The first time I heard about a “virtual simcha” was in the late 1990s. Detroit was hit with a massive snowstorm and the 8-day old baby boy’s aunt who was to play the role of rabbi was stuck at the airport in New York. The rabbi improvised and she officiated at her nephew’s bris via…
I don’t recall “The Jewish Vote” ever being such a widely discussed topic during a presidential election in my lifetime. Not only is there speculation about how American Jews will vote today, but opinion polling of Israelis is making world news as well. A Times of Israel survey of 400 adult Israelis showed they prefer…
If Al Gore actually had invented the Internet, as he once claimed, he would be the least popular guy in any ultra-Orthodox neighborhood today. It is clear that the fervently Orthodox Jewish leaders despise the Internet and technology because they’re willing to spend over $1.5 million in a rally against the Internet next month in…
On its Tublr page, The Atlantic reposted a photo of Cuban leader Fidel Castro with columnist Jeffrey Goldberg. They turned the photo into a caption contest. I love caption contests so I couldn’t resist coming up with the following captions (under the photo): Let me just proofread my note Jeffrey before I give it to you…
Study finds doctors take supernatural into account By Chanan Tigay NEW YORK, Dec. 23 (JTA) — In the 1980s, when Rabbi Leonard Sharzer was still working as a plastic surgeon, he treated a patient suffering from a debilitating neurological disease. Sharzer and his colleagues agreed that the man wasn’t long for this world. “It was…
Yes, technology is increasingly more important in Judaism. Ten years ago when I wrote my senior thesis in college on “The Globalization of Judaism” focusing on how new technology has affected the global Jewish community, I predicted that in the future congregations would communicate with their membership via e-mail and that Jews would choose their…