Welcome to the Forward’s coverage of rabbis, the spiritual leaders of Jewish congregations.
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Fast Forward Fierce Dissent Erupts Over Israel Chief Rabbi Post
Members of Habayit Hayehudi are split over who to support in the race for Chief Rabbinate, with party leader Naftali Bennett strongly in favor of Rabbi David Stav, a founder of the religious Zionist organization, Tzohar. On Sunday Bennett denied reports about “deals of one sort or another with Shas or other parties” concerning the…
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Fast Forward Pamela Geller’s Talk at Toronto Shul Scrapped in ‘Hate Speech’ Flap
A speaking engagement by American anti-Islamic firebrand Pamela Geller was moved following police intervention. Geller, a vocal critic of radical Islam, was due to speak May 13 at a Chabad synagogue in Thornhill, north of Toronto, but the synagogue’s rabbi, Mendel Kaplan, backed out after a visit by the hate crimes unit of local police….
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Israel News Israelis Chafe Under Orthodox Grip on Marriage, Divorce and Conversion
To get married in Israel, Dima Motel had to bring his family photo album and two of his ancestors’ birth certificates to a rabbinical court. Then an investigator quizzed his mother in Yiddish. Israel’s Chief Rabbinate often asks Russian immigrants like Motel to prove that they’re Jewish, sometimes requiring documentary evidence that can be hard…
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Fast Forward Dresden Gets First Town Rabbi Since 1938
The Jewish community of Dresden is installing its first hometown rabbi since 1938. Alexander Nachama, 29, is to be formally inaugurated this Sabbath as rabbi of the new synagogue in Dresden, which is in eastern Germany. Dresden’s Semper-Synagogue was destroyed during the Kristallnacht pogrom in 1938. The new synagogue was dedicated at the original site…
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Fast Forward Israel Chief Rabbinate Backs Controversial Circumcision RIte as ‘Preferred’
Israel’s chief rabbinate has weighed in on the practice of a controversial circumcision rite in Germany, saying that metzitzah b’peh is preferred. The practice, in which blood is sucked orally from the circumcision wound, is under scrutiny in Germany, due to a complaint filed against a Berlin rabbi for allegedly committing bodily harm during a…
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Opinion French Chief Rabbi’s Fall From Grace in Plagiarism Scandal
Forty years ago, “The Mad Adventures of Rabbi Jacob” had French audiences doubled over in laughter. Gerard Oury’s frantic comedy of an anti-Semitic businessman who finds himself mistaken for a famous rabbi — don’t ask — smashed box office records. The timing was important: Oury’s anarchic comedy reflected the end of a 30-year run of…
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Fast Forward Chabad Leader Blasts Rabbis Group Over Circumcision Rite
A Chabad-affiliated rabbi criticized a rival group for its public disapproval of a circumcision-related ritual currently under investigation in Germany. Some Jewish leaders “decided to align themselves with those who are working against Jewish interests,” Rabbi Menachem Margolin, director of the Rabbinical Centre of Europe, wrote in an editorial Thursday in the Frankfurter Rundschau newspaper….
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Opinion A Woman Among the Chief Rabbis?
As the race to choose the next chief rabbis heats up in Israel, a new lawmaker is proposing appointing a female religious figure to serve alongside them. She says that she will propose legislation to introduce the role. Aliza Lavie of the centrist Yesh Atid party wrote today that there should be a female in…
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