RJ Blog

by Max J. Goodman It was October of 2010. I was standing in Bradford, Pennsylvania’s Beth Israel Cemetery at the base of my parents’ headstone. The wind was swirling, the temperature was falling, snow was coming.  I looked up at the dead tree leaning ominously over the headstone and thought, “Why doesn’t someone cut down that tree before it comes crashing down on my parents’ stone.” As I looked around, I realized I was the only one there, so that someone was me. With that in mind, I sent a letter to each of the 30 members of Temple Beth [...]

A spokesman at the Auschwitz-Birkenau state museum confirmed that Antoni Dobrowolski, the oldest known survivor of Auschwitz, died in Poland earlier this week at age 108. When the Nazi regime limited elementary education for Polish children to just four years of schooling, Dobrowolski participated in underground education efforts. In June 1942, he was arrested by the Nazis and sent to Auschwitz, where more than one million people were ultimately murdered by the Nazis. In a documentary recorded five years ago, Dobrowolski said, “Auschwitz was worse than Dante’s hell.” He was later moved to concentration camps Gross-Rosen and Sachsenhausen until being [...]

by Rabbi Bernard M. Zlotowitz According to traditional Jewish belief, the Sabbath has its origin in God’s divine command to observe the seventh day as a day of rest and sanctification. Scholars, on the other hand, are divided in their opinion concerning the origin of the Sabbath, although they all agree that it was borrowed from another culture. Some scholars contend that its origin is Babylonian. The Babylonians believed that the seventh, fourteenth, twenty-first, and twenty-eighth days of the month (flowing the phases of the moon) were evil days and, therefore, the physician, the oracular priest, and the king ceased [...]

by Rabbi Donald Kunstadt I’ve come to the conclusion we need to change the date of Simchat Torah. Our Jewish festivals must be re-envisioned as inspirational community gatherings of joyful spiritual Jewish celebration.  Every single festival needs to be a time of great community involvement and meaning. To not maximize that possibility is a mistake that can easily be fixed. Here are the basics. Though the pilgrimage festivals originally had agrarian roots, we are no longer an agrarian people. Exactly how many Jewish farmers do you know? With all due respect to the kibbutz movement in Israel, and to the [...]

How can one best participate in building the State of Israel? In the long history of the Jewish people, this is a very new question. The question of what is the best way to build or protect Israel has been, and continues to be, at the center of many debates. These debates were present in Israel before the declaration of the state. There were two groups in the land; those who worked to return the Jewish people to the land as farmers, workers, and builders, and those who wished to bring about a state based on Torah study. The chalutzim [...]

NFTY in Israel alum Marlana Fireman writes about the incredible journey that a rock from Auschwitz took with her as she traveled from Europe to Israel and back to her home in Ohio. Read about the awe she discovered while contemplating the meaning her experiences this past summer, and find out why she says that “in my travels, no matter where I go or what I learn, I will do for those who couldn’t.”

by Barry Shainker As Americans, we look forward to Thanksgiving each November. Whether we enjoy the holiday meal, watch football or college basketball, attend parades, or get prepared for Black Friday shopping sprees, it is a time when most of us take time off from work to enjoy a long weekend with family and friends. As young children, we learn that the Pilgrims created the holiday to thank God for guiding them safely from England to New World. But few us know that the Pilgrims, deeply religious people, likely looked to Sukkot, our holiday of thanksgiving, for inspiration in creating [...]

How did they examine the witnesses? The pair that arrived first they examined first. And they brought in the elder of the two and said to him: Relate how you saw the moon: in front of the sun or behind the sun? To the north of it or to the south of it? How high was it? And how wide was it? If he said, In front of the sun, his statement was worth naught.  And then they brought in the second one and examined him.  If their statements were found to agree, their evidence stood… The head of the [...]

Earlier this month, I traveled to St. Thomas in the U.S. Virgin Islands for a week-long family vacation. Before leaving my home in Dallas, I contacted the Rabbi Shimon Moch, the spiritual leader at Hebrew Congregation of St. Thomas, and inquired about coming to Shabbat services while I was there. With just over 110 members units, Hebrew Congregation is small in size but large in passion, and its community is very welcoming to those who are vacationing in the islands. With a real pride in the history of their community, its members are quick to let you know that their [...]

by Rabbi Evan Moffic Ralph Waldo Emerson famously said that “Foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of small minds.” Foolish consistency is clinging to a viewpoint when all evidence points to the contrary. It is refusing to change when change is the only approach that makes sense. The Talmud foreshadowed Emerson’s insight saying that “one should be soft like a reed, and not hard like a cedar.” (Ta’anith 20a) Successful Jewish leaders have followed this insight. Among the most intriguing examples in American Jewish life is found in the history of the Sunday Shabbat service.

By Séverine Sokol Our parashah Eikev reminds us that God “upholds the cause of the fatherless and the widow, befriends the stranger, providing food and clothing – You too must befriend the stranger, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt.” (Deuteronomy 10:18-19) Scholars often note that the Israelite code of ethics was founded on the belief that God identifies with the vulnerable. This expression of concern for the oppressed, the poor, the stranger is not exclusive to the Book of Deuteronomy (see also verse 24:17). We find it also in Leviticus (19:9, 19:33- 34), Exodus (22:20), and Numbers [...]

by Rabbi Donald Kunstadt Why would a rabbi want to travel to Berlin, Germany? Certainly there are more pleasant places to visit, from Tahiti to Hong Kong, on the bucket list of life. Well, for one, Germany is closer. Second, I must admit a curiosity as to what modern-day Berlin is like. It has a reputation for being über hip. After traveling there, I don’t know if I would characterize it in that way; however, it certainly is a progressive city by American standards. Third, my father leaving Vienna at the age of 16 as a refugee from the Nazis [...]

by Alden Solovy Here is a memorial prayer for the 40th anniversary of the Munich massacre. The first stanza includes an allusion to the Eleh Ezkera, the liturgical poem that we will recite in just over a week on Tisha b’Av. The second and third stanzas are influenced strongly by this week’s attack on Israelis in Bourgas, Bulgaria. This prayer focuses on the massacre and our people, excluding reference to the movement to gain the obvious rightful memorial: a moment of silence at the upcoming games in London. Sign the petition here. Also read this prayer “For Israel’s Olympic Athletes.”

By P.J. Schwartz The ninth day of the Hebrew month of Av has come to symbolize a day of tragedy for the Jewish people. Tradition tells us that both the First and Second Temples were destroyed on Tisha B’Av, and history has shown that other prominent events resulting in catastrophe for the Jews occurred on or close to this day as well: the Jewish expulsions from England and Spain, the declaration of war on Germany leading to World War II and the Holocaust, and the mass extermination at Treblinka of Jewish deportees from the Warsaw Ghetto. As a result, the [...]