I begin with one of my favorite stories: A Reform and an Orthodox Rabbi are walking down the street, deeply engaged in an animated discussion (already you know this is a tale of some vintage [Read more…]
I was born and raised in Youngstown, Ohio. It was an extraordinarily diverse community with large Italian and African American populations. The Italians, mostly from Sicily and Calabria, were pretty nonchalant about Jews unless a [Read more…]
One inevitable and inescapable rabbinic responsibility is to write eulogies. In these days of multiple family members and acquaintances invited to speak at the levaya, the “pressure” is diluted. Once upon a time, only the [Read more…]
Editor’s note: Jewish Sacred Aging begins a new series of commentaries on Talmud Torah with this contribution by Rabbi Jonathan Kendall. I started religious school three years after Israel was declared a state. My first [Read more…]
There is a little enclave of quaint early 20th century houses and buildings that improbably sits above the coastal road in the hills between Caesarea and Haifa. Once an Arab village abandoned in ’48, it [Read more…]
A Pesach anecdote: when I became the Senior Rabbi at a large Miami congregation, among my many meetings with the Founding Rabbi Emeritus, the issue of the community Seder (though months away) became the focus [Read more…]
I retired from the rabbinate almost three years ago. (A terrible confession: I don’t attend worship services all that much.) I am a dinosaur, a Jurassic Rabbi, and the Reform Judaism of today has pretty [Read more…]
A long, long time ago, just on the edge of where memory meets embellishment, I was an Associate Rabbi in Hollywood – not Hollywood, FL, heaven forefend – but the real Hollywood, with swimming pools [Read more…]
I want to begin this essay with an acknowledgment: I believe hospice performs extraordinary work in life’s final stage. I know that hospice care varies from place to place, but I personally have never seen [Read more…]
I have always felt that laughter – not to be trite – IS the best medicine. Knowing plenty of people who have no senses of humor – as is my lot – I find to [Read more…]
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