These days, everyone seems to have something to say about what they think is wrong with Reform Judaism. We have heard that the Reform movement is, at best, in stasis and, at worst, facing a significant decline in its membership rolls. Some argue that Reform institutions are insufficiently nimble and overly bureaucratic. Others point to what they see as an underlying ideological or theological malaise, suggesting that Reform Judaism does not galvanize Reform Jews to acknowledge and act upon their covenantal obligations.Read More
Several weeks ago, the former Israeli chief Sephardic rabbi, Mordecai Eliyahu, charged that the Holocaust was divine punishment meted out against our people on account of the sin of Reform Judaism. Such an accusation is infuriating, and unleashes unnecessary hatred and incitement among Jews.Read More
“It is vital to learn how to stand before God,” said Abraham Joshua Heschel, explaining his participation in the famed 1965 civil rights march from Selma to Montgomery, Ala. “Even without words, our march was worship.”Read More
There is a Hasidic allegory in which a rebbe explains why the stork, known in Hebrew as the hasidah, is characterized as a non-kosher animal. At the outset of his homily, the rebbe observes that the stork is labeled the hasidah (the merciful one) because the kindness and compassion this animal displays for its own kind is unlimited. However, the rebbe goes on to point out that precisely because the stork reserves these traits only for its own, the stork must always be defined as treyf. He concludes that the Jew must always extend compassion and mercy to all.Read More
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