- When an Apology is Not an Apology November 12, 2016
Aron Moss raises a hypothetical situation – one he claims has never happened before. Because of a mix-up in communication, he left his wife stranded at the train station in ...
Read more - Shemini Atzeret: The Holiday That Isn’t October 28, 2016
Right in between Sukkot and Simchat Torah, sort of attached to both of them, is Shemini Atzeret, the 8th Assembly, or at least the 8th Something, since we are not ...
Read more - From the Cutting Room Floor October 14, 2016
When a film is completed, usually there are entire scenes and out-takes left over. They are referred to as being left on the cutting room floor. At the end of ...
Read more - Sephardi Ways – Mizrachi Ways September 23, 2016
When a child is growing up, he or she just assumes that how they are raised and what goes on in their home is how things are supposed to be. ...
Read more - Sisterhood Then and On That Day September 9, 2016
This Shabbat will be our very first Sisterhood Shabbat. We certainly hope that this will be the first of a great many such events. In many congregations Sisterhood is considered ...
Read more - I See – I Hear – What You Are Saying August 26, 2016
I take enormous pleasure when I read a truly learned person writing what I have said before. Granted, they are almost always more erudite than I, and add insights that ...
Read more - Rio 2016 The More Things Change, The More They Stay The Same August 12, 2016
I cannot imagine that I am the only Jew watching the Olympics. Also, I cannot imagine that I am the only Jew keeping track of our own country and also ...
Read more - Lashon Harah: The Power of Words July 22, 2016
Halpern’s Rule #5 – It Is All About the Words – is usually applied to the understanding of our Holy Scriptures. It is often too easy to gloss over the ...
Read more - May His Soul Be Bound Up in the Bond of Eternal Life Rest in Peace – Elie Wiesel July 8, 2016
This past week one of the Jewish community’s giants passed away– Elie Wiesel: Shoah survivor, author, voice for all those who survived “The Kingdom of the Night”.
What can we say ...
Read more - Halpern’s Rule #19 and Orlando June 24, 2016
I am positively certain that Rabbi Benjamin Blech is totally unaware of Halpern’s Rules . . . or of Halpern, either, for that matter. However, he recently wrote about the ...
Read more - Confirmation: Something Old, Something New, Something Borrowed and Something Not Quite Ours June 14, 2016
A couple of years ago I attended a Catholic wedding, a Catholic funeral and Mass, all in a very short period of time. I noticed that as part of the ...
Read more - Coming in Threes May 27, 2016
Recently our family suffered two deaths. Neither passing was tragic. Both individuals were in their nineties and had been in good health almost to the end. However, the one statement ...
Read more - Thus Saith the Lord – “I Am Not Your Mother” a Passover Lesson April 22, 2016
This is the time of year when we teach the story of the Exodus from Egypt to a number of different audiences—children, Jewish adults, non-Jewish adults, teens—in other words, many ...
Read more - Being Encrypted – A Most Unusual Feeling April 8, 2016
There has been a gap in my twice-monthly “Desks”, and I have been asked about the cause. So, for both of you who asked, and everyone else, let me relate ...
Read more - Just What Was Esther Thinking? March 11, 2016
I don’t know whether any of you were ever taught about what is one of the most interesting and perplexing questions in the reading of the Megillah on Purim. Perhaps ...
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