Blogs

Response to American Friends
Rabbi Daniel Landes

I wish to thank you all for writing and expressing your worries and concerns about us, particularly after the last round of sirens in Jerusalem just several minutes ago. All of you wish to know how we are “holding up” and what is our emotional and spiritual situation.

This is a traumatic moment for the Jewish people. But this moment could very well be a long period. The tragic deaths of the three Jewish teenagers and shameful murder of the Arab boy, and now rockets falling all over Israel and Israel’s determined response… these have jarred us all. Is there a context in which we can put this?

Here is an excerpt of a letter I received from a young person who was raised in an Orthodox home.

The Holy Day season is approaching and I dread it. Year after year, I’ve attended services with my family, sometimes at one synagogue and sometimes at another. We are supposed to feel awe and religious uplift during this season but I only feel frustration and discouragement.

In our shul, the lay leaders strut around like peacocks. The chazen doesn’t pray but only sings to show off his voice. The rabbi tells stories and jokes, and kisses up to the rich, and his sermons never make me feel closer to God. The Holy Day services are a charade of prayer, but not prayer.

What can I do? I don’t want to go to synagogue on the Holy Days…or maybe never.

Men, Women, and the Language of Minyan

"How many more people do we need for a minyan?" An apparently innocent question, posed daily in Orthodox synagogues across the United States and Canada. Or, in another context, "Despite the fact that there is no explicit mitzvah to cover one's head, it has been the universal custom of observant Jews to wear yarmulkes or kipot." What could be objectionable?

Especially for those of us men who identify ourselves as Modern Orthodox Jews, we ought to make a sustained effort to become more sensitive, beginning with understanding why such seemingly routine statements are problematic. Even as men who advocate for expanding the roles available to women in the synagogue, we subtly betray long internalized and damaging biases.

Words of remembrance by Rabbi Marc D. Angel, December 17, 2014

“Thus said the Lord: A voice is heard in Ramah, lamentation, and bitter weeping, Rachel weeping for her children; she refuses to be comforted for her children because they are not. Thus said the Lord: refrain your voice from weeping and your eyes from tears; for your work shall be rewarded, said the Lord; and they shall come back from the land of the enemy. And there is hope for your future, said the Lord; and your children shall return to their own border” (Jeremiah 31:15-17).