An Etiquette Guide To Paying A Shiva Call
Exploring what the Shiva customs in Judaism are
Mourning
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Community What I’ve Learned About Life Preparing Jewish Bodies For Death
It’s a crisp autumn day in Madison, Wisconsin, and I’m running late for a meeting with a dead person. I volunteer with my congregation’s Chevra Kadisha, a group that helps prepare Jewish bodies for burial and ensures that every congregant has company from the moment they’ve passed away until the last clump of dirt covers…
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Life Where Are The Orthodox, After Pittsburgh? We’re Right Here, Mourning With You.
I have been asked, repeatedly, by non-Orthodox Jews about the “Orthodox response to Pittsburgh.” What a strange question. After all, the American Orthodox Jewish community has undoubtedly been plunged into mourning over the Pittsburgh shooting victims. Still, I sense a frustration here, among progressives seeking emotional responses from the Orthodox — and I want to…
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Community Why Do Jews Have Gravestones?
The past year had been a really tough one for me. I experienced a frozen shoulder which lasted over six months, digestive symptoms only a GI doctor could listen to, multiple skin problems and — oh yeah — one of my front teeth suddenly came out unexpectedly while I was out of town. Also, I…
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Life I Don’t Believe In Prayer — Yet I Say ‘Yizkor’ Every Year
Like many families, I go into the Jewish holiday season with some sense of sorrow and regret. There is nothing sad about these holidays themselves — even Yom Kippur, a day of fasting and forgiveness is pervaded with a sense of hopefulness and expectation that God will forgive us and inscribe us in the “book…
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The Schmooze Anthony Bourdain’s Favorite Jewish Deli Pays Tribute: His Breakfast Order And An Empty Chair
Nova Scotia lox and egg scramble. A toasted poppyseed bagel. A pot of black coffee and a glass of orange juice. The staff at Barney Greengrass, a historic Jewish deli on Manhattan’s Upper West Side, honored chef Anthony Bourdain by serving his regular breakfast order today, at an empty table with a single chair. Bourdain…
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Life The Prayer For My Mother That Made Me A Better Man
I am not a Jew who prays three times a day, in the morning, afternoon and evening as proscribed by Jewish law. Not like my wife’s four religious cousins who live with their large families in Israel. Not even like my Modern Orthodox brother in Jerusalem, who often dons a baseball cap and finds time…
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Life Why I Hate Hanukkah
For years, I’ve taken care to light the Hanukkah candles with my children. I fry latkes every single night for eight nights and make sure we sing all the right songs. I buy doughnuts filled with jelly and sometimes even make my own. And I hate every moment of it, because it was at Hanukkah…
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