Rabbi’s Turn (Page 8)

By Rabbi Seth Goldstein , Temple Beth Hatfiloh Dear Mr. President, Mazel tov on your victory this election Day. This was definitely a hard-fought contest and you have done well to have prevailed. I know you must have a lot of work ahead of you as you prepare for yourContinue Reading

By Rabbi Moshe Kletenik, Congregation Bikur Cholim- Machzikay Hadath This November, Initiative Measure 1000 will appear on the ballot in Washington State. “This measure would permit terminally ill, competent, adult Washington residents, who are medically predicted to have six months or less to live, to request and self-administer lethal medicationContinue Reading

By Rabbi Ted Falcon, Bel Alef Meditative Synagogue Spiritual teachings sometimes flow from the most unlikely sources. One of my teachers this year has been Margo. I don’t actually know Margo. I’ve never seen her, never met her, and never will. Yet I often listen to her at crucial momentsContinue Reading

By Rabbi Jacob Fine, Hillel at UW The air has become crisp with the smell of fall, and with the change in season comes the reminder that the High Holy Days are again upon us. Somehow, despite the fact that Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur arrive at the same timeContinue Reading

By Rabbi Anson Laytner, American Jewish Committee Twentieth-century America was the era of civil rights. The National American Woman Suffrage Association was formed in 1890 by the merger of several smaller predecessors. In 1906, a group of German Jewish Americans came together to advocate on behalf of Russian Jewish pogromContinue Reading

By Rabbi Harry Zeitlin , Congregation Beth Ha’Ari As the rhythm of the Jewish year flows from past setbacks, failures and disasters typified by Tisha B’Av to looking forward to Rosh Hashanah and the promise of the future, I personally find it a lot “easier” to accept that things haveContinue Reading

By Rabbi Mark S. Glickman, Congregations Kol Ami and Kol Shalom How shall we sing God’s song in a foreign land? — Psalms 137:2 When I was growing up in the 1970s, the Judaism my classmates and I learned was very different from the Judaism many of our students learnContinue Reading

By Rabbi Jacob Izakson , Temple Beth Shalom, Spokane On May 12, a 98-year-old lady named Irena Sendler passed away in Warsaw, Poland. During World War II, Irena obtained permission to work in the Warsaw Ghetto as a plumbing/sewer specialist. She had an ulterior motive. Irena knew what the Nazis’Continue Reading

By Barbara H. Brandt , The Secular Jewish Cirlce of Puget Sound There are two persistent commandments in the Torah: have no strange gods and welcome strangers. Why welcome strangers? The paradigmatic passage is in Leviticus 19: “You shall not oppress the alien. The ger (stranger) who resides with youContinue Reading

By Rabbi Beth Singer, Temple Beth Am We Jews, like all other constituencies in America, have been caught up in the drama, headache and excitement of a presidential primary that included the first serious Mormon candidate. It also included, of course, the first woman and the first African-American to makeContinue Reading

By Rabbi Daniel Lapin, American Alliance of Jews and Christians It’s a good thing that more Americans attend synagogue or church each week than go to the movies. Regular worship helps to keep you healthy, and also wealthy. The Journal of Chronic Diseases reported that men who attend church frequentlyContinue Reading

By Rabbi Bruce Kadden, Temple Beth El We are approaching Shavuot, the Feast of Weeks, as we continue to count the omer, taking us from the Exodus from Egypt to the revelation at Mount Sinai. God freed the Israelites not so that they would wander aimlessly in the wilderness, butContinue Reading

By Rabbi Josh Hearshen, Herzl-Ner Tamid Conservative Congregation We are in the season of saluting parents. We have Mother’s Day and Father’s Day. We are also in the season of saluting education, as the school year comes to a close and we thank our teachers for all that they do.Continue Reading

By Rabbi Avrohom David, The Seattle Kollel “Rabbi, are you growing a beard?” It’s a question I hear often at this time of the year. The period between Pesach and Shavuot is marked by the counting of the omer. This time is know as Sefirah, the time of year thatContinue Reading

By Rabbi Elazar Bogomilsky, Chai Center of Seattle As I prepare to sit down to the seder again with family and guests, I think about a question one of my dear friends asked me recently. “Rabbi,” he wanted to know, “what is so important about all the minutiae of theContinue Reading

By Rabbi Chaim Levine, LivingJudaism o·pin·ion (e-pin`yen) n.— Belief or judgment that rests on grounds insufficient to produce complete certainty. Once every four years we run into an election year Pesach. At first glance, they may seem completely disconnected; however, one just may have some relevance for the other. RecentlyContinue Reading

By Rabbi Shalom D. (Berry) Farkash, Chabad of the Central Cascades Since it is Purim today, we need to say l’chaim, so l’chaim, l’chaim v’livracha! Opening the previous JTNews, I saw the Purim edition called “The Backward” and this brought to my mind an interesting halachah I learned in yeshivahContinue Reading

By Rabbi Yechezchel Kornfeld, Congregation Shevet Achim The “Hot Topic” in all Jewish communities throughout the world is how best to ensure the continued existence of our people. What must be said at the onset is that the existence of the Jews is not in danger. God has already promised,Continue Reading

By Rabbi Rachel Nussbaum, The Kavana Cooperative We’ve experienced a dramatic shift in the content of our Torah reading over the past couple of weeks. For the months since Simchat Torah, we’ve been captivated by the gripping narrative that led us from the creation of the world, through the storiesContinue Reading