Tag Archives: orthodox rabbi

An Original Mind At Beth Jacob

Rabbi Kalman Topp is giving a bunch of classes at Beth Jacob and he prepares original content for each one (just like the rabbis at Bnai David and the rabbi at YICC much of the time). Rabbi Topp is fluent … Continue reading

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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

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Does Facebook Lead To Defamation?

Orthodox rabbi Gil Student blogs: In this week’s The Jewish Press, R. Mordechai Weiss writes [on page 25]: Then came Facebook and Twitter, which took the Internet to a new level of impropriety. Things are written on Facebook that end … Continue reading

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Dull Books For Yom Kippur

I afflicted my soul on Yom Kippur by reading a couple of very dull, poorly written academic books on Judaism. The first one had the exciting title: Between Redemption and Doom: The Strains of German-Jewish Modernism. I gave up on … Continue reading

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Artificial Insemination Forbidden For Single Women

Jerusalem Orthodox Rabbi Shlomo Aviner writes: Q: If it permissible for a single woman, who is reaching the age of forty, sees that she does not have a reasonable chance of getting married and desperately wants a baby, to be … Continue reading

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Orthodox Rav Solves The Mystery Of Sexual Identity Formation

Rabbi Kanefsky writes in the Jewish Journal: "I cannot articulate for myself a convincing argument as to why the legal recognition of civil marriage should be withheld from citizens who, by dint of how they were born, are only able … Continue reading

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Shmuel Herzfeld – A Gay-Friendly Orthodox Rabbi

James Kirchick writes: Unlike most Orthodox synagogues, some of those congregants at Ohev Sholom are gay and don’t feel pressured into keeping that fact a secret with their rabbi or fellow worshipers. This is of course in large part attributable … Continue reading

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Embrace Your Bad Self

Friends of mine are obsessed about bad things — many of them true — said about them on the internet. This is totally understandable. Reading bad things about yourself, especially when true, feel like a knife ripping through your abdomen. … Continue reading

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Remembering Slain Israeli Gays

Is there any hip ethical movement in Modern Orthdooxy that Rabbi Shmuel Herzfeld is not a leader of? JTA reports: WASHINGTON (JTA) — An Orthodox rabbi spoke out against anti-gay rhetoric in the Orthodox community at a Washington vigil mourning … Continue reading

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Using Torah For Secular Songs

Orthodox rabbi Gil Student blogs: The Forward has an article about a recent trend of mainstream Israeli singers using passages from the Bible and other religious texts in songs (link). While it is not clear to me how much of … Continue reading

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