Challenging Tradition, Young Jews Worship on Their Terms - New York Times

It looks like roll-your-own Judism is not just for aging boomers

A third of Israelis "strictly observant."

It may be bad for Middle East peace but it's great for the Rabbi business. A recent survey claims 80 % of Israelis say they observe "religious traditions."

Presidential candidate Mike Huckabee on Genesis

Biblical Genetic Engineering

Free range organic Kosher...

Free-range, organic Kosher chicken, beef and bison, in Highland Park and they even deliver. Thanks to Peta Kaplan for letting us know about Oakville Organics, oakvilleorganics.com. Their warehouse is across the street from ToysRus, at 1630 Old Deerfield Road, (847) 831-3030. I went there one afternoon and got a tour of the place, giant walk-in coolers and freezers, big open sorting room and 2 guys at desks with computers. They were cute and friendly and eager to tell me about the hecture from real Brooklyn Lubovichers on the pack of Wise chicken wings I bought. The package assured me that those wings came from happy chickens who’s lives included running around in fresh air.

I ordered a Thanksgiving turkey, too.

It is expensive, but if we’re going to buy kosher meat, I want it to mean something beyond supporting the rabbinate. There should be an ethical, humane aspect to kosher. There’s no discussion here of conditions in the slaughterhouse or treatment of the workers, but this is a step along the way.

Oh, they have fruit and vegetables too. I’ll get some when our Angelica Farms CSA season ends.

My Brother's Cheater, Parshat Toldot

God is green

Parshat Vayeira 07

Parshat Lech Lecha '07

‘Alcohol not conducive to Simchat Torah’ - Ynetnews

Orthodox Union warns against serving alcohol to teenagers during Simchat Torah celebrations

Ynetnews - Published: 10.01.07, 19:37 / Israel Jewish Scene

The Orthodox Union in America has called on its synagogues to make sure that teenagers are not served alcohol during Simchat Torah celebrations later this week.

The holiday, which falls on Thursday night in the Diaspora, marks the end of the annual Torah cycle and the beginning of the next cycle, and features dancing with the Torah scrolls in a celebration that often includes alcohol.

"The reality is that no one should overindulge in alcohol on Simchat Torah, as it is not conducive to the spirit of the day. Even adults should be careful that their celebrations do not go counter to the appropriate decorum of our synagogues,” the OU's executive vice president, Rabbi Tzvi Hersh Weinreb wrote in a letter to rabbis and presidents of OU synagogues. more

The best Sukkot weekend evuh!

Perfect weather, sunny, warm clear! We served Shabbos dinner for eighteen Friday night, Persian lamb stew. We dwelled and studied Torah on Shabbos morn. we partied in our Sukkah Motzi Shabbos. We dwelled in the Sukkot of dear friends. In the image above, Sharon delights in the Sukkah of our friends the Ohringers.

The Book of Jonah

Parshat Ha'azinu

L'Shana Tova & Shabbat Shalom

Parshat Ki Tavo

When a gangstuh talks about, "going Old Testament on his ass," she probably means something like the stuff in Parshat Ki Tavo. As Moses final speech continues, he follows through with his theme of, "obey and be happy, disobey and suffer BIG TIME!" The threats in this parsha makes Guantanamo seem like Club Med. It makes water boarding seem a shower massage. The good news is that, like so many of YHWH's threats, She didn't go through with it... yet

Jewish Family Converts to Islam

Secrets of the Star

All 24 letters of the Hebrew alphabet are found in the Magen David. There is no such thing in any other language. - Thanks to Cindy Cossid Stern and her mom.

Ki Tetze - More food fun

This week's parsha included the rules for rape, and this week's garden included the last rape harvest, and such a confluence was almost too easy.

Also in this week's parsha we found the instructions for taking eggs from a mother bird: you must first shoo away the mom so she won't see you taking her eggs.

The eggs were served sunny side up, cooked on top of the rape in a paella pan. The roasted chicken was kept from seeing this by a cleverly improvised divider (silk wrapped box of dishwasher detergent).

Garden discoveries included MEL, Aaron's first watermelon, a moon and stars variety he'd photographed with his new Iphone and shows to anyone who'll look, and now about 9 siblings and cousins of the Golden Midget clan. Rhonda had put plates under them to keep them from the worms.

Also a trove of overly mature lemon cucumbers and many heirloom tomatoes originally from Carla's starts. These, with some beauties from the garden at 61, led to my first gazpacho, all hand cut ito tiny bits.

We returned from our annual canoe trip in Wisconsin on Tuesday night, wet and tired, and had the satisfaction of seeing the shower water blacken in the rinse. It was a wonderful trip, especially in retrospect, where you can be warm and dry while you remember the heroic and amazing acts of, for instance, Diana, who left her leaky tent in the middle of the night in a thunderstorm to improvise an extra layer of tent over the heads of Shani and Dina who were being dripped on. And Leona, camping for the first time in 80 years, who proved it is possible to start and maintain fires in the rain.

Wednesday morning was all about washing and drying. Around noon I decided it would be ok to send out last year's comic without improvements, and there was much rejoicing.

Parsha Chukat

Zeus, king of the Greek gods, was not mentioned in this week's parsha, though the Greeks did, for a time, occupy Palestine. His appearance as YHWH's confessor is a device to let us put words in her mouth about how she might have felt about this week's shocking turnaround in her relationship with Moses.

Zeus is also our way of emphasizing one of the things we notice most in this year's parsha reading, the VERY polytheistic nature of our Torah. But that is for another discussion and perhaps another god.

Shabbat Shalom,

a & s

Sharon Goes Native

Sharon shops for Islamic clothes in Ramallah, the capital of Palestine.

Parsha Ba'alotecha

What's Israel's favorite wineEgypt!" Now that we've finally left Sinai and are on our way to Canaan it's complain, complain, complain. The Hebrews demanded dietary diversity! Though for us it's hard to figure why they needed the extra foods since manna tasted like whatever the eater wanted. We're not sure why YHWH believes that Moses needs prophetic help, especially since, as far as we can tell, he doesn't do much prophesizing himself. The lesson of this parsha is clearly, "Be careful what you wish for."

- SHABBAT SHALOM! - a & s