When most people think of summer, they think of cold soups and barbecues. Here are some of my favorite summer recipes, most of which don’t require much cooking. Gazpacho 10 servings Perfect for the summer, this popular cold soup made with raw vegetables can be made as spicy and as colorful as you’d like. It […]

Most shofarot are made from a ram’s horn. However, an increasing number of exotic shofarot are available from species such as the kudu, the gemsbok and the ibex. While some of these “alternative” shofarot are quite popular, there are serious halachic concerns regarding their acceptability. The most well-known “alternative shofar” is made from the horn […]

Do you have a work-related kashrut question? Send it to ja@ou.org, and it may be featured in our newest column dedicated to exploring the multitude of kashrut issues that confronts the Orthodox Jew in the workplace. Answers supplied by the OU Kashrut Department. Even if a utensil is perfectly clean, non-kosher flavor may be absorbed […]

Throughout the world, groups of women are gathering together to share the importance and power of Amen. In 2001, while driving home to Bat Yam, near Tel Aviv, twenty-six-year-old Alte Nechama Malka (“Malkie”) Wachsman was killed in an accident. Among the hundreds of visitors at the mourning house of her devastated parents in Bnei Brak, […]

I have good news for those of you in despair about the shtiebelization of American Orthodoxy. I have inadvertently conducted a social science experiment in my own community, and the results suggest that—surprise, surprise—people will join bold leadership in countering this trend in American Orthodoxy. My experiment developed when I found myself behind deadline (again) […]

“Those who trust in the Lord shall be like Mount Zion, which cannot be moved but abides forever” (Psalms 125:1). Dr. Ari Zivotofsky’s well-presented article “What’s the Truth about … King David’s Tomb?” addresses the question of the true location of King David’s Tomb from a Biblical as well as an archaeological perspective. In the […]

Grandfather’s passing was a whisper— a final billowing and undulating sigh that drew over our heads curled in our nostrils heady and suffocating mist of ash. He lived a muted life; but not for loss of words. He was penitent; as if the sound of his voice would rouse the ghosts he’d left behind. And […]

Misconception: King David is buried on Mount Zion, in a room that bears the inscription “King David’s Tomb.” Mount Zion is located just outside and to the south of the Armenian Quarter and Zion Gate of Jerusalem’s Old City. Fact: Evidence indicates that the area known today as Mount Zion was not part of inhabited […]

Want to get a new perspective on being Jewish? Try living on a farm in Maine. I’ve been visiting an organic vegetable farm in the remote northeastern corner of Maine almost every day for the past ten years. When I’m there, I get caught up on the latest weather and insect reports, soil conditions, tractor […]

I may not be a typical Chareidi Jew (if there even is such an animal), but I’m a musmach of Rabbi Yaakov Yitzchok Ruderman, have been a member of Agudath Israel for many decades (and have served as the organization’s spokesman for the past thirteen years), don’t own a television and wear a black hat. […]

“David was thirty years old when he began to reign, and he reigned forty years. In Hebron he reigned over Judah seven years and six months; and in Jerusalem he reigned thirty-three years over all Israel and Judah. And the king and his men went to Jerusalem, to the Jebusites, the inhabitants of the land, […]

Take a brief quiz to find out how much you really know about kosher travel. Good luck—and don’t forget to rate yourself at the end!