The latest international storm in a teacup is yet another dumb letter circulating in Israel. This one, signed by 27 prominent rabbis’ wives and distributed by the “Lehava” organization, calls on Jewish women not to date Arabs, work in places where Arabs are employed, or volunteer for National Service with them. They insist that it isn’t about racism but about…
General Topics
Censorship
A few years ago there was a kerfuffle in the Orthodox Jewish world over a book called Making of a Godol: A Study of Episodes in the Lives of Great Torah Personalities. The book was a scholarly history of life in the world of the Eastern European Lithuanian yeshivot of the last century, with specific reference to the rosh yeshiva…
Washing Hands
When I was a child and went to visit my grandfather, he always put a bowl and a cup of water next to my bed at night, so that I’d wash my hands first thing when I woke up in the morning. Neigelvasser, it was and is called in Yiddish. Actually, the first thing I did (and still do) was…
Ghettos
The term “ghetto”, meaning a place where Jews were forced to live within a city, does not appear until 1611. In 1570 the Italian papacy insisted that Jews be confined to certain areas of towns in order to prevent them contaminating the local Christians. The actual word simply means a “foundry” in medieval Italian. That happened to be the name…
Rabbis and Fires
A group of nationalist rabbis in Israel, including the chief rabbis of Ramat Hasharon, Ashdod, Kiryat Gat, Rishon Letzion, and Carmiel, issued a statement declaring that Jews are forbidden to sell or rent homes in the Holy Land to non-Jews. “Wise men, be careful what you say lest people misuse them to lie” (Mishna Avot 1:11). Their declaration has been…
Modern Leadership
In the Jewish world leadership is discredited. And Chanukah is good time to discuss it. Recent exchanges on my blog have questioned my definition of “leadership”. So let me clarify what I mean. All significant creative and innovative movements in religious Judaism, after Moses, have come from outside the established leadership. The prophets of Israel, the Maccabee uprising, Talmudic Judaism,…