The Thanksgiving Synagogue Service
While Thanksgiving is most certainly an American festival of gratitude, its founders prominently articulated its religious underpinnings, which ultimately find their source in Judaism.…
Kindness Day
While giving charity (tzedakah) is an act of kindness (chesed), acts of kindness are not necessarily charity. According to the Talmudic sage Rabbi Elazar, “Acts of My kindness are greater…
National Hermit Day
Judaism is not known for encouraging asceticism. While the Torah commands the Jewish people to “afflict” themselves on Yom Kippur by fasting and refraining from certain pleasurable…
Berlin’s Hildesheimer Rabbinical Seminary
On May 11, 1820, a child was born in Prussia who, as a grown man, would almost single-handedly change the face of German Jewry. Rabbi Azriel Hildesheimer attended yeshiva in Hanover, and…
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Labor, Technology and the Torah
Labor celebrations have taken place throughout North America since the 1880s, and Labor Day became an official U.S. holiday in 1894. As students of history are well aware, in the decades…
Potential Energy
Parashat Kee Tavo begins by juxtaposing two important agricultural laws. First (Deuteronomy 26:1-11), the Torah instructs the Israelites to bring bikkurim, the first fruits from among the…
Coming of Age
The assumption that every Jewish adult has had a Bar/Bat Mitzvah celebration is presumptuous. The assumption that every Jewish adult (other than a convert) has become a Bar/Bat Mitzvah is…
Three Times Strong
One of the beautiful aspects of Jewish living is that it often strives to bring together the spiritual and the practical. Judaism is a growth-oriented religion. At the same time, it is…
Your Jewish Life Coach
Do you have a life coach? For those unfamiliar with the term, life coaches work to help clients determine and achieve personal goals. While life coaching as a profession in western…