Jewish People

Hillel, Comma, Open, and Beit Shammai

Once again HIllel has found itself in the news due to several recent events: Eric Fingerhut’s refusal to speak at ...

Can The Jewish People Find Common Ground?

Can the Jewish people find common ground? Is there enough that brings together all the varied different ways of being ...

Gasping For Air In Israeli Discourse

I love the ocean.  Whether surfing or just playing in the waves, as a native Californian, I feel at home ...

Who Speaks for the Jews?

I have sung the song “David Melech Yisrael” thousands of times. It’s easy to learn and fun to sing with ...

The Freedom of Now

When does time begin? What does time measure? What came before the beginning? Such mind-bending questions evoke timeless truths especially ...

A Hundred Thousand Miracles

I cannot remember the last time I switched on the news—be it on the television or the radio—or glanced at a newspaper headline ...

Will There Be One Jewish People?

I have been thinking a lot again recently about the correspondence between one of the great Orthodox luminaries of the ...

Denominational Ins and Outs: The New Mishkan

Jewish life is turned around – so suggests this week’s Torah portion (Terumah) about the first Mishkan (ritual focus of ...

If a Chicken and a Half….

 If a chicken and half takes a day and a half to lay an egg and a half, and if an eastbound train ...

Is the Messiah Coming?

Several years ago I went to visit one of my daughters in Israel.  She was attending a summer program and ...