Double Coconut Chocolate Macaroons
Macaroons - cookies generally made from ground almonds, sugar, and egg whites - are popular for Passover because the recipe doesn’t use flour.
How I Hosted a Huge Seder Without Cooking
Although my family started out with the smallest guest list in years last Passover, we ended up with the most well-attended seder we have ever hosted. Thanks to technology, tradition, and trust, we had more people at our seder table than ever before.
Why Praying at the Western Wall Matters to Jewish Women
I had come to Israel to join my friend Anat Hoffman, who is one the leaders of the Women of the Wall. The previous month, there had been a random decree that as women were coming in, they were not allowed to wear their prayer shawls, their tallits. I’ve been wearing a prayer shawl since I would say the late '70s, a long time. And it’s just considered a regular part of my ritual in prayer. In 1968, the Orthodox rabbinic created a mechitza, which is a separation between men and women at the Western Wall. And the understanding here in a very traditionally observant manner, in an orthodox manner, is that men are obligated to pray. Women are not. The Orthodox have deemed this site to be a synagogue.
We Stood Together at Sinai: We May Stand Together at the Kotel, Too
I grew up in a home with my single mother and two sisters. My mother had one sister, two nieces, and one nephew. When my mother died, our synagogue shipped in the men of the traveling shiva minyan to say Kaddish for her the night of her funeral.
Sharansky’s Kotel plan loses support from both sides
Following a court ruling in their favor, leaders of an organization pushing for women's prayer rights at the Western Wall have withdrawn their endorsement of Natan Sharansky’s compromise proposal to expand the egalitarian section there.
A 16-Year-Old's Epiphany at the Western Wall
This past November, I traveled to Israel as part of a NFTY delegation team in honor of the 25th anniversary of the Women of the Wall.
Reaching My Own Promised Land
When I think about my life
All that I’ve seen and done
I ask myself: Have I achieved
All that I might become…O… yes!…and no…
It is hard to reach all I can be
When oppression’s living within me
O help me now to end this slavery
An SOS from my OS seder
At future Passovers, if we consider the Jewish implications of the recent hit movie Her, we all could be using a talking computer operating system with artificial intelligence to lead our seders.
Considering "Next Year in Jerusalem"
On a recent trip to Jerusalem, my son decided that his favorite color was gold. Whenever he’s asked why, he replies with a wry smile befitting a 5-year-old.
“Jerusalem is the city of gold, of course,” he says.