Review of ‘Reclaiming Dignity’ by Rabbi Johnny The fact that ‘Reclaiming Dignity’ has already sold out (yes, they are printing more!) already says much about this new ‘Guide to Tzniut for Men and Women’, published by Mosaica Press. But what makes ‘Reclaiming Dignity’ unique? Before even delving into the specific details and nuanced insights found…

Interview with Rabbi Ilan Segal about ‘Aruch Hashulchan in English’

STUDIES IN SPIRITUALITY by Rabbi Jonathan SacksBefore reading Studies in Spirituality, a collection of essays on the parsha on themes relating to spirituality written by Rabbi Sacks the year before he died, I was not sure what to expect. I’ve read every one of Rabbi Sacks’s previous books, but beyond the strange feeling experienced when…

𝐋𝐀𝐘𝐄𝐑𝐒: 𝐏𝐄𝐑𝐒𝐎𝐍𝐀𝐋 𝐍𝐀𝐑𝐑𝐀𝐓𝐈𝐕𝐄𝐒 𝐎𝐅 𝐒𝐓𝐑𝐔𝐆𝐆𝐋𝐄, 𝐑𝐄𝐒𝐈𝐋𝐈𝐄𝐍𝐂𝐄 𝐀𝐍 𝐆𝐑𝐎𝐖𝐓𝐇 𝐅𝐑𝐎𝐌 𝐉𝐄𝐖𝐈𝐒𝐇 𝐖𝐎𝐌𝐄𝐍 𝐛𝐲 𝐒𝐡𝐢𝐫𝐚 𝐋𝐚𝐧𝐤𝐢𝐧 𝐒𝐡𝐞𝐩𝐬 (𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐓𝐨𝐛𝐲 𝐏𝐫𝐞𝐬𝐬, 𝟐𝟎𝟐𝟏) Many life journeys and personal stories are recorded in ‘Layers: Personal Narratives of Struggle, Resilience and Growth from Jewish Women’, but in order to explain what this book represents, I want to begin with the last…

‘The changing nature of human society demands a fresh Tanakh translation which speaks to each and every one of us while remaining rooted in the eternal essence of the Torah. The Tanakh is a living script, the screenplay of the history of humanity from Creation to the present. Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks zt’l was the…

Interview with Kira Sirote about ‘Haftorah Unrolled’

Interview with Rabbi Ari Kahn about ‘The Crowns on the Letters’

Interview with Rav Yaakov Nagen about ‘The Soul of the Mishna’

‘WHAT DO YOU REALLY WANT?’ BY RABBANIT SHAYNA GOLDBERGA universal experience of human nature is that we feel a deep sense of connection when we see people like us on TV and in movies, or encounter people like us in magazines or in the books that we read. Moreover, when those people not only look…

Today I had the wonderful opportunity to talk with Rabbi Dr. Benjy Epstein about his wonderful book ‘Living in the Presence: A Jewish Mindfulness Guide for Everyday Life’. In our wide-ranging conversation we explored the concept of ‘Yishuv Hada’at’ (Jewish Mindfulness), the importance of living a life that reflects the totality of who we are,…

Today I had the privilege of interviewing Rav Ronen Neuwirth about his fascinating new book ‘The Narrow Halakhic Bridge: A vision of Jewish Law in the Post-Modern Age’ (which also exists in hebrew as גשר ההלכה: פסיקת הלכה בדור פוסטמודרני). In ‘The Narrow Halakhic Bridge’, Rav Ronen provides an easy-to-read yet nuanced presentation about the…

‘Conversations on Love and Fear’ by Sharon Shalom. (Yediot Acharonot, 2018) Imagine a book, written by a wise, insightful and emotionally intelligent Jewish philosopher with a flair for poetic language, that explores the richness and complexity of Jewish identity, heritage and observance in the modern state of Israel. Imagine that instead of avoiding some of…

  And Beit Hillel Says (U’Beit Hillel Omrim): Halakhic Rulings of the Rabbis and Rabbaniot of Beit Hillel (Yedioth Ahronoth/Chemed Books, 2018) Introduction December 2018 saw the launch of U’Beit Hillel Omrim (literally ‘And Beit Hillel Says’), which is a collection of halakhic rulings generated by members of the Beit Hillel organisation. Beit Hillel is an…

MINCHAT ASHER: KLALEI HAMITZVOT by Rabbi Asher Weiss Machon Minchat Asher, Ellul 5778 The study of the Talmud is a magnetizing process that draws a learner into debates of the past while urging them to consider how the laws and values emerging from those debates can be applied in the present and the future. This…

JEWISH GUIDE TO PRACTICAL MEDICAL DECISION-MAKING by Rabbi Jason Weiner (Urim, 2017) It takes considerable skill to write a book about modern medicine, and even greater skill to explain how halakha (Jewish law) responds to the dilemmas generated by modern medicine. Still, even those with the requisite knowledge of medicine and Jewish law may struggle to…

I. Introduction Over many years I have developed a great passion towards the study of contemporary halakhah – and specifically – towards contemporary She’elot U’Teshuvot (responsa literature). This is due to the fact that while codified halakhah is often recorded by the author ‘after examining the halakhic materials from a theoretical point of view’[1], responsa…

SH’UT YISHREI LEV by HaRav Yonatan (Yoni) Rosensweig Introduction Responsa – or in hebrew, She’elot U’Teshuvot – are unique texts whose questions, no less than their answers, shine a light on halakhic trends and challenges in the Jewish world. As David Ellenson observes, they are ‘the crossroads where text and context meet in the ongoing…

FAITH WITHOUT FEAR: UNRESOLVED ISSUES IN MODERN ORTHODOXY by Michael J. Harris (Vallentine Mitchell, 2016) Rabbi Dr Michael Harris, whom I have the privilege of knowing, is a Modern Orthodox ‘academically-informed rabbi’ who has recently written a compelling, scholarly, yet lucid presentation exploring some of the most important issues facing Modern Orthodoxy today.In Faith without…

FALSE FACTS AND TRUE RUMORS: LASHON HARA IN CONTEMPORARY CULTURE by Rabbi Daniel Z. Feldman Maggid Books/Michael Scharf Publication Trust of Yeshiva University Press, 2015 Very rarely is a book published that addresses an already familiar subject and revolutionises the way we understand it. Yet this is precisely what Rabbi Daniel Feldman has done in…

AGGADAH: SAGES, STORIES & SECRETS There are very few books that I wish to re-read the moment I finish them, but Rabbi Immanuel Bernstein’s ‘Aggadah: Sages, Stories & Secrets’, published by Mosaica Press, is one of them. Like Aggadah itself, this beautifully designed book is multileveled; yet in contrast to the cryptic style of Aggadah,…