For many Orthodox Jewish women, the mikveh is fraught with tension: a secret space for married women only — who immerse only after the completion of a menstrual cycle and after childbirth -– occasions inevitably tied to sexuality. Immersions are obligatory, and are done in the privacy of night, only after the stars come out….
Yom Kippur is the holiest day of the year. It’s the day when we become like angels: We pray all day and night and we don’t eat as we beg God for forgiveness; for Him to grant us a good year. But that doesn’t mean we always succeed. At least we don’t always succeed at…
Yom Kippur 2017, the Jewish Day of Atonement, will begin on Friday evening, September 29, and will end the evening of Saturday, September 30. The date of Yom Kippur is determined according to the Hebrew calendar. Yom Kippur occurs 10 days after the Jewish New Year,Rosh Hashanah. This year, Yom Kippur also falls on Shabbat,…
Yom Kippur Eve And Teshuva (Repentance) • The guiding rule in observing Yom Kippur is maintaining a balance between respecting the sanctity of the day and one’s physical health. • According to Shulhan Arukh (Code of Jewish Law), the practice of doing Kapparot with chickens should be eliminated. • We must ask for forgiveness and reconcile with…
On October 6, 1973, the Yom Kippur War began. I was thirteen years old; still a child but old enough to form memories — of sirens so unexpectedly blowing, cars suddenly running along roads usually deserted to pedestrian synagogue goers and secular bike riders. Confusion. Should we turn on the radio? Should we descend to…
(JTA) — A court in Sweden has rerouted a neo-Nazi march on Yom Kippur farther away from a synagogue. The Gothenburg administrative court ruling concerning the Sept. 30 march by the far-right Nordic Resistance Movement overrode the suggested route by police. The court also shortened the route. The group had initially wanted to march on…
With the high holiday season upon us, many liberals – especially younger ones – are girding themselves for battle with their Trump-supporting relatives. “Uncle Irv,” I called these people last Spring, after a particularly irritating right-winger with whom I ‘celebrated’ the Seder for many years. Uncle Irv can be particularly challenging at this time of…
I grew up in a semi-religious household. My father was Orthodox; my mother was resentful. It wasn’t that she rejected Jewish beliefs, but she didn’t exactly respect them either. Nowhere was this more evident than in the small kitchen of our Lower East Side apartment. Keeping kosher was a constant source of conflict. Jewish food…
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