themselves were…
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The World Cup Winner
As any soccer fan will tell you, it only takes seven games to win the FIFA World Cup once you’ve qualified for the final tournament. Unfortunately, Israel has reached the finals just once — Mexico 1970 — where, after losing to Uruguay and tying with Sweden and Italy, it failed to progress beyond the group…
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Of Boy Cantors and Little Jewesses
With graduation upon us, ’tis the season to think about lofty matters, about responsibility and duty and legacy and heritage. In that connection, consider, for instance, the transmission of Jewish culture from one generation to the next, a task that has bedeviled the Jewish community for centuries now. The Jews of a much earlier time…
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Chai Noon
Sherriff’s badges weren’t the only Jewish stars in the Wild West. Consider gunslinger Jim Levy, Deadwood mayor Sol Star, Jewish Pueblo Indian chief Solomon Bibo, blue jeans inventor Levi Strauss and David May, the merchant who built his trading post into a chain of national department stores now controlled by Macy’s. Even O.K. Corral gunfighter…
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