The Rebbetzin's Husband

Here's a brief pre-Pesach seder thought, too simplistic for a derashah but interesting nonetheless: The fifth chapter of Pirkei Avot inc...

[ Haveil Havalim is here ! ] For me to give a speech about a topic, I need to feel: 1) I am exercised by the topic, and 2) I have a basic un...

I won’t be publishing my Shabbat HaGadol derashah (technical reasons), but I did want to put up an item from the Seder Insights class I exp...

Yesterday I drove into Brooklyn to pick up our community’s Shatzer hand-shmurah matzah for Pesach, as I do each year. [Last year I blogged t...

From time to time I attend a funeral at which the officiant begins by quoting these lines from Ben Sira: “Seek not to understand what is too...

This morning, visitors to our shul davened outside of the actual room where we were davening; they believed our mechitzah was too low. My h...

[ This week’s Haveil Havalim, hosted by the inimitable Jack, is here ! ] We all have on-going projects – cleaning out the garage, sitting on...

If you ever need a thought-provoking quote, go for Voltaire; he coined adages like, “Common sense is not so common,” and, “Originality is un...

A Mother in Israel posts her list of Pesach to-do items . The Talmid, commenting on a recent post of mine, mentions his own pre-Yom Tov list...

The New York Times on Birkat haChamah, The Blessing of the Sun, April 8, 1897: HEBREW FESTIVAL MARRED Rabbi Arrested for Observance of an An...

The New York Times testifies : A soldier, identified by the pseudonym Ram, is quoted as saying that in Gaza, “the rabbinate brought in a lot...

[ The latest Kosher Cooking Carnival is here ! ] I know I will miss many, many aspects of the shul rabbinate. I’m having a hard time mentall...

[ Haveil Havalim is here ! ] I’ve been having a hard time writing this post. I’ve been thinking about how I would write it for a couple of w...

[ I have some big news, but I'm not ready to blog it just yet. ] One of the fun side-effects of blogging is that it makes periodic self...

Missiles, rocket fly between Israel, Gaza Five Palestinian militants were wounded, one critically, when an Israeli missile hit a car in down...

Catherine Mayer writes in Time about one of Ten Ideas that are Changing the World : Amortality. She writes, “The defining characteristic of...

The following two young Israeli policemen were killed by terrorists this week: David Rabinowitz David was born in Kiryat Shmona and grew up ...

This hardly seems like an economic time when any synagogue – or any dues-collecting organization – would want to cap its membership. Nonethe...

[ This week's Haveil Havalim is here ! ] What's on my mind this evening: Thinking Outside the Siddur. I'm teaching a class Thurs...

Science fiction revels in the “What if” – as in, “What if Lincoln had not gone to Ford’s Theater on the night of his assassination?” “What i...