The End Of The Seven Days Of Mourning
1. HOW ARE THE SEVEN DAYS CALCULATED? The seven days of mourning begin when the burial has ended. Therefore, the day of the burial...
Aharon Mendel HaCohen (1866-1927), The Ashkenazi Rabbi Of Cairo, Egypt
NATION OR RELIGION?
One of the most fascinating, but not very well known, stories from the early 20th century is the attempt to renew...
SHELOSHIM: Mourning for the 30 days and the 12 months
MOURNING FOR PARENTS AND OTHER RELATIVESThe mourning periods differ depending on whether one is mourning for parents or other relatives. For a father or...
The Shoah, Pfizer, And The Vaccine That Protects And Saves Millions In Israel
THE BOURLA FAMILY
"Bourla" (also spelled "Burla") is the surname of a famous Sephardic family from Spain. After the expulsion in 1492 we find...
SHEMOT: The Beginning of the Jewish People and the Beginnings of Antisemitism
We have just finished the book of Bereshit, Genesis. Bereshit is not a book of laws. It is a book that tells us how...
The Damascus Blood Libel (1840)
THE ALLEGED CRIME
In the morning of Wednesday, February 5, 1840, the Catholic monk Thomas left his monastery in Damascus. In the afternoon, it is...
Rabbi Isaac Abulafia (1830-1910) and the Education of the Jews of Damascus
RAISED BY HIS GRANDFATHER Rabbi Isaac Abulafia was born in Damascus, Syria, in 1830. He came from a family of great luminaries dating back...
What is the Septuagint?
On the 8th of Tebet, approximately in the year 260 b.c.e., in Alexandria, Egypt, King Ptolemy ordered 72 Jewish scholars, six for each tribe,...
When should the Sheba Berakhot be recited?
4. The seven blessings are recited only when the follwoing conditions are met:
a.There must be ten adult males present (the hatan is considered one...
TEHILIM 23: Why Bad Things Happen To Good Sheep?
The most profound work of Jewish thought is the book of Tehillim, the Psalms of King David. In this Text, the greatest poet of...
