In Bible study, teachings of morality often take a back seat to the teachings of law, custom and history. The book being brought to your attention this week explores morality in the context of our … more

The base themes of the holiday of Purim are survival and the smile. Irony in my opinion is a smile with a clear understanding of the inner meaning of the biblical text, in this case that of the Book … more

At my family’s seder this year, we read, as we always do, from the traditional Sephardic Haggadah, in keeping with the customs of the Jewish communities from Spain and Portugal. Our guests need … more

Summer is my favorite season and so far, I’ve been keeping busy. My daughter and son-in-law’s dog, Murphy kept us company for a week while they enjoyed their first anniversary on July … more

This probably won’t be true for the next generation, and perhaps it’s only the case for New Yorkers or many of us who called New York home for a good chunk of our lives, but remembering … more

When people jogged or ran, back in the 1980s and 1990s, it was mostly for the utilitarian purpose of staying fit. Running was exercise. Now, when people commit to run a marathon, there often is a … more

As welcome as the remarkably diverse condemnations of Mahmoud Abbas’s latest anti-Semitic speech have been over the last few days—with UNESCO’s new director-general, the New York … more

The late Rabbi Shlomo Carlebach founded a synagogue in Berkeley during the 1960s in order to reach out to the many young Jews who had drifted away from Jewish tradition. He named it the House of … more

Parshat Zachor has a bit of a cult following. People who are not necessarily strict to hear Torah readings in general will run to shul to hear Parshat Zachor. Many synagogues have multiple readings … more

Just as there were six million victims, so were there at least six million stories. One of those stories seems to have occurred many times, because I’ve heard it told by quite a few … more