Stuart Nadler’s first book, “The Book of Life,” is now available. His posts are being featured this week on The Arty Semite courtesy of the Jewish Book Council and My Jewish Learning’s Author Blog Series. For more information on the series, please visit: For me, the year has always begun in September. I grew up…
While those of us on a gluten-free diet may have our daily eating habits under control, the chagim (Jewish Holidays) present a whole new array of challenges. Unless you’re preparing a holiday feast in your own home where everything is under control and to your own standards, it’s often difficult to eat out — even…
Remember that peculiar Kia commercial with hamsters dancing to LMFAO’s “Party Rock Anthem”? Not exactly an instant classic — but the Shmooze does appreciate Aish.com’s new Rosh Hashanah-themed remake of that song. With lines like “Three times a day I’m shucklin’ shucklin’, shucklin,” and “Stand up, sit down, pass the prayer books around,” the tongue-in-cheek…
Jewish tradition teaches that the current Hebrew month, Elul, is a wake-up call to repent and prepare for the High Holy Days that follow. Well Israel’s largest telecommunications company, Bezeq, is taking this idea rather literally. As if weekday synagogue services don’t already start early enough in Israel — often between 5am and 6am —…
Comedy writer Janet Leahy was working on an episode of “The Simpsons” a couple of years ago, when her rabbi asked her for three jokes to punch up his Rosh Hashanah sermon. With this year’s High Holy Days looming, Leahy sat on the sun-drenched terrace of the Stephen S. Wise Temple and listened attentively to…
Rabbi Ovadia Yosef’s eldest daughter, Adina Bar Shalom, is helping to train Haredi women for jobs in Israel’s high-tech sector. Meanwhile, secular Israeli women have a higher rate of workforce participation than do women in any other developed country, Haaretz reports. In a discovery that could help women undergoing cancer treatment preserve their fertility, scientists…
Recently, a friend announced that she was not attending High Holy Days services this year. It was not a sign of protest but rather of resignation. Having attended services last year with a toddler, there was no way she was going to try this year with two small children. Even when a congregation offers tot…
Oaktoberfest, an annual fall festival in Chicago’s western Oak Park neighborhood, boasts seasonal food from local restaurants, specialty micro-brews and great wines. But local Jews are forbidden from partaking — according to the calendar, at least. For the second year, organizing body Downtown Oak Park has scheduled Oaktoberfest on the High Holidays. And while last…
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