Many months ago, I shared something that the rabbi of my shul had discussed on Rosh Hashana. He talked about George Nagel, AKA the Yabloner Rebbe. Here’s what I wrote then: In the 1920s, the Yabloner Rebbe (born Yechezkel Taub) moved much of his community to Israel in anticipation of Moshiach’s arrival. Things went poorly

A few years ago, my family moved into a new home. It had pretty much everything we wanted and a few extras to boot. My wife took up gardening, much to her delight. The only thing she didn’t particularly love was the tree in the front yard. This is one weird-looking tree. It’s droopy, twisted,

Roots & Rituals: Insights into Hebrew, Holidays and History Mitchell First Kodesh Press I can’t speak for you but this book was 100% up my alley, focusing as it does on linguistics/etymology and history/archaeology, each of which is a subject of interest to me. If any of these – especially the language aspect – is

A colleague recently heard someone pronounce a religious term differently from the way that she had always pronounced it. This made her concerned that perhaps she had always said it wrong. When such a thing happens, the ramification is that a person becomes retroactively self-conscious. “Have I been saying it wrong? For how long? Who

Why Do We Read Different Parshas? This year, we have a situation that arises every so often – certainly not infrequently! In America, Europe, Australia, South Africa – basically, most of the world – the eighth and final day of Pesach falls on a Shabbos. But in Israel, where Pesach is only seven days long,

Years ago, my family lived on the upper floor of a two-family house. The landlord had exclusive use of the driveway, so my wife and I would park our cars on the street. Next door to us was an older widow, who owned a single-family home; she always parked in her own driveway. (This seems

I recently had occasion to review the Passover Haggadah Graphic Novel, which represents a novel approach to the traditional Seder text. Almost immediately upon completing this task, another unusual take on the Haggadah was brought to my attention for potential review: Martin Bodek’s The Emoji Haggadah. If a Haggadah in graphic novel format strikes you as

You’ve probably seen the news about the recent college admissions cheating scandal, in which wealthy parents paid exorbitant sums to buy their children’s way into prestigious colleges. The last time I looked, about 50 people had been indicted in this scandal but one name stands out, featuring again and again in news stories and social

Remember the musical Bye Bye Birdie? In it, Paul Lynde sings this famous refrain: Kids! I don’t know what’s wrong with these kids today! Kids! Who can understand anything they say? Kids! They are disobedient, disrespectful oafs – Noisy, crazy, sloppy, lazy loafers! And while we’re on the subject, Kids! You can talk and talk

I’m hesitant to springboard an article using something I read in Reader’s Digest but I always like to start at the beginning. My hesitancy to cite Reader’s Digest comes from my own prejudices about the magazine, based on the assumption that its readership is primarily women of a certain age, which I am not. (My wife