“Greater is the one who is commanded and does, than the one who is not commanded and does.”(Babylonian Talmud: Bava Kamma 38a)
In the Reform Temple that I attended while growing up in the suburbs of New York, one topic we never seemed to discuss was God. Back then, Judaism, as far as I understood it, was basically synonymous with secular humanism. read more
Out of approximately 1.1 million Jews who were imprisoned in Auschwitz, there are only two who were known to have been born there. One of them was Angela Polgar. read more
Daily door-buster deals … friends and family discounts … free shipping if you spend over $150! For an estimated 6% of Americans with compulsive buying tendencies, this is a tough time of the year.
The whole culture conspires against us in the holiday season,” says April Lane Benson, a Manhattan psychologist who has treated compulsive shoppers for 15 years. Besides tempting sales, pressure to top last year’s gifts and the urge to shop for oneself, she says, “the holidays bring up a lot of unfulfilled longing for some people—and that’s one reason why they shop, as a salve for disappointment.” (Excerpted from: Shop ‘Till You Drop: How to Treat Compulsive Spending – Wall Street Journal, Dec 6 2011) read more
If you wander the streets of Jerusalem’s Jewish Quarter long enough, there’s a good chance you’ll stumble upon a sight that may at first seem out of place. Don’t let appearances fool you. The pistol toting cowboy in the Stetson is as much a part of that neighborhood as the Jerusalem stone that lines its narrow alleyways. read more
“In a building a mile up the hill from the Entertainment Technology Center, HERB sits motionless, lost in thought. Short for Home Exploring Robotic Butler, HERB is being developed by Carnegie Mellon in collaboration with Intel Labs Pittsburgh as a prototype service bot that might care for the elderly and disabled in the not too distant future… read more
“Benjamin Scheibehenne from the University of Basel and his colleagues, Jutta Mata from Stanford University & Peter Todd from Indiana University, suggest that even though people will claim to be pretty good at predicting the likes and dislikes of others we are often anything but good. Surprisingly, they present evidence showing that the longer we know someone, far from our predictions getting better, they may actually get worse. read more
“If you hear a voice within you say ‘you cannot paint,’ then by all means paint, and that voice will be silenced.” Vincent Van Gogh
If God could destroy the mighty Egyptian empire, it stands to reason that the inhabitants of Canaan should have been a piece of cake. So how could the generation that witnessed the miracles of the exodus forget what their own eyes had witnessed? Why were they afraid to enter the land? read more
“Do not despair of retribution” (Chapters of the Fathers (Pirkei Avot) 1:7)
Osama Bin Laden was a despicable human being, and his death is a positive development for mankind. But is it okay to take it a step further? Can we, or perhaps even should we go as far as to openly celebrate his demise? read more
Obese Ohio Man Found Fused to Chair he Sat in for 2 Years
March 29, 2011
“A morbidly obese Ohio man was in the hospital Tuesday after police found him fused to a chair he had not moved from in two years and were forced to cut a hole in the wall of his house just to get him out, WTRF-TV reported. Officers who responded to the scene said that the man’s skin was fused to the fabric of the chair, and that he was sitting in his own feces and urine with maggots visible. read more
It is an obligation to get intoxicated on Purim until you don’t know the difference between blessed is Mordechai and cursed is Haman (Babylonian Talmud Tractate Megillah: 7b)
In 370 BCE the Jews of the Persian Empire were saved from annihilation at the hands of Haman, the evil advisor to the Persian king Achashverosh. So naturally, each year on Purim, the anniversary of that victory, we celebrate our salvation by reading the Book of Esther, sending gifts to our friends and to the poor, enjoying a festive meal and of course, getting drunk. read more