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"Luke Ford reports all of the 'juicy' quotes, and has been doing it for years." (Marc B. Shapiro)
"This guy knows all the gossip, the ins and outs, the lashon hara of the Orthodox world. He’s an [expert] in... all the inner workings of the Orthodox world." (Rabbi Aaron Rakeffet-Rothkoff) LATEST POSTS:
- Dennis Prager v Cedars-Sinai Lawsuit
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- Marine Le Pen
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- Nigel Farage
- Bernard Haykel: A Life Between the Text and the Gun
- Walker Connor (1926-2017)
- Benedict Anderson and the Nation as Imagination
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- Dominic Cummings: A Biography
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- * The Enlightenment Wasn’t Enlightened (6-23-26)
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* Why Does Australia Produce So Many Great Journalists? (6-11-26)
* Steve Wynn and the Press: Power, Litigation, and the Contest Over Las Vegas (6-3-26)
* Sheldon Adelson and the Journalists (6-3-26)
* The Vigilant Animal: Thinkers Who Reject the Myth of Human Gullibility (6-2-26)
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* The Norm Explainers (6-2-26)
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* The Administrative Capital: Sacramento Legal Culture (5-27-26)
* San Diego - The Quiet Republic (5-27-26)
* The Quiet Bar: San Diego Legal Culture (5-27-26)
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Category Archives: Ashkenazim
Ashkenazi Heat Sensitivity
Ashkenazi Jews seem to have an extreme heat sensitivity. I made the mistake of shifting the thermostat overnight during the heat wave to 78 from 71 and the poor Ashkenazim were all schvitzing and kvetching until they caught on what … Continue reading
Posted in Ashkenazim
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Kissing Hands
About a decade ago, I saw a friend at Bnai David-Judea. I shook his hand and he immediately kissed the hand that I had just shaken. I was moved. Over the next few months, I saw some old Sephardi men … Continue reading
Posted in Ashkenazim, Personal, Sephardim
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The Last Of The Pure Sephardic Poskim
In a 2008 lecture for Torah in Motion on Rabbi Ben Zion Uzziel (former Sephardic Chief Rabbi of Israel), history professor Marc B. Shapiro says: He’s one of the last of the few Sephardic poskim (deciders of Jewish law). The … Continue reading
Posted in Ashkenazim, Marc B. Shapiro, Orthodoxy, R. J. B. Soloveitchik, Sephardim, Yeshiva
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When In Doubt, Call Your Opponents Racists
Whenever I hear the charge of “racism” these days, I’m immediately suspicious because I’m so used to the accusation being tossed around without evidence. I’m also tired of Jews using their putative Orthodox status to lobby for non-Orthodox positions. I’m … Continue reading
Posted in Ashkenazim, Haredi, R. Brad Hirschfield, Sephardim
Tagged Conservative Judaism, jewish theological seminary, lengthy bio, liberal jews, orthodox judaism, orthodox rabbi, rabbinic ordination
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Should The Sephardim Go To The Back Of The Bus?
Orthodox rabbi and history professor Marc B. Shapiro blogs Nov. 7, 2007: I read about the outrage taking place in Emanuel, where in the local Beit Yaakov Sephardi students are being segregated from Ashkenazim to the extent that the two … Continue reading
Posted in Ashkenazim, Marc B. Shapiro, Sephardim
Tagged Ashkenazim, Marc B. Shapiro, orthodox rabbi, Sephardim, shas party, tannaim
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AJU Professor Yitzchak Kerem Interview Part II
Part One Luke: "How does your activism fit with your scholarship?" Yitzchak: "It complements each other. I try to be objective. I’m critical of Sephardic organizational life. I received a lot of resistance when I tried to organize a Sephardic … Continue reading
Posted in Academia, Ashkenazim, Greece, Jews, Sephardim, Turkey, Yitzchak Kerem
Tagged active world, area specialists, encyclopedia judaica, gaon, jewish communities, loan fund, march of the living, sephardic world
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American Jewish University Professor Yitzchak Kerem Says The Sephardim Were Discriminated Against With Holocaust Reparations
Part Two I met Dr. Yitzchak Kerem at LimmudLA a few weeks ago. "Yitzchak Kerem is an historian on Sephardic Jewry at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. He has been the editor of Sefarad, the Sephardic newsletter, since 1991. He … Continue reading
Posted in Armenia, Ashkenazim, Genocide, Greece, Sephardim, Turkey, Yitzchak Kerem
Tagged american jewish, diaspora jewry, eastern european jews, ecumenical patriarch of constantinople, encyclopedia of the holocaust, former soviet bloc, hebrew university of jerusalem, holocaust reparations, hovel, jewish university, Sephardim
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Sephardim are rational — Ashkenazim, not so much
Dennis Wilen writes: From an essay in Zeek — A Sephardic Answer to Modern Jewish Identity By David Rabeeya: " . . . Ashkenazic authorities traditionally have placed a “fence around the Torah,” enlarging restrictions in order to be sure … Continue reading
Posted in Ashkenazim, Sephardim
Tagged ashkenazic, Ashkenazim, authorities, dennis wilen, fanaticism, fence, integrity, inventions, irrationality, jew, jewish identity, jewish law, latitude, pesach, quot, radicalism, religious leaders, sephardi jews, Sephardim, Torah
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Praise God On Your Own Time, Buster!
I sometimes go to an Ashkenaz minyan in the evening where this Sephardi guy always insists on yelling out, "Barchu et Adonai Hamvorak!" at the end of Ma’ariv (and by reflex the rest of us respond, "Baruch Adonai Hamvorak l’olam … Continue reading
Posted in Ashkenazim, Orthodoxy, Sephardim
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