Segregating the dead

Rafi G wrote a post yesterday about the latest haredim vs. everyone else fight in Beit Shemesh. The proposal has been made to create a shomrei shabbat section in the Beit Shemesh cemetery. This is something that exists in other places as a way for the Orthodox community to define the the line between “us” and [...]

Read Full Post »

Why we do mitzvot bein adam le-haveiro

I am currently reading a book by Rabbi Jonathan Sacks – “To Heal a Fractured World, The Ethics of Responsibility“. I enjoy very much Rabbi Sacks’ writing as he is a big rationalist a thoughtful philosopher and a great writer.
I read a passage yesterday in chapter 8 which is about darkei shalom (ways of peace) which is Judaism’s [...]

Read Full Post »

Great minds…

By coincidence Climate Progress had a post yesterday about environmental action by faith communuities in the US. I looked at one of the links – lo-Watt Shabbat. Not amazingly exciting. I’m looking for an halakhically acceptable solution for wasting less electricity keeping an urn of hot water and a hot-plate heated over Shabbat.

Read Full Post »

Patriotic Religious Green

Why are religious people so often so totally ungreen? A post appeared recently on the “Beit Shemesh List” decrying the total lack of awareness in Ramat Beit Shemesh for civic cleanliness. The post was worded in a haredi rhetoric style but embedded in the post are a point that I have thought about for a while:
We [...]

Read Full Post »

Watchmaker argument?

Joshua Berman just published a new essay on his site in which he more or less summarizes his book “Created Equal” and then proposes a “watchmaker argument” for the existence of God that firstly the intellectual quantum leap to come up with Jewish theology in the ancient world was just too big, secondly the theology [...]

Read Full Post »

Book Review: Created Equal

Created Equal: How the Bible Broke with Ancient Political Thought, Joshua A. Berman, Oxford University Press 2008
A couple of years ago I heard a fascinating lecture by (Rabbi Dr.) Josh Berman given at the annual Tikun Leil Shavuot held in our community. In his lecture he compared the structure of the ten commandments to that [...]

Read Full Post »

Judaism Classic

Rafi G blogged today about an article on RabbiHorowitz.com – “Charedi Classic“.
Rabbi Horowitz seems to be a school principle and educational advisor and writer. The article in question describes how the education and values passed to him by the previous Haredi generation seem to him to be much more balanced and successful than those that he as part [...]

Read Full Post »

What Your Rabbi Didn’t Tell You

A neighbor and scholar, Chuck Davidson has just started a new blog called “What Your Rabbi Didn’t Tell You“. A refreshing, scholarly yet down to earth blog on contemporary Halacha. So far he has posted on kashrut of raisins (“I reviewed Sefer VaYikra and could not for the life of me find raisins mentioned among [...]

Read Full Post »

Hatimah Tovah

A Hatimah Tovah to all my readers. May this year be one of creativity, enjoyment and satisfaction.
The last few weeks have reminded us of the difference between creating wealth and creating real value. Let’s all create something great this year and enjoy it.
BTW the image illustrates the sentence from Selihot:
VeNislah LeKhol Adat Bnei Yisrael VeLaGer [...]

Read Full Post »

In search of value

This was the title of a post on Seth Godin’s blog yesterday. Seth says forget the falling stock markets and get out there and create value.
In general I agree with him. Everyone, whether they be a creative type or not should be concentrating on creating real value for the World and the human race. [...]

Read Full Post »