I received the following comment in response to The Music of Halacha: A Case Study: Was the friend present when the rebuker rebuked? If he was, wasn't he obligated to say something to the rebuker? If he wasn't
“One who sees the Sotah in her shame, shall become a Nazir.” My Rebbi, HaRav Yochanan Zweig, asks how thirty days of being a Nazir is more powerful than watching the Sotah explode? He compares this to people who drive by an accident without stopping...
In honor of Akiva S.: “One stormy night when my nephew Roger was about twenty months old I wrapped him in a blanket and carried him down to the beach in the rainy darkness. Out there, just at the edge of where -we-couldn’t-see, big...
Five of us would gather in one of the Yeshiva classrooms and have our own “Minyan.” We were all between six and seven-years-old and could not wait for another lifetime before becoming bar-mitzvah and being the Chazzan in the Yeshiva davening, or prayer service. (We...
Pythagorus had a lot of influence for a man who probably never existed. The Pythagoreans invented their founder, including the manner of his death. Pyhthagoras had a strong revulsion to beans. He would definitely never have eaten Shabbat afternoon Cholent, and not because of its...
“Bind the festival offering with cords until the corners of the Altar.” (Psalms 118:27) Please, God, bind our experiences of the Hallel to us, so that we can remained connected to Your Altar of Service, even after the Chag has ended. (Chiddushei HaRim)...
“Bind the festival offering with cords until the corners of the Altar.” (Psalms 118:27) Please, God, bind our experiences of the Hallel to us, so that we can remained connected to Your Altar of Service, even after the Chag has ended. (Chiddushei HaRim)...
I need a few days to adjust to a different time zone. I flew into LA a day before Shavuot in order to adjust before the Holyday, but one day was not enough. Things only got worse when I had to teach all night and...
It is difficult to get the news from poems yet men die miserably every day for lack of what is found there. William Carlos Williams - Asphodel, that Greeny Flower Every Biblical narrative and law is a unique creation, yet consists of universal components and techniques which are shared by other...
Early summer 1945: Britain was broke. Its cities lay in ruins, its citizens were shabbily dressed and its daily food and fuel would be strictly rationed for the next ten years. The world’s richest nation had become its biggest debtor. There were neither the resources...
I envy her final few seconds: She was not an especially religious woman. She did not believe in God or His Torah. She was warned by her husband to stay away from a certain man. She knew that she was being watched, but she did...
Pinocchio-nosed frogs, gargoyle-faced geckos and the world's smallest wallaby are among the newly identified species discovered during an expedition to Indonesia's remote Foja Mountains and announced today. The newfound species they detailed include several new mammals, a reptile, an amphibian, at least 12 insects and...
Having confessed his crime (writing love poems to the Prince’s mistress), the straight young knight from Venice stood all alone, above the royal palace court, to hear his fate: “You have a choice. So listen and decide. Either: retire to the desert, and take a vow to forfeit women, wine, and...