Galilee Diary: New Grain
Driving across the Jezreel Valley these days, you can't miss the biblical echoes of the landscape. On Pesach we are to eat only cereal products made from the last year's harvest, baked with no leavening – and at the same time we are to clean out completely any remnants of any grain products from the old supply.
Celebrating 40 Years of Women on the Bimah
This month, we celebrate “40 Years of Women on the Bimah,” leading up the 40th anniversary of Rabbi Sally Priesand’s historic ordination as the first female rabbi in the United States.
An Historic First: Ordaining Our Cantors
Next month may mark the 40th anniversary of women in the American rabbinate, but another historic event is taking place this weekend: On Sunday, six graduates of Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion wil
Women in the Rabbinate: Equal Leaders in Our Community
"Men Can Be Rabbis?!"
“Who’s that guy?” I asked my mom.
“He’s the rabbi,” she answered. I stared up at my mom, with a blank gaze on my face.
When I was eight years old, my family joined a synagogue for the first time.
Counting Up and Counting Down
We are four weeks into the Counting of the Omer, the period of seven weeks between Passover and Shavuot.
Galilee Diary: Sustainability
When the Holy One Blessed be He created the first humans, he showed them all the trees in the Garden of Eden, and said to them: See how wonderful and pleasant are my creations! Everything I created – I created for you.
Cause for Celebration in Israel: Tu B'Av, the Jewish Festival of Love
When I moved to Israel, it was easy for me to forgo some of the holidays that I grew up with in America that I knew had a distinctly non-Jewish origin. It was also a pleasant surprise to discover other holidays here that unite Israelis across the spectrum – such as Tu B’Av, also known as the festival of love.
Galilee Diary: Return to the city of the dead
A man is nothing but a small plot of land,
A man is nothing but the image of the landscape of his birthplace,
Only what his ear recorded when it was still fresh,
Only what his eye took in before it had seen too much,
Whatever was encountered on the dew-covered path
Galilee Diary: Balancing act
Everyone will sit under their own vine and under their own fig tree, and no one will make them afraid… -Micah 4:4