Rabbi Avi Shafran
By Rabbi Avi Shafran
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Opinion American Jewish Unity In Favor of Egalitarian Kotel Is a Fiction
It might be hard to imagine the hardline Israeli Haredi parties and the hardline feminist “Original Women of the Wall” group as occupying the same library, much less the same page. But that’s where they find themselves. It’s not just that both are hardline, and that both reject the compromise idea of an egalitarian Western…
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Opinion Does Anyone Really Benefit from ‘Balkanizing’ the Kotel?
Many are celebrating the official setting aside and expansion of a part of Jerusalem’s Western Wall for non-traditional public prayer. I’m not among them. Over nearly 50 years, the Kotel has been the only place in the world where Jews of all sorts — black-hatted and hair-covered Haredim, National-Religious, Reform and Conservative and agnostic —…
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Opinion If Temple Mount Provocation Is Bad, What About Women of the Wall?
With the worst (one hopes) of the recent spate of stabbings in Israel in the rearview mirror, it’s time to reap the benefits of hindsight. One benefit, as disturbing as it is undeniable, is the realization that violence lies just beneath the surface of at least a portion of Palestinian society. All that’s needed for…
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Opinion Where’s the Orthodox Counterpoint to All Those OTD Books?
Compelling personal essays and well-promoted books by “off the derech” writers — Jews who were raised Orthodox but are currently elsewhere — have become something of a cottage industry. Some of the accounts are somewhat condescending, even cynical, embodiments of the perennial phenomenon of intrepid youth discovering truths to which their parents are lamentably oblivious….
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Opinion Don’t Blame All Ultra-Orthodox for Actions of One Stabber
The death of Shira Banki, one of the six marchers stabbed at the recent Gay Pride Parade in Jerusalem, was a horrific exclamation point to the indefensible rampage. Indefensible as well, though, were some reactions to the stabbings. Forward columnist declared that the actions of the stabber, now murderer, Yishai Schlissel, were the result of…
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Opinion Yes, Orthodoxy Changes. No, That’s Not ‘Rewriting History.’
Pssst! I’ve got a secret to share. It’s from deep inside the Orthodox Jewish world. Come closer… Okay, here it is: Orthodoxy changes! It’s not much of a secret, actually. At least in these here parts. But it seems to be an unfamiliar concept for Marc Shapiro, a University of Scranton professor and author of…
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Opinion Shavuot Means Not Trusting Ourselves
Were any Sadducees around today, they’d be happy. The first day of Shavuot falls on a Sunday. There are, however, no Sadducees left. They were one of the camps of Jews during the Second Temple period that rejected the orally transmitted Jewish religious tradition, or Oral Law, which, together with the Written one (the “Five…
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Opinion America’s Not ‘1984’ Yet — So Why Can’t I Refuse To Back Gay Marriage?
Some of us who consider the teachings of a religious tradition to define our purpose on earth have been feeling a bit like Winston Smith enduring Hate Week in ‘1984.’ The protagonist of George Orwell’s novel was distressed by his totalitarian society’s collective projection of ill will against a nebulous enemy. Thankfully, even 31 years…
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