Scribe, the Forward’s curated contributor network, is a place for showcasing personal experiences and perspective from across our Jewish communities. Here you will find a wide array of reflections on Jewish issues, life-cycle events, spirituality, culture and more.
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You say matzah — and matzo and matzuh and matzee and more
Readers respond to our editor-in-chief’s column about a Passover copy-editing conundrum
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A year into COVID, Zoom funerals are still surreal
I waited outside the main office building of Beth Moses Cemetery in Long Island. It was a bright, cold day. I’d been there many times before. Normally the spot is a swirl of activity, with cars snaking around every driveway, funeral directors talking shop in small clumps and crowds of mourners greeting one another with…
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Surviving the Texas winter storm — with yahrzeit candles
I’m a cantor, and I lead a small congregation in Arlington, Texas; I’m also a hospice chaplain. So given my credentials, I’m supposed to be good in crisis situations. But I have to be completely honest: I was completely unprepared for the devastating winter storm that hit us last week. Who could ever have imagined…
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After a year of extreme strain, we need Purim more than ever
Funny. Musical. Irreverent. These aren’t words we typically associate with synagogue, but Purim isn’t your typical holiday. Don’t call it “Jewish Halloween.” It’s not. Just because we wear costumes on both holidays doesn’t mean one has anything to do with the other. For centuries, theater has been used as satire and political commentary. The Purim…
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After celebrating Purim as a pandemic descended, the holiday is forever changed
The Jewish holidays remind me of my old vinyl records: They have an A-side and a B-side. The origin of the holiday and the rituals for observing it, as I imagine it, are on the A-side. On the B-side is my personal relationship with the holiday. For example, the A-side of Sukkot is found in…
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Jews must push for more diverse children’s books
In 1990, my family spent the summer in England. Curled up on a couch in an Oxford bookstore, rain drumming gently on the window, I happily turned the pages of a book I’d found on the shelf called “Tintin in the Congo.” I didn’t notice that it depicted Black people as racist stereotypes. As a…
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How to judge Trump’s impeachment trial? Look to the story of Hanukkah.
Extensive, often never-before-seen footage of the riots at the Capitol on Jan. 6, shown this week during former president Donald Trump’s second impeachment trial, is a terrible, powerful depiction of the bloodlust and violence exhibited by the men and women who stormed the Capitol. Their only aim was to stop the certification of the electoral…
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Yes, taking our hands off the wheel can lead to magical parenting
It has been said that “no other work transcends that of righteous, intentional parenting.” As caregivers, we have been guided to believe that we can — and we should — imbue our parenting actions and words with a sense of purpose, with a preferred outcome. Want our kids to love reading? Model sitting down with…
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George Shultz was a hero for Soviet Jewry — and all of us
On Feb. 6, the world learned that former Secretary of State George P. Shultz had passed away at age 100. Shultz was a U.S. Marine, MIT Ph.D and former head of the Business School at the University of Chicago who went on to serve his country as Labor Secretary, Treasury Secretary and Director of the…
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When a haircut is more than just a haircut
“Cut his hair.” That was the entire direct message. Left by a complete stranger – an older woman according to her profile pic – on a photo I had posted on Instagram of our son Cielo, at age two, playing in our neighborhood park, under sprinklers, while rocking a pretty amazing man [boy?] bun. “Excuse…
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Call me by what name?
I’ve never been a nickname person, and people rarely call me anything but my given name — at least to my face. No alliterative alliterations, no truncated shortcuts and certainly no initials. At the furthest deviation, I have been proud “Unghullariel” to my sister’s three impressive kids. So when my husband and I had to…
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How to be a good neighbor in Israel? Learn Arabic idioms.
When I made Aliyah 31 years ago, I told the bespectacled bureaucrat at the Ministry of Interior that his repeated demands for arcane, unobtainable and unnecessary documents were driving me bananas. I said this in Hebrew, translating it word for word: ata noheg oti bannanot. Complete silence. As there was not a banana in sight,…
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