Odds & Ends

The opinions expressed on this webpage represent those of the individual authors and, unless clearly labeled as such, do not represent the opinions or policies of TBS. Trip to New Haven Holocaust Memorial helps students remember the lost Friday, May 25, 2012 By Alexandra Sanders, Register StaffNEW HAVEN — As Jews walked into Aushwitz, mine cars left, traveling from the ovens to an open streambed to dump the ashes.But one survivor collected a shoebox-full of ashes and it now sits buried in the center of the Holocaust Memorial in the city, according to Mike Romeo, member of the Holocaust Preservation Committee.The shoebox is surrounded by a concrete Star of David that forms the base of the memorial on Whalley Avenue. Jutting skyward from the ground and surrounding the shoebox are curved metal beams with symbolic barbed wire that represent Jewish imprisonment. Six center yew trees memorialize the six million murdered…

The opinions expressed on this webpage represent those of the individual authors and, unless clearly labeled as such, do not represent the opinions or policies of TBS. Israeli Life: Translating the Bible Into HebrewMay 2012 by Shoshana London Sappir, Hadassah Magazine In the beginning, it seemed like a good idea. When Hebrew speakers read the Bible in the original Hebrew, they can find it difficult to comprehend without the help of commentaries; many give up on the ancient texts. Enter Tanakh RAM, a translation of the Bible into Modern Hebrew. Yet, this new edition has been called scandalous, pernicious and fraudulent by critics; the Ministry of Education has threatened to ban its use in schools; pundits warn of the demise of Modern Hebrew culture; a university held a seminar about the pros and cons of the new publication; and the Op-Ed pages and Internet are atwitter. Meanwhile, according to publisher…

The opinions expressed on this webpage represent those of the individual authors and,unless clearly labeled as such, do not represent the opinions or policies of Temple Beth Sholom. Scott Rubin is the Editor-in-Chief of National Lampoon, the most recognized brand in humor. Rubin's tenure began in 1999, when he created the award-winning National Lampoon Dotcom as an outlet for the NatLamp's cutting edge comic sensibility. The site's content was entered into the Smithsonian Institute for best exemplifying American satire in the weeks following the 9-11 attacks, and has been awarded "Best of the Web" from the Los Angeles Times, Forbes, USA Today, CNN and The Wall Street Journal. In his five years running the website, Rubin has created, written and produced nearly 600 animations, videos, and written pieces. The site is ranked as one of the most popular entertainment internet destinations, with a monthly audience that exceeds 800,000 readers. Continued…

The opinions expressed on this webpage represent those of the individual authors and, unless clearly labeled as such, do not represent the opinions or policies of TBS. ANCIENT TALMUD FOUND IN JERUSALEM DIG; GIVES GREEN LIGHT TO “HALF SHABBOS” TEXTINGVol. XXVI, No. 1 Special Purim Edition March 8, 2012 - Special to the Kustanowitz KronikleFAIR LAWN, March 7 – The Orthodox Jewish world was shaken today by the announcement that a Talmud volume discovered last month in the City of David archaeological dig in Jerusalem seems to provide justification for the use of cell phones to send text messages on Shabbat.The practice, used by Orthodox teens and popularly known as “keeping half-Shabbos” was widely reported in Jewish newspapers last summer.The Talmud scrolls, titled Tractate Textin, describe in intricate detail the way that God communicated with the Kohen Gadol (High Priest) in the Temple.The high priest wore a breastplate on a…

The opinions expressed on this webpage represent those of the individual authors and, unless clearly labeled as such, do not represent the opinions or policies of TBS. Two weeks ago I came back from Miami from the reunion of my chaverim of Hanoar Hatzioni B'Cuba, this Zionist youth movement's branch in Havana. For the first time I saw people I spent my teen age years and haven't seen since 1957. Soon after Fidel Castro replaced the previous Batista capitalist dictatorship with a communist dictatorship, all but three of us have left the island. Those of us from TBS who went last March on the charitable mission saw the perpetuation and the crumbling of this Cuban communism. The picture below is of some of the Hanoar Hatzioni leadership in the late 1950s. I, George Alexander, am the leftmost in the first row.More pictures and my narrative are available from those years…

The opinions expressed on this webpage represent those of the individual authors and, unless clearly labeled as such, do not represent the opinions or policies of TBS. You can view the video in the full screen mode by clicking the box with four arrows in the lower right corner of the video box.

The opinions expressed on this webpage represent those of the individual authors and, unless clearly labeled as such, do not represent the opinions or policies of TBS. Skyping the Minyan Posted on Nov 8, 2011By David Lerner, Temple Emunah, Lexington, MA The Project: Avram Reisner's 2001 CJLS teshuvah, "Wired to the Kadosh Barukh Hu: Minyan via Internet," (See below the full text less the Hebrew) explains that should the technology arise (since Skype had not yet been invented), it would be permissible for someone to join in a daily minyan, and to recite the kaddish (although they would not be counted in the minyan). Maxine Marcus is a new participant in our minyan. She lives in Amsterdam and works in The Hague, where she serves as a prosecutor of war criminals from the wars in the former Yugoslavia. In recent years, Max has been dealing with the aging of her parents and the…

The opinions expressed on this webpage represent those of the individual authors and, unless clearly labeled as such, do not represent the opinions or policies of TBS. Hugo Chávez is ramping up his assault on Venezuela’s upper class, and now a rare Jewish paradise is squarely in his sights. Can it be salvaged?By Matthew Fishbane January 23, 2012 7:00 AMMatthew Fishbane is a senior editor at Tablet Magazine.For generations, the Jews of Caracas had idyllic weather, prosperity, and vibrant communal organizations. Things have changed under Hugo Chávez.During a recent trip to Bogotá, Colombia, where I’d lived for years, I discovered that the wealthier parts of the city were filling up with an odd sort of super-refugee. The new arrivals were mainly rich Venezuelans fleeing an increasingly chaotic situation in their home country: oil execs booted out by nationalization, industrialists frustrated by the corrupt and now hostile business environment, successful entrepreneurs…

The opinions expressed on this webpage represent those of the individual authors and, unless clearly labeled as such, do not represent the opinions or policies of TBS. "Torah that is not accompanied by a worldly trade will in the end amount to nothing and will lead one into sin."(Mishnah Avot, chapter 2; Rulings on this basis are found in Maimonides, Mishneh Torah, “Laws Concerning Torah Study”, chapter 10, and in Shulhan Arukh, Orah Hayyim #157)Many of you are aware of the distress of so many in Israel over the fact that not only do the vast majority of Haredim not serve in the IDF or do national service, but more than ten thousand of them have been receiving government stipends for their yeshiva study. The Israeli Supreme Court ruled that these stipends were not permissible and now Shas and its allies in the government have been working to find ways…

The opinions expressed on this webpage represent those of the individual authors and, unless clearly labeled as such, do not represent the opinions or policies of TBS. With Samoa calendar change, question for Jews: When is Shabbat? NEW YORK (JTA) By Adam Soclof · December 30, 2011 The Pacific island nation of Samoa is taking 186,000 citizens through a national time warp by moving west of the international dateline, forfeiting the last Friday of 2011 and jumping straight from Thursday into Saturday. For Samoans, this solves a practical question: Why remain 18 to 23 hours behind chief trade partners Australia and New Zealand? For Jews, it poses a question of a different sort: When does Shabbat start in Samoa? And are there really any Jews in Samoa? A country adopting a new stance vis-a-vis the international dateline is nothing new. In 1995, the island nation of Kiribati also shifted westward.…