There is usually some form of recognition when donors give a significant amount to an organization. The plaques that decorate the hallways of hospitals, symphony halls, universities, and museums is nothing new. In the Jewish community, there seems to be a longstanding joke about the large amount of plaques dotting the walls to recognize donors….
I often joke that the point of a bar mitzvah is to celebrate the Jewish boy’s realization that he’ll have a much better chance of owning the professional team than playing on it. It’s tongue-in-cheek humor, but the fact remains that there are many more Jewish professional sports team owners than Jewish players. In Detroit,…
In 1994, following the death of my maternal grandfather, David Gudes, I received his entire library of Jewish books. In his collection were all of the volumes of Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz’s translation of the Talmud into English that had been published thus far. These beautiful light-yellow volumes prompted me to start learning Talmud as a…
I’ve been thinking a lot about labels lately. I recently wrote an op-ed about denominational labels in Judaism that was published in the Detroit Jewish News and on the Huffington Post website. In it, I explained how ambivalent I am about labeling individuals because these labels don’t always help us understand the individual better. Calling…
Cross-posted to CommunityNext So, we’re right in the middle of the Jewish holiday of Sukkot. And if you’re like most people, when you hear the word “Sukkot” you’re thinking of shaking lulavs (palm branches), smelling the etrog (lemon-impersonating fruit), and eating in the sukkah (temporary hut). But there’s this really cool ritual on the holiday…
There have been a lot of movies being filmed here in Michigan over the past couple of years because of the lucrative tax and loan incentives for film production in the state. Apparently Sean Penn will be in Detroit making a new movie called “This Must Be The Place.” I just received an email message (see…
The Jewish Telegraphic Agency (JTA) likes to think of itself as the Jewish AP. The JTA is a non-profit news service that disseminates the happenings in the Jewish world as soon as they happen. Ideally, they try to scoop all the other news agencies and print media. The long-time publisher of the JTA, Mark Joffe, stepped…
It might be unusual for a grandson to continue a friendship begun by his late grandfather, but that’s exactly what happened. Ben Gurvitz and his late wife Sara were dear friends of my grandparents, David and Adele Gudes. The Gurvitzes were at all of our family’s life-cycle events. After my grandfather passed away in 1994…
While I often write about sports on this blog, I have always done so through a Jewish perspective. In fact, everything I write on this blog I write through a Jewish perspective. So, why am I writing about last night’s Detroit Tigers baseball game in which pitcher Armando Galarraga had a perfect game until the…
Hall of Fame baseball broadcaster Ernie Harwell died on Tuesday. He was 92. He had been battling cancer for over a year. It was his time to go and yet his passing has cast a pall over Detroit. Upon hearing of his death, I began to feel both sad and nostalgic. To paraphrase Ernie, “I…