by Rabbi Yaakov Wolff | f 21, 2023 | Yom Kippur
Rabbi Aharon Soloveichik, a respected scholar, teacher, and community leader in both Chicago and New York, faced a significant challenge towards the end of his life. He suffered a debilitating stroke that made walking nearly impossible. Determined to regain his...
by Rabbi Elie Mischel | f 21, 2023 | Acharei Mot, Yom Kippur
Hank Greenberg was the first Jewish superstar in American baseball and in American sports in general. Now, as you might imagine, when he first came up to the Big Leagues to play for the Detroit Tigers in the early 1930s, antisemitism was a fact of life. But in 1934,...
by Rabbi Elie Mischel | f 19, 2023 | Yom Kippur
Michael Levy was born blind. At his mother’s funeral, Michael told the following story: Since he was not able to see, Michael’s mother would walk him to school every morning, and, at the end of the day, she would wait for him right outside the school building to walk...
by Rabbi Elie Mischel | f 12, 2023 | Amos, Elul, Rosh Hashana, Yom Kippur
The following scenario is probably familiar to many of us: Summer was great, but with a couple of weeks between the end of camp and the first day of school, we find our kids becoming restless and ready to return to routine. They miss the structured days and the...
by Rabbi Elie Mischel | f 6, 2023 | Bible Study, Nitzavim, Yom Kippur
At the height of his popularity, Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel (1907 – 1972) spoke in London to an overflow crowd. The crowd was there, waiting, when Rabbi Heschel walked quickly over to the speaker’s podium and made the following announcement: “My friends, I have just...
by Shira Schechter (Moderator) | f 3, 2022 | Faith, God, Jonah, Light Unto the Nations, Prayer, Repentance, Rosh Hashana, Sukkot, Temple, Tishrei, Yom Kippur, Zechariah
By Adam Eliyahu Berkowitz When I think about the High Holidays, I picture synagogues full of Jews, the men wrapped in snow-white prayer shawls swaying silently, the women praying fervently. They are Jewish holidays and the pinnacle of the Hebrew calendar. These are...
