Currently Browsing: Religion 31 articles
Pandemic Passover 2.0: What Have We Learned?
As Pesach approaches Nathan Abrams argues that we need to step up to help remote Jews. As Pesach approaches it is a good time to take stock of the past year and what we have learned from the ongoing pandemic and continued lockdowns. In July last year, I wrote for JewThink, how things were looking […]
A Scholarly Unorthodox
Karen H. Skinazi reviews Zalman Newfield’s Degrees of Separation. When my teenage son was little, he used to sway back and forth if he was concentrating hard on something—a book, a puzzle, a Lego creation. ‘Who knew shokeling was hereditary?’ we joked. My husband comes from Hasidische stock. If my son still shokels while he […]
Dear Mandy: A Jewish woman, a Muslim woman, and an interfaith book group
In the second of these paired posts, Abda responds to Mandy‘s letter published yesterday. Dear Mandy Thank you for your insightful letter. I never imagined when we met that such a wonderful friendship would bloom, not only with you but with so many remarkable women. Nisa Nashim book club is so much more than a […]
Remembering Jonathan Sacks – remembering his struggle
The death of Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks has provoked a great deal of sadness, that is all the more striking given how much the US election dominated everyone’s attention the weekend that he died. That sadness seems to be widely shared across the British Jewish community. On my social media feeds, it seems that as […]
Zoom Connections
Roma Cohen writes about organising services, via Zoom, for a small and aging regional congregation. On Sunday 26th July 2020, the 102nd Annual General Meeting of our small northern ‘friendly, warm and welcoming’ Harrogate synagogue took place for the first time through the medium of Zoom. The much respected, dedicated Chair of fifty years plus […]
RBG and the Jewish Tradition of Dressing with Intention
Of the many lessons Ruth Bader Ginsburg embodied – that our legal status should not be contingent on gender; that we can value people with whom we virulently disagree, and that disagreement can make us better; that choosing the right life partner can make all the difference – the one that most resonates with me […]
A Gloriously Miserable British Sukkot
The worst the weather is on Sukkot, the more perfect the festival is
Sometimes it’s funny being Jewish in Ireland!
I’m not a religious Jew. But I am culturally and secularly Jewish. And living in Ireland. This year, as in the previous few, I attended my local Jewish community’s Rosh Hashana service. This year, though, due to Covid, it took place online, on Zoom. All fifteen of us in our little boxes on the screen, […]
If I am not for myself, who will be for me? A Profile of Yehudis Fletcher
Karen Skinazi profiles Yehudis Fletcher, a Haredi political and social activist who helped to found Nahamu, an organisation dedicated to fighting extremism. ‘What would you do if, say, a transwoman who used to be part of the Haredi community lost the right to see her children in the civil courts?’ I asked (admittedly, it was […]
Rosh Hashana 5781
Nigel Grizzard reflects on the new and improved Rosh Hashana services this year. What were my abiding memories of Rosh Hashanah as a child growing up in Woodford Green, Essex? Full shuls and long services that finished around two o’clock in the afternoon. Fifty years on in Leeds, things have not improved much. Schlep it […]