Article Archives

Orthodoxy and Innovation

For many religiously observant Jews, the traditional siddur, or prayer book, constitutes a problem. One such Jew was the great hasidic rebbe, Nahman of Bratzlav (1772-1810), who articulated the problem in terms appropriate to his time: the fixed prayers, with their praises and petitions, are like a well-traveled highway, and well-traveled highways attract robbers. By which he meant that excessive routine makes it difficult to concentrate the mind. 

A Tale of Two Lobbies

The problem of the Arab-Israel conflict begins with the term itself, which misrepresents the unilateral Arab war against Israel as a bilateral dispute. Unilateral aggression is not unheard of—when did Poland ever aggress against Germany or Russia?—but nothing in United Nations history compares in intensity or fixity with Arab belligerence toward Israel, a UN member state. 

Creations

Rosh Hashanah, the beginning of the year, marks the creation of the world. Or does it? The Torah refers to Rosh Hashanah, although not by that name, as the first day of "the seventh month" (Leviticus 23:24)—the seventh, that is, if you're counting from Nisan, the month of Passover. That month is designated as the beginning of the year in the first act of the Exodus: "This month will mark for you the first of the months; it will be, for you, the first month of the year" (Exodus 12:2). Like revolutionaries everywhere, the Israelites wanted a new calendar. 

Ramadan

Three near-certainties accompany the Muslim holy month of Ramadan: in Islamic countries, the stock market climbs; in Jerusalem, the already amplified pre-dawn adhān, or call to prayer, becomes even more piercing than usual; and there is a steep rise in Muslim bloodletting. 

The Romance of Gush Etzion

The modern return of the Jewish people to their homeland succeeded thanks to the extraordinary tenacity of pioneering individuals who, in a dangerous environment, created new communities from scratch. One such community, or rather series of communities, is the Etzion district—in Hebrew, Gush Etzion—located along the ancient mountain route between Jerusalem and Hebron. The first three communities built by Jewish settlers were completely destroyed by Arabs. The fourth still stands today.

Repentance = Freedom?

In the thick of the month of Ellul, nearing Rosh Hashanah, penitence is or should be in the air. Also recently marked was the 75th yahrzeit of the great mystic, jurist, and theologian Abraham Isaac Kook (1865-1935).  As it turns out, Kook's  teachings on the meaning of repentance are among his most striking, stamped with his distinctive mix of piety and audacity. In his eyes, teshuvah, generally translated as "repentance" but literally and more powerfully "return," signifies not only a deepened and renewed commitment to religion and commandments but, paradoxically, nothing less than a new birth of freedom.

Cemetery Politics

Among the many bones its various enemies pick with the Jewish state, one has been much in the news lately: bones, very dry bones, residing in cemeteries both real and imagined all across the country.  

Arab Moderates: Help, or Hindrance?

At the re-launching of direct talks between Israel and the Palestinian Authority, attention will be focused on Mahmoud Abbas and Benjamin Netanyahu. But Egypt's ailing president, Hosni Mubarak, will also be in attendance, as will Jordan's King Abdullah II. To maintain their bona fides as Arab moderates, the two men helped cajole Abbas to resume face-to-face negotiations with Israel. So did other Arab states in the U.S. orbit, including Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the Emirates.

World Jewish Congress

In a show of solidarity with Israel, leaders of the World Jewish Congress (WJC) will be gathering in Jerusalem at the end of the month. Not to be confused with the American Jewish Congress, of which it was originally an outgrowth, or the World Zionist Congress, founded by Theodor Herzl, the WJC is an umbrella group of Diaspora organizations (including the European Jewish Congress, the Latin American Jewish Congress, and others) that defines itself somewhat grandly as "the diplomatic arm of the Jewish people." If you haven't heard of it, there's a reason.

A Grim Teaching

Every first-year law student knows that hard cases make bad law. In Israel, a particularly hard case lies in the ongoing controversy around an inflammatory Hebrew-language volume of Jewish religious law (halakhah) that offers justifications for violent treatment of non-Jews in general and of Israel's foes in particular. The debate has highlighted longstanding divisions within Israeli society; now that the courts and the police have gotten into the act, it has also highlighted the difficulties of drawing meaningful lines between free speech and incitement.