“In this age of pandemics and polarization, it may be hard to envision. But it’s not a mystery. Someone who prizes decency and embodies dignity. Someone who exercises empathy and exhibits patience and understanding. Someone who lives, breathes and acts on the basic beliefs which are unique to Jewish tradition and universal in application—to pursue justice, welcome the stranger, open your hand and your heart to the needy and love your neighbor.”
Anyone who’s spent anytime on Twitter has probably seen some form of #IsOverParty trending. In its most common usage, IsOverParty is written after the name of someone or something that is “canceled.” Generally, if #IsOverParty is trending, clicking on it will pull up tweets that explain what the person has done to deserve such a party. Recently, however, many on Twitter have used the hashtag to ask why #IsOverParty is trending in the first place, flooding Twitter with tweets of confusion, making it difficult to find the reasons behind the tweets.
Through plagues, pandemics and wars, Jewish communities have found ways to adapt their traditional practices to the events of the time. Today, with the spread of COVID-19, many Jewish traditions have had to change.
When we interviewed a group of thinkers on the years that altered human history, we were floored by their thoughtful responses. While we had to condense their answers for the print issue, we have curated additional selections from their interviews, which we are so pleased to publish here.
Moment has its origins in Eastern Europe. Leonard Fein and Elie Wiesel named Moment for the influential independent Yiddish-language Der Moment, founded in 1910 in Warsaw, Poland.
We Jews are obsessed with history. From ancient to modern times, from the Flood to the Exodus to the destruction of the Temples and the exiles, from the Middle Ages to the Inquisition and the pogroms to the Holocaust to the establishment of the State of Israel, we recall and retell our history.
In mid-January 2020, when Israelis first became dimly aware of a mysterious new virus coming from far-off China, most of our attention was focused closer to home.
Zero Hour, the anti-climate-change group that Jamie S. Margolin founded two years ago when she was 16, calls itself “a movement of unstoppable youth.”
In the previous issue, Moment asked David Dayen and Stuart M. Butler to debate whether there should be Medicare for All. Dayen said yes; Butler said no. Here, they respond to each other’s arguments.
We asked Russell Roberts and Harold Meyerson.
What do President Donald Trump and the religious right see in each other?
