Biden’s rabbi and I debate whether it’s time for the president to step aside
Jewish text reminds us there's a time to lead, and a time to pass the torch.
Jewish text reminds us there's a time to lead, and a time to pass the torch.
Bintel says: Jewish tradition contains things you'll love and things you might hate
This article originally appeared in the Yiddish Forverts. Shul was packed last Shabbos – not because of a bar mitzvah or aufruf, but because on the last Shabbos before Purim, Shabbat Zachor, we read the short passage that commands us to ‘erase’ our bitter enemy – the people of Amalek whose most famous descendant was…
On the way home from the funeral, we discussed Amalek. It was Purim time, 1996. Israel was living through one of its worst spates of terrorism in years. Two students, Matt Eisenfeld and Sarah Duker, boarded a bus together and were killed, along with 24 other people. Matt was my friend. He and Sara were…
A haredi Orthodox rabbi who encouraged assassination of Israeli politicians in a speech to yeshiva students has retracted his remarks. In a recorded speech, Rabbi Nissan Kaplan of Jerusalem’s prominent Mir Yeshiva equated Israel’s current political leadership to Amalek, the biblical enemy Jewish law traditionally commands Jews to eradicate. The comparison follows passage of a…
Esther denouncing Haman / Ernest Normand These days, many liberal Jews think of Purim as a play date for the kids and a night of drunken debauchery for the grown-ups. We think of costumes and songs and noisemakers, a kind of carnival spirit. But the levity with which we approach Purim is actually pretty astonishing….
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