If there’s one thing American Jews and Muslims have in common, it’s that they share a very similar relationship to corporeal forms of atonement. Roughly half of the American Muslim community fasts in the month of Ramadan. The same number of Jews fast on Yom Kippur. While some think this is a low number compared…

I’m disappointed by Rabbi Stern’s pessimism. There’s no question that there is much to be dismayed about in the year that is drawing to a close, and I can’t dispute the prevailing mood of anxiety and concern. Which is why Rosh Hashanah is all the more important. It promises a new beginning and, more than…

Enough with the homilies. There is no high in this year’s high holy days. My fellow rabbis are missing this year’s significance: Most people who will be walking into synagogue feel a sense of loss, confusion, and bewilderment at a world in total and utter disorder. This year was worst than last year and there…

Rabbi Waxman rightly points out some of the cognitive dissonance we confront in the High Holiday liturgy that makes it hard to get the most from services. Largely written in the Middle Ages for a population who viscerally understood their vulnerability and dependence upon the whims of a powerful lord or sovereign, the liturgy speaks…

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