Welcome to the Forward’s coverage of the robust lives of American Jews. Here there’s a little of everything about the multifaceted world of Jewish life. There are light-hearted Jewish celebrity stories and shocking Jewish celebrity news. Food is also plentiful,…
Life
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Sukkot Customs I’d Like To Change
As a parent, I love the holiday of Sukkot, which begins Friday night. It’s a great family time – lots of al fresco dining, sleeping outdoors, enjoying fresh air, singing, cooking favorite foods, and experiencing a welcome escape from the weightiness of an excessively material life. There’s nothing like spending eight days inside four walls…
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Offbeat Israel: Kitchen Appliances Visit the Mikveh
Of all the characteristics Israelis have been blessed with, electrical safety is not one of them. Bare wires are a common sight. Earthing appliances is seen as a quaint indulgence a bit like wearing ties — popular abroad but not part of the culture here. And oy, the love affair with splitter sockets. One doubts…
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Perahia vs. Schiff: Dueling Bach Partitas by Jewish Pianists
Before his much-anticipated October 23 Carnegie Hall recital, of music by Bach, Beethoven, and Schumann, the magisterial Jewish American pianist Murray Perahia is releasing a new CD on Sony Classical of three of the six Bach keyboard Partitas, Nos. 1, 5 & 6, completing the set begun last year with his CD of Partitas 2,…
The Latest
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What Odds Amos Oz for Nobel Prize?
So far Israel has had eight Nobel winners, S. Y. Agnon (1966) being the only recipient in the literature category. Yet, according to the Guardian, bets are being placed on Amos Oz as this year’s top choice for the award. Amos Oz, born Amos Klausner, is conveniently turning 70 this year and this would be…
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On Women (and Hermaphrodites) Blowing the Shofar
One of the highlights of the High Holy Days is the blowing of the shofar, and the best shofar-blowing I ever heard was by a woman. Her tekiah gedolah was — the long blast sounded at the end of each shofar-blowing sequence on Rosh Hashanah and at the very end of the Neilah service on…
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Help! I Left My Job; Now I’m Nostalgic for It
Dear Bintel Brief: A few months ago, I decided to leave a very demanding job in television production. I had been there for five years and I was, quite simply, burned out. I felt like I needed a change of pace and direction in my life. Ever since quitting, though, my anxiety about what to…
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Bibi, Again With the Rebbe
Those in the handpicked crowd at the 92nd Street Y Thursday night weren’t the only ones who heard Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu speak of being inspired by the late Lubavitcher Rebbe Menachem Mendel Schneerson. Earlier in the day, he told the Israeli press roughly the same story about the Rebbe’s message to him, which stressed…
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Brit Milah — A Modern Jewish Mother’s First Submission to Tradition
I love Rebecca’s new post about the commitment it takes for a Jewish woman to give birth to a boy and, usually on his eighth day of life, turn him over to the (hopefully skilled) hands of a mohel. It brought back that moment when, 15 years ago, I stood in our shul, weak winter…
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For Convert and Mother-to-Be, Bris Is Ultimate Measure of Commitment
How do you measure commitment? That’s the question I was left pondering after reading Elana Sztokman’s post on the double standard for Orthodox women. Some women’s tardiness for services has become a justification for shutting out the entire gender from a whole host of responsibilities, as late arrival to shul apparently signifies a lack of…
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‘Glee’ Welcomes Chutzpadik Rachel Berry to the Tribe
This week on the television dramedy “Glee” — the Fox show centers on the members of an Ohio high school choir — the lead character Rachel Berry officially came out, as a Jew. There were hints before: her name, her allusions to her big nose, her love for Streisand. But wasn’t until the most recent…
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Light One Candle: Bibi on the Lubavitcher Rebbe’s Challenge
Benjamin Netanyahu has a message to the American Jewish community: It’s time to get out and fight against the lies people are spreading about Israel. Netanyahu himself, as he told a crowd of 1,000 hand-picked Jewish activists at an invitation-only event Thursday evening at New York’s 92nd Street Y, has already embarked on the mission…
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