Ask the Rabbis | What Is the Jewish Relationship to Time?
INDEPENDENT: Time is an invitation. Both words share the same root: z’mahn. It is written: “The life of man is like a breath exhaling; his days are like a passing shadow” (Psalms 144:4).
Ask The Rabbis | What Should Jews Know About the Muslim Faith?
“I used to think I knew what Islam was about. Yet as I came to know more Muslims personally and learned more about their faith, I realized that much of what I knew was either flat-out wrong or grossly misguided.”
Palestinian Haute Cuisine Heats Up
“To this day, most Israeli Jews think of Arab food as cheap ‘hummus-chips (french fries)-salad-kebab’—all said as a single word. But it isn’t really Arab food at all.”
A Rare Peek Into a Renowned Library’s Vault
The extraordinary works in this exhibition are rarely seen, and this is their first time in America.
Ask The Rabbis // How Do We Balance Civility With Disapproval For Others’ Politics?
We should learn from our sages.
The Delectable Dumpling Diaspora
Their seemingly modest appearance belies their multicultural significance, manifold incarnations and long history.
Ask The Rabbis // Is it the job of rabbis to fight intermarriage?
INDEPENDENT
Intermarriage is a reality of American Jewish life that isn’t receding, no matter how valiant the efforts to counter it. The central challenge to American...
The Great Hanukkah Clanging
Hanukkah was really only about one thing when I was growing up. It wasn’t the presents—they were generally small and unexciting…
Gelt-y Pleasures for All Ages
In the story of Hanukkah—the cruel reign of Antiochus, the unlikely victory of Mattathias and his sons, the one cruse of sacred oil left in the plundered Temple that burned for eight days—there is no mention of money.
Fiction // Turboatom
I wanted to tell my father that the fish salad was shining, but he was asleep, calling my name in long somniloquous moans. I stood at his bedside, the shape of our room made visible by the scarce lights of the Marshal Zhukov Street. Slava! My name rose from his lungs…
Ask The Rabbis // Gender Identity
What guidance, if any, does Judaism offer to transgender people?
Visual Moment // Jerusalem, 1000–1400: Every People Under Heaven
From the years 1000 to 1400 CE, a kind of Jerusalem mania captivated much of the world. This fervor drew thousands of people from across the globe to the Holy City…