This is the Forward’s coverage of Orthodox Judaism, which aims for a stricter observance of halachic law than Conservative or Reform Judaism. It includes Modern Orthodox Judaism, as well as Haredi (sometimes called ultra-Orthodox) Judaism,…
Orthodox Judaism
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News Western Wall Prayer Fight Ends With Historic Compromise
TEL AVIV (JTA) — Israel’s government on Sunday approved a compromise to expand the non-Orthodox Jewish prayer section of the Western Wall, putting to rest the decades-long fight between Women of the Wall and Israel’s haredi Orthodox religious establishment. The deal achieves what had been an elusive goal: an interdenominational consensus on Judaism’s holiest site…
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Life What Donald Trump and NFL Football Tell Us About Chained Wives
(JTA) — Following eight years of struggle, an Israeli mother named Adina Porat finally received a Jewish writ of divorce, or get, earlier this month, bringing back into the headlines the plight of “agunot” — so-called chained women trapped in marriages and unable to move on because their husbands refuse to grant a divorce. Porat’s…
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Yiddish World How Aaron Frank Became the Unlikely Orthodox Head of Secular Day School
In 1996, Asher Abramovitz, the longtime principal of Kinneret Day School, a non-denominational community school in Riverdale, New York, received an unusual proposition: Aaron Frank, the 27 year-old assistant rabbi of a local Orthodox synagogue, offered to meet weekly with the school’s mostly non-observant eighth graders to chat about Jewish ethics and philosophy, a sort…
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Fast Forward Jerusalem Woman’s Search for Diamond Engagement Ring Comes Up Empty
The Municipality of Jerusalem allowed dozens of haredi Orthodox volunteers to search through one of its garbage trucks, after a young woman accidentally threw her engagement ring in a city trash container. The search was conducted Thursday at several locales, including on a public square in the predominantly haredi Orthodox neighborhood of Geula, west of…
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Fast Forward British Chief Rabbi Backs Women Saying Mourning Prayer
Britain’s Chief Rabbi Ephraim Mirvis said that women who would like to say the Mourner’s Kaddish “should feel comfortable and supported in doing so.” His comments came in the wake of the publication Wednesday by the United Synagogue, a union of British Orthodox Jewish synagogues, of a mourning and Kaddish booklet for women. “It is…
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News Why Does Bronx Old-Age Home Funnel Millions to Ultra-Orthodox Groups?
A Bronx old-age home whose board includes several high-powered Orthodox Jewish activists has sent at least $20 million to dozens of ultra-Orthodox organizations in an unusual, decades-long arrangement. The not-for-profit, called the Bronxwood Home for the Aged, runs a home care agency and an assisted living facility, which serves largely non-Jewish seniors. It has sent…
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News Trailblazing Orthodox Rabbi Lila Kagedan Stands on ‘Shoulders of Giants’
(JTA) — When Rabbi Lila Kagedan spends her first Shabbat at the Mount Freedom Jewish Center in Randolph, New Jersey, later this month, she will be making history. A recent graduate of Yeshivat Maharat, Kagedan, 35, is the first person ordained at the Orthodox women’s clergy training institute in New York to adopt the title…
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Fast Forward New Jersey Synagogue Reveals It Hired First Orthodox Woman ‘Rabbi’
An Orthodox synagogue in New Jersey has hired Lila Kagedan, the first Yeshivat Maharat graduate to go by the title “rabbi.” Mount Freedom Jewish Center, in Randolph, New Jersey, announced in a news release Monday that Kagedan is joining its “spiritual leadership team.” The news release did not use the word “rabbi,” instead referring to…
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