The OU mourns the passing of Rabbi Dr. Yehuda Cooperman, founder of Michlalah Jerusalem College for Women.
In recognition of Rabbi Cooperman’s extraordinary contributions to Jewish women’s education, we are highlighting this article from the Spring 2014 issue of Jewish Action that detailed his life and achievements.
For my wife and me, like many of this magazine’s readers, Pesach conjures up memories of being with family, sitting around a table together and sharing a special Seder with loved ones. Many of the same faces, year in and year out, make the Seder night a very warm, multi-generational, family-focused ritual. Its substantial religious and halachic importance is matched by the imprint it has on forming fond childhood memories of Jewish family life.
Do
• Make sure everyone at the table feels like a player on the field and not a spectator watching the action.
Do you feel a sense of panic when trying to plan your menu for the Sedarim? Do you struggle to keep your Pesach menus as healthy as possible? Do you need recipes that are gluten-free or non-gebrokts? Are you tired of hearing your family complain that they’re hungry? A constant complaint during Passover is: “There’s […]
Misconception: The two foods sent on Purim for mishloach manot must be from two different categories of blessings. Fact: This widespread misconception has no halachic basis. Background: Mishloach manot is one of the four mitzvot established by Mordechai and Esther to be performed on Purim day. Alluded to in Megillat Esther, these mitzvot are: reading […]
Like Dreamers: The Story of the Israeli Paratroopers Who Reunited Jerusalem and Divided a Nation By Yossi Klein Halevi Harper Collins Publishers New York, 2013 608 pages Reviewed by Yitzchak Etshalom Anyone who can remember a pre-1967 Israel will testify to the implausible impact that those magical six days had on his or her life. […]
A View from the Heights Magnificent scenery and spectacular views, fun activities for the entire family and opportunities to focus on history as well as on issues facing contemporary Israel. Manara, located in northern Israel, has it all. Kibbutz Manara, founded in 1943 by young immigrants from Germany and Poland, is perched on the top […]
For reasons I cannot begin to fathom, I had the incomparable zechut of knowing Rebbetzin Batsheva Kanievsky personally. I first met her in 2005, the year I spent learning in seminary in Israel.
In this section, we take a look at Anglos who have had an extraordinary impact on Israeli society be it in education, medicine or the arts, among other fields. No attempt was made to be comprehensive. Rather this is a sampling of a few of the remarkable Anglos who have helped shape Israeli culture in profound ways.
Until recently, any native English speaker living in Israel was considered Anglo-Saxon. That’s “Anglo-Saxim” in Hebrew. That has changed a bit in the past decade. English speakers are now called “Anglos.”
“Whanne he cam and was nyȝ þe hous, he herde a symphonie and oþer noise of mynstraleye.” In modern-day English, the sentence above—written in fourteenth-century Middle English—means: “
Short & Sweet: Text Message Responsa of Ha-Rav Shlomo Aviner Shlit”a Rabbi Mordechai Tzion, trans. American Friends of Yeshivat Ateret Yerushalayim New Jersey, 2012 472 pages Piskei Shlomo 3 vol. Rabbi Mordechai Tzion, ed. Hava Books Jerusalem, 2013 320 pages Reviewed by Gil Student The communications revolution of the last two decades places a troubling […]
In 2003, my wife, daughter and I spent the summer in Israel. We had already made aliyah, but had temporarily moved back to the US. On a whim, we checked out an open house in Modi’in, and by the end of the summer we had signed a contract to buy a home under construction that […]
By Nachum Amsel Twenty-five years ago, I moved to a neighborhood in Ramot Aleph called Neve Orot. My wife and I chose Ramot because my brother-in-law, Dr. Danny Weil, had recently moved to the community and we wanted the cousins to be able to play with each other. (To this day, the cousins remain very […]
By Zvi Volk Like many of his friends, Max Rabin learned in a yeshivah in Israel the year after he graduated high school. That’s where his path diverged from most of his friends. Instead of returning to his hometown of Los Angeles, he stayed in Israel. He spent two years in yeshivah, then joined the […]
They say that the only time you hear Ivrit spoken on Derech Beit Lechem, a major street near where I live in Jerusalem’s Baka neighborhood, is when a Russian meets a Frenchman. That may be an exaggeration, but, as is evident from the accompanying article, most olim want to live in a neighborhood where they […]
By Jack Abramowitz Shabbos. There, I said it. Shabbos. Sukkos. Shavuos. Mitzvos. Matzos. Shalosh seudos. Baba Basra. It feels good to get that off my chest. Readers may not realize how much I’m getting away with here, because at the Orthodox Union the convention is to publish those words as Shabbat, Sukkot, mitzvot, et cetera.* […]
There is a fascinating debate among the Tannaim in Tractate ta’anit regarding an issue that at first glance seems purely academic, since it is about an institution we no longer practice today. However, upon taking a closer look, we find that the debate, which is so extreme in its positions, is actually extraordinarily relevant to […]
After attending a meeting with a group of various individuals, Sheldon Rudoff, a”h, suggested I speak to one of the attendees—Rabbi Matis Greenblatt. Matis and I subsequently met in my home and after a few hours of intense discussion, we decided to turn the organization’s four-page newsprint throwaway—known as Jewish Action—into a full-fledged magazine.
Yerach Tov: Birkat HaChodesh in Jewish Law and Liturgy By Rabbi Elchanan Adler OU Press Yerach Tov: Birkat HaChodesh in Jewish Law and Liturgy is a gem of a book. Rabbi Elchanan Adler treats the reader to a fascinating, in-depth study of Birkat Hachodesh, the prayer for the new month recited on the Shabbat before […]
I don’t believe in self-esteem. That is, I don’t believe in the way the self-esteem movement promotes the idea that parents and educators need to constantly shower praise on their children . . .
Q: I’m so tired of potatoes for every side dish on Pesach. What are other options if I don’t eat gebrokts? A: As a self-professed potato lover, I feel that a meal is just not complete without potatoes. But I know not everyone enjoys these tubers to such an extent. Thankfully, we have a world […]
“Rabbi, we received a letter from a Jewish inmate who’s worried that his blanket contains both wool and linen. What on Earth is he talking about?” As a pulpit rabbi in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, most of my appointments involve shul matters. However, one of my scheduled meetings is completely different. On the last Tuesday of each […]
One morning King Pharaoh woke in his bed / There were frogs in his bed and frogs on his head / Frogs on his nose and frogs on his toes / Frogs here, frogs there, frogs just jumping everywhere! If you’ve been to any Seder with children in attendance in the past twenty-five years, you’ve […]