Let it be written that from this day forward, the only acceptable way to celebrate MCA Day shall be with breakdancing Buddhist monks. This past Saturday, four Buddhist monks took to Union Square, the site of the first MCA Day, to pay tribute to Beastie Boys rapper Adam Yauch, who died in 2012 after a…
I admit, I am a BuJu. I admit, I am a BuJu. Of course, I am not alone. Not only do a disproportionate number of American Buddhist teachers come from Jewish backgrounds, but many Jews practice both Judaism and Buddhism, and many more practice a Jewish spirituality influenced by Buddhist-derived meditation practices and values. The…
A knot of about 100 people stood under a steely winter sky January 26 to plant a tree for Tu B’Shvat in the Paris suburb of Bussy-Saint-Georges. The town’s 120-family strong Jewish community was out in force for the celebration, which mirrored similar rites held around the world. Here, however, a few things stood out…
Jews had a bad year in terms of winning seats in Congress, falling from 39 members in both chambers in the 112th Congress to only 32 in the next one. We pretty much predicted this outcome. But with the breakdown of the new Congress by religion, which was carried out by the Pew Forum it…
Man Seeks God: My Flirtations With the Divine By Eric Weiner Twelve, 368 pages, $26.99 I’ll be honest: I normally hate books like this — memoirs of spiritual tourism, jauntily retold by trustworthy but neurotic narrators who are careful never to be more knowledgeable than the reader. I have read about two dozen of these…
In celebration of Jewish Book Month, The Arty Semite is partnering with the Jewish Education Service of North America (JESNA) and the Jewish Book Council to present “30 Days, 30 Texts,” a series of reflections by community leaders on the books that influenced their Jewish journeys. Today, Monica Rozenfeld writes about “”Letters to a Buddhist…
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