Celebrating Bar Ilan University
Would you believe that the founding of Israel’s second largest university (33,000 students) was conceived “deep in the heart of Dixie"? Two years after Israel’s founding in 1948, the…
Happy Birthday Birkat Hamazon!
The Torah (Exodus 16:1) reports that the Children of Israel arrived at the Wilderness of Sin on the 15th of the Hebrew month of Iyar, approximately one month after the exodus from Egypt.…
Purim, Again?
Unique to the Jewish calendar, Purim is actually observed on different days depending on location. The majority of the Jewish people celebrate Purim on the 14th of Adar (yesterday).…
The History Around Purim
The story of Purim takes place at the very end of the era known in Jewish history as the Babylonian Exile.Nebuchadnezzar and the Babylonian empire destroyed the Temple and Jerusalem and…
The Jewish Holiday A Week before Chanukah
The Mishnah (Rosh Hashana 1:1) declares four calendar dates as “Jewish new years.” On the first day of Tishrei, we celebrate Rosh Hashana as the annual day of judgment…
The Unspeakable
The Prophet Jeremiah, lived during the destruction by the Babylonians of Solomon’s Temple, and served as the Jews’ chief consoler as they were being exiled out of Jerusalem. Jeremiah’s…
Ginger Ail?
Happy “Love Your Red Hair Day”! Those endowed with ginger-ness (In Israel, a redheaded person is called a “gingy”), 1% of the world’s population and 2% of that of the United States, are…
What’s in the Book: Ezekiel
The 48 chapters of the Book of Ezekiel are filled with wondrous visions. Ezekiel’s first vision is of a fiery chariot drawn by creatures with four faces (of a man, a lion, an ox and an…
Rav Kook
Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook (1865-1935) was appointed as the first Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi of Palestine in 1921. A few years later, he founded the World Central Yeshiva, now known as Merkaz…
Happy Birthday Birkat Hamazon!
The Torah (Exodus 16:1) reports that the Children of Israel arrived at the Wilderness of Sin on the 15th of the Hebrew month of Iyar, approximately one month after the exodus from Egypt.…