Hasidism: A New History By David Biale & 7 co-authors Princeton UniversityPress, 896 pages, $45.00 In 1770, a young man of 18, later to be known as Solomon Maimon, traveled from Nesvizh in Lithuania to the court of Dov Ber, the foremost leader of the budding Hasidic movement, in the Polish town of Mezerich. As…
Katie Fenster says that she wasn’t planning on walking out on her Birthright Israel tour when she arrived. But during the free 10-day trip, she grew increasingly frustrated that the answers to her questions about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict “all came from one perspective” and did not include Palestinian views. “We felt like we weren’t being…
Sometimes a dog whistle can be a number, not a word. The number “88” appeared in a strange context in a press release from Homeland Security calling for building a border wall, along with a headline that had a total of fourteen words — but until today, no one seems to have noticed. Today, the…
Prominent progressives like Sen. Bernie Sanders and activist Linda Sarsour are vying with each other to laud Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who notched a David-and-Goliath upset victory over 10-term Rep. Joe Crowley in Tuesday’s Democratic primary in New York. Her victory — with 57% of the vote — raises larger questions about the party’s direction, including whether…
The room sparkles, a montage of brilliantly colored wigs, gleaming cufflinks, the Sabbath china set. The men recite the prayers with such gusto! Bravo, what a Yeshivishe accent, every ‘oy’ pronounced loud and clear, your rebbe would be proud! We serve tuna tartare and foie gras and brisket, open a bottle of Glenmorangie. Someone shares…
Over beers in Jerusalem, a writer I know shared a fascinating linguistic tidbit from his recent research trip to Austria. He said he had heard the Hebrew phrase tohu va’vohu, from Genesis 1:2, memorably translated by Everett Fox as “wild and waste,” used in Vienna. As slang, he thought. In any case, tohu va’vohu seemed…
As the language of public life has declined from dinner-table English to something previously considered unprintable, the word “civility” is suddenly everywhere — except Donald Trump’s lips. While Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders claimed that she has the right to be served dinner at any restaurant, no matter what she says or does, her father,…
The phone call informing Rob Kaliner that an old Lower East Side apartment complex had rejected his $54 million drove him out of his office and onto the sidewalk, where he started walking and didn’t stop. “I did like 26,000 steps,” said Kaliner days later, still reeling from one of the most startling rejections in…
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