A fascinating little snippet from the Forverts’ front page on September 26, 1923, which we felt compelled to share on the eve of atonement day: Having been rebuked by his brothers for not having attended synagogue on Yom Kippur, Isaac Gordon, a young Manchester man, quickly drew his revolver and fired on his Orthodox brothers,…
The journey to “The Boat” — a prison barge floating in the East River of New York City — is long. The Bx6 bus winds through the most industrial parts of Hunts Point. I get off at the head of a road flanked on either side by a wastewater treatment facility and the fish market….
Eight years ago, the Forward wrote about the growing trend for caffeine suppositories among the devout to help get them through a day of fasting and praying, without even having to break their caffeine habit. Since then, the trend has exploded, infiltrating every pharmacy with a sizeable Jewish (usually Orthodox) population. Before Yom Kippur, as…
(JTA) — Nashville-area synagogues will increase security for Yom Kippur services in the wake of a shooting at a local church that killed one worshipper. On Sunday, the gunman shot a woman in the parking lot of the Burnette Chapel Church of Christ as she walked to her car at the end of services. The…
A video broadcast by New York’s ABC 7 channel shows chickens in cages that have died waiting to be used for kapparot, the ultra-Orthodox practice of swinging a chicken around your head to transfer your sins to it. The broadcaster reporting the video noted that, although the word kapparot means “forgiveness” in Hebrew, “it is…
My journey, both personally and professionally, in Orthodox and non-Orthodox circles alike, has introduced me to a surprising divide, one that does not map neatly onto the denominational divide but evokes diverging passions that grow more animated as one moves from right to left. Namely: The practice of reading in shul. Every year I try…
Late this Saturday afternoon on Yom Kippur, many Jews will be sitting in synagogue listening to the chanting of the Book of Jonah. We will be tired, hungry, thirsty, and perhaps even irritable. At this point, many will be tempted to take a snooze – or dream of the break-fast that awaits — during this…
For many years, I had my own personal tradition that I would observe on Yom Kippur. The day before, I would go to the big supermarket in our neighborhood in Southern Jerusalem and buy myself a watermelon. On the morning of Yom Kippur, I would split the watermelon in half, and declare the official beginning…
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