More Than Words on a Page: Social Justice in our Prayer Books
When I left for college my freshman year, I was nervous about exploring a new Jewish community. However, I immediately felt at home as I walked into my university’s Hillel’s Conservative Friday night services and saw the Siddur Sim Shalom, the prayer book I had grown up with.
New & Updated Resources: Preparing for the High Holidays in Challenging Times
The Gay Synagogue I Didn’t Know I Needed
Congregation Kol Ami in West Hollywood, CA, is dedicated to raising the voices of queer folks so the rest of the Jewish community cannot help but hear our cry.
How Midrash and Commentary Help Us Read Between the Lines
As Rosh HaShanah approached last year, I was living in southwestern China, where I celebrated by eating apples and explaining the Jewish New Year to my Chinese roommate.
A Familiar Conversation with a Family Twist
It's a conversation I had had hundreds of times in my 44 years as a Jewish educator. However, this time was different: It was with my son.
How I Feel as a Jew During Christmas
Sustaining a minority culture in the face of Christmas’s incessant commercial drumbeat can be exhausting.
How to Play Dreidel: The Traditional Game, Plus a New Spin
How to Understand the Timelessness of Jewish Time
Although we may think time moves in a linear fashion, Jewish holidays insert themselves in unexpected moments and places, seemingly out-of-sync with our expectations.
Being Holy - and Staying Alive
Acharei Mot, the first of this week's two parashiyot, begins on an unsettling note—a reminder of the death of Aaron's sons and the suggestion that such tragedies might occur again unless the priests take specified steps to prevent them
Just Like Me, They Long(ed) to Be Close to You
In this week's double parashah, Acharei Mot/K'doshim, there's a one-sentence reference to the mortal sin of Aaron's sons, Nadab and Abihu, who brought "alien fire" into the Mishkan, which we read about in Parashat Sh'mini two weeks ago (see Leviticus 10:1-7).