While hiking in the fall of 2008, a member of Temple Beth Jacob, a Reform synagogue in Newburgh, New York, discovered several headstones with Hebrew inscriptions on a steep, thickly wooded hillside. It turned out that the Jewish cemetery, in desperate need of repair, belonged to the Temple. The Temple’s youth group did an […]

How you can have an elegant and delicious Shabbat meal without sacrificing your waistline Q: How can I make healthier choices on Shabbat without feeling like I’m eating “diet foods”? A: As Orthodox Jews in the twenty-first century, we’re interested in following a healthy diet, but frequently our typical Shabbat fare makes this very challenging. […]

The life story of David Ben-Gurion, Israel’s first prime minister, is interesting enough on its own, but when told by his protégé, former Prime Minister and current President Shimon Peres,

A poem in honor of the Siyum HaShas.

“The World Endures Solely on Account of the Breath of Schoolchildren” An Elegy Over the Murders of a Teacher and Students in Toulouse, 25 Adar 5772 By Moshe Sokolow On Tishah B’Av this year, along with mourning the tragedies over the centuries, let us mourn the Jewish victims of Islamic terror in our days as […]

Planes, trains or automobiles—no matter which mode of transportation you choose, it can be somewhat of a challenge to ensure that you’ll have kosher food while traveling and upon arriving at your destination.  Organization and advance planning are the keys to having a relaxing vacation, so it’s a good idea to prepare a list and […]

Following the Destruction of the Beit Hamikdash, our Sages introduced a number of practices whose purpose is to remind us of Yerushalayim and the Beit Hamikdash. Our Sages felt that anything that brings joy should be accompanied by a zecher l’Churban, a remembrance of the Destruction, because without Yerushalayim and the Beit Hamikdash, there is […]

Journalist Steve Lipman observes a small but growing trend among aging Orthodox baby boomers: they are heading back to yeshivah.

The disappearance of a Jewish community in a small mining town in Pennsylvania sheds light on the disappearance of many other small Jewish communities that once dotted the American landscape.

We fight and quibble, like all families. At times, the ideological differences between us—Chassidic, Sephardic, Yeshivish, Modern Orthodox—seem like formidable, even insurmountable, walls.

Until recently, the vast majority of frum families in the US were concentrated in a fairly small number of cities and suburbs. Today, thanks to growing numbers—and a welcome decline in anti-Semitism—Orthodox Jews are making homes in a diverse array of locales around the country. That’s the good news. Here’s the bad: In communities with […]

Eishes Chayil is a pseudonym for Judy Brown, the author of Hush, a book that has been described by some as a sensationalist exposé, and commended by others for its masterful suspenseful style. (Brown originally wrote the book anonymously but revealed her identity after the murder of eight-year-old Leiby Kletzky.)

In a corridor in Me’arat HaMachpelah this past March, a few soldiers, their heads bare and hair closely cropped, step away from a larger group and approach a man. The soldiers take turns as the man secures a tefillin box on their left biceps, and then wraps the leather straps along their arms. The soldiers […]

OU Press takes special pride in playing a major role in the growing body of literature by and about Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik, the Rav, and is pleased to present three new important publications.

Ah, summer. Barbeques. Sun. Long Shabbatot, beaches and blue skies. And the kids? They’re in day camp, having a blast. They bounce from baseball to hockey, from arts and crafts to learning, to music, to dance . . . until they finally come home exhilarated and exhausted. Of course we all know the best part […]

In the twelfth century, a Spanish traveler known as Binyamin of Tudela set out on a thirteen-year tour of Jewish communities across Europe and the Middle East. He would later catalogue his sojourns in what would become a famous work—beyond which we know nothing of its author

One of the universally acknowledged goals of Jewish education, in addition to acquainting students with the fundamentals of Judaism, deepening their sense of faith and commitment to religious life, equipping them with the skills that will allow them to become life-long learners and preparing them to continue their Jewish and secular educations is the development of exemplary character traits, often represented by the Yiddish term “Mentschlichkeit,” or in Stanley Fischman’s more Americanized form, “Mentschhood.”

Four years ago, feeling helpless over the Sderot bombings and the intensifying danger facing Jews worldwide, Tziporah Harris knew that Jewish unity would turn it all around. And it had to start with her. Harris, a forty-year-old Aish HaTorah lecturer who lives in Passaic, New Jersey, began an impromptu speaking tour, urging women from around […]

By now the outlines of Rabbi Nosson Tzvi Finkel’s life are widely known. Born in Chicago in 1943 to Rabbi Eliyahu Meir, zt”l, and Sarah Finkel, Rav Nosson Tzvi attended Ida Crown Jewish Academy, a coed Modern Orthodox day school.

Early this year, my family celebrated the wedding of my nephew Simcha in Baltimore, Maryland. The wedding was lovely. The chatan and kallah radiated a sense of infectious joy. And since I live in Israel, it was wonderful to see members of my family who live in America, albeit briefly. I greatly appreciated another aspect […]

Who would have imagined a display of Jewish unity emerging from that most solitary of sports—long distance running? Since its inception in 1983, the International Minyan for New York City Marathoners has been a model of Jewish unity—the joint project of an Orthodox shul-goer from New Jersey running his first marathon (me), and a rabbi […]

By Mark Levie Hearing my thirteen-year-old daughter Talia say that she had the best Shabbat ever was music to my ears. And it was not because she went to an over-the-top Bat Mitzvah or hung out with the “in” crowd. It was because something special happened around our Shabbat table that was meaningful—and she clearly […]

  The Knesset Menorah stands about fifteen feet high across from the main entrance to the Knesset. Photo: www.sasson-photos.com Upon the founding of the State of Israel, the menorah was chosen as its official symbol. Today, the Knesset Menorah, a bronze monument, stands about fifteen feet high, across from the Knesset gates, symbolizing the eternity […]

Tiny little Israel. Such a small and inconsequential piece of land should logically be ignored and forgotten. She is content to be the small Jewish homeland that welcomes and absorbs people of all faiths. She does not seek the world’s attention; she seeks the world’s persecuted and broken and offers assistance and refuge. She does […]

Let’s Stay Safe By Bracha Goetz Mesorah Publications Brooklyn, 2011 32 pages Reviewed by Norman Blumenthal When teaching children about safety, educators and parents alike face a formidable challenge: how does one impart lessons about potential danger and the need to take precautions but not instill undue fear or trepidation? Ideally, our children should have […]

In the Negev region of Israel there is a city called Sderot, which serves as a commercial, medical, cultural and educational center for the surrounding area. Brochures seeking to attract visitors might call it “kassum,” Hebrew for “enchanting,” if not for the fact that today Sderot’s main claim to fame is the Kassam missiles that […]

Angels at the Table: A Practical Guide to Celebrating Shabbat By Yvette Alt Miller Continuum New York, 2011 367 pp. + vii Reviewed by Hillel Goldberg After I read Abraham Joshua Heschel’s beautifully written and spiritually penetrating The Sabbath, with its elaboration of Shabbat as a “palace in time,” I thought I had read everything […]

For the past six years, on the Sunday evening between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, OU-member synagogue rabbis have been swapping pulpits in the name of Jewish unity. “Unity starts from the top,” says Rabbi Yaakov Luban, executive rabbinic coordinator of the Orthodox Union and rav of Ohr Torah in Edison, New Jersey, who swapped […]

The Lonely Man of Faith, the Rav’s classic essay, has achieved iconic status in the world of Jewish philosophy. No contemporary discussion of fundamental themes in Jewish philosophy

Professor Gerald Blidstein, professor emeritus at Ben-Gurion University and winner of the Israel Prize in Jewish thought,

Few questions represent the challenge modernity poses to religion greater than that of intellectual freedom.

The past few years have seen a dizzying amount of revelations and publications about abuse in the Orthodox community.

When Rabbi Aharon Lichtenstein speaks, people listen. In this latest collection of his articles, he addresses many of the issues that rose to the fore over the past two decades and remain relevant today—