Similar Posts
Michigan State hires chair of Israel Studies
When I attended Michigan State University from 1994-98, I certainly would not have believed that the university would soon hire an Israel Studies chair and a Jewish Studies professor who specialized in Jewish studies. In addition to concentrating in International Relations at James Madison College, a liberal arts residential college at MSU, I also specialized…
- Humor | Jewish | Ritual | Tefillin | World Events
Tefillin On Board
Most Jewish people have never heard of the word “phylacteries,” and yet according to Google, at current count the word appears in over 800 of today’s news articles on the Web. Apparently, a 17-year-old man wrapped in his phylacteries (tefillin in Hebrew) was treated suspiciously on a U.S. Airways plane from NYC headed to Kentucky….
- Antisemitism | Celebrities | Israel | Jewish
Details Magazine
I was disappointed a few months ago when I received the letter in the mail alerting me that my subscription to Condé Nast Portfolio magazine would be discontinued because the publication had gone bankrupt. But, rest assured, the letter informed me of my consolation prize: a subscription to Details Magazine. To this day, I’m not…
God bless the Bedouin People
Ten-and-a-half years ago I came to Mamshit Camel Ranch, a Bedouin Village, close to Demona in the Negev desert in Israel. I was a participant on USY Israel Pilgrimage (Group 3) and celebrated my 18th birthday in the Bedouin tent. To my young eyes it appeared to be a fairly realistic Bedouin experience complete with…
- Celebrities | Environmentalism | God | Hebrew | Hollywood | Jewish | Movies | Theology | Torah
How Jewish is Avatar?
I was surprised by how much I enjoyed James Cameron’s film “Avatar.” It is unusual for me to enjoy a fantasy movie so much that I have to see it a second time in the theater, but this was the case with this 3-D film about a futuristic planet (Pandora), inhabited by an indigenous population…
- Christianity | Holocaust | Interfaith | Israel | Jewish
Pope in Israel
My first exposure to Catholicism was as a teenager. I was the assistant to a photographer who photographed several Catholic weddings. I found it fascinating to be in these beautiful churches and watch the religious rites of the Catholic tradition. I joked that, at the time, I had been to more Catholic weddings than Jewish…