Chanukah Posts & Dreidel

Chanukah Posts & Dreidel

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Today’s New York Times has an editoral discussing Chanukah customs, including dreidel. The author, Howard Jacboson, who won the 2010 Man Booker prize, isn’t a fan. His take is pretty much summed up in this quote: “How many years did I feign excitement when this nothing of a toy was produced? The dreidel would appear and the whole family would fall into some horrible imitation of shtetl simplicity, spinning the dreidel and pretending to care which character was uppermost when…

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אדם דואג על אבוד דמיו / ואינו דואג על אִבוד ימיו

אדם דואג על אבוד דמיו / ואינו דואג על אִבוד ימיו

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In the prior post, Yitzhak discussed a phrase and its origins. We now present, a chapter from R. S. Askenazi unpublished works, related to the same topic. As mentioned before we are working on printing his writings. At this point three volumes are completely ready to print (with a few more on the way). While they still require financial assistance to see the light of day we are very close, only 5K is necessary. With the help of many people,…

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“Whence Worry?” – On the Murky Trail Of An Aphorism

“Whence Worry?” – On the Murky Trail Of An Aphorism

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by Yitzhak, of בין דין לדין [I am greatly indebted to Wolf2191 and Mississippi Fred MacDowell for reading an earlier draft of this essay and for providing numerous valuable references.] This past Rosh Ha’Shanah, my friend A.F. showed me a collection of various homilies of the Rav related to the days of Awe, “prepared, translated and edited by B. David Schreiber”. While browsing through them, I noticed the following passage: Every Jew must also ensure the continuity of future generations…

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A Picture is Worth a Thousand Questions

A Picture is Worth a Thousand Questions

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          A PICTURE IS WORTH A THOUSAND QUESTIONS By Eli Genauer Authors note: I would like to thank Dr. Peggy Pearlstein and Sharon Horowitz of the Library of Congress for their help in allowing me to assemble the various printed editions of the Talmud that I used in this article Amongst all the difficult tractates of the Talmud, Eruvin stands head and shoulders above most. The Gemara tries to describe in words what would normally take a picture to…

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New Writings from R Kook Part 1 by Marc B. Shapiro

New Writings from R Kook Part 1 by Marc B. Shapiro

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New Writings from R Kook and Assorted Comments, part 1 by Marc B. Shapiro 20 Marheshvan,[1] 5771 I now want to return to R. Kook and discuss some of his writings that have recently appeared. This is the first of what will be a five part post. It will be followed by at least one other multi-part post also dealing with R. Kook’s new writings. For those who have never read R. Kook and don’t understand why there is such…

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Upcoming Kestenbaum Auction

Upcoming Kestenbaum Auction

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Next week, Oct. 27, Kestenbaum & Co. is having an auction, and the catalog is availalbe online. Obviously, there are many items worth highlighting but I want to focus upon one general topic and select those lots that are relevant. The focus of this post is on translations and the vernacular. Lot 7 is the first book using Hebrew fonts to teach Hebrew to an American audience. This book, Grammar of the Hebrew Tongue, written by Judah Monis, was a…

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