The scent hit me before I saw it. Sweet, suffusing, almost overpowering. I turned around, and there it was: a lush, magnificent, profusely blooming lilac. I had to stop and smell it. I was instantly transported to the backyard of my first house, the one we left when I was seven. Hanging over, and growing…
Photograph by Katarzyna Bialasiewicz/Thinkstock As Jews around the world gathered to celebrate Hanukkah last month, traditional foods such as latkes, sufganiyot, sfinge and other deep-fried delicacies lined our dinner tables. Today, modern Jewish food is celebrated as more than just the krepelach and pickled herring from Eastern European kitchens. It is recognized as a rich…
Digital Spy It was my first shiva call, and it shocked me out of my wits. Sarah, one of the residents in the Jewish retirement community where I’d been conducting seminars on world news, had passed away. A cheerful lady in her 90s, she had always brought an international aspect to our weekly discussions. I…
For readers left feeling bereft after David Grossman’s portrayal of the relation between the life of a family and the tragic corrosiveness of Israeli militarism in “To the End of the Land,” here is an audaciously unorthodox work that may serve as an emotional sequel of sorts. If we assumed that Grossman could hardly delve…
The American Jewish Committee praised Nelson Mandela’s “quiet strength and dignity” in a statement marking his death, but neglected to mention the time they canceled a dinner honoring him in a fight over an Iranian espionage trial. American Jewish groups issued warm remembrances of Mandela as news of his death at the age of 95…
Last week I attended the funeral of a girl who was my age, 39. Jodi and I grew up together. We lived next door to each other as children, from when I moved into my house right before kindergarten until we left for college. For me she will always be that little girl that I…
Some 40,000 people participated in a memorial for Rabbi Ovadia Yosef in Jerusalem at the end of the mourning period. The memorial on Sunday evening at the grave site of the Shas party spiritual leader marked the end of the seven-day shiva period for the one-time Sephardic chief rabbi, who died on Oct. 7 at…
It’s the beginning of another Jewish year, holidays are bookending each week, and death is in the air. Two of the Yizkor prayers — the mourner’s prayer, which is recited on four different holidays throughout the year — are said this month alone. If that weren’t enough to put death on my mind, my father’s…
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