Growing up as a Jewish kid in Montreal, I loved Christmas. Snowy winter lawns were bejeweled at night with twinkling trees. People got tipsy and were nice to each other. What could be bad about all that? And a baby nursed in a Bethlehem stable seemed like friendly ‘family content’. Secular Westerners love the tinsel […]
Category Archives: Rabbinic
One of the main deliberations in the Messianic Jewish movement today is, “What is true Jewish identity, and what is authentic Messianic Jewish identity?” Some Gentiles who are interested in things Jewish ask a similar question: “What are the Jewish roots of our faith, and how can Gentile believers embrace those Jewish aspects which are […]
I grew up in a Yiddish-speaking home in Montreal, Canada where I attended Yiddish and Hebrew day school, participated in Montreal’s Yiddish theater group and also performed in a Yiddish mandolin orchestra. My memories of the High Holidays (Rosh Hashoneh and Yom Kipper is how we pronounced them) included the traditional foods – apples dipped […]
“God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble. Therefore we will not fear even though the earth be removed, and though the mountains be carried into the midst of the sea, though its waters roar and be troubled, though the mountains shake with its swelling…” (Psalm 46:1-3). When natural destructions surge […]
The Feast of Shavuot/Weeks is upon us (Deuteronomy 16:10). Fifty days have now passed between Pesach/Passover and Shavuot (Leviticus 23:16 – the counting of the Omer, a peck measurement and first-fruits prophetic promise of a coming full harvest). The crest of those calculations has been reached, and now the wave of fulfillment crashes down onto […]
High school Biology teachers often guide their students through the dissection of frogs or fish. The stench of formaldehyde wafts around trembling fingers as scalpels slice through rubbery material. Students squint at the internal organs of the amphibian or the vertebrate and then roughly sketch the physical details. There is no time for lasting emotional […]