Welcome to the Forward’s coverage of Hasidic Judaism, a sub-group of Haredi Judaism that adheres to the historical traditions of Eastern European Jews, including communicating in Yiddish.
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News Hasidic Enclave Keeps Its Secrets Amid Elusive Rebbe’s Tight Control
To his hasidim, Rabbi David Twersky is nearly akin to God. But that does not mean he exempts himself from the obligations God imposes on all Jews, at least as traditionalists understand them. Like his followers, Twersky prays to God three times a day. But unlike other Hasidic grand rabbis, Twersky does not pray in…
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Breaking News Ex-Hasidic Man Sues for $1.25M Over Poor Education
A lapsed haredi Orthodox Jew is suing the Quebec government for $1.25 million for not enforcing provincial education guidelines that he says left him virtually illiterate and unemployable. Yonanan Lowen, 36, attended two still-operating illegal haredi Tosh yeshivas north of Montreal and spoke only in Yiddish. He says he never learned to read or write…
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News How Moshe Twersky’s Family Tree Melds Hasidic and Modern Orthodox Worlds
Rabbi Moshe Twersky, murdered in a bloody Jerusalem terror attack on November 18, bore the last name of one of the most illustrious families in Hasidic Europe. But he also was the “truest disciple” of his grandfather, Rabbi Joseph Ber Soloveitchik, the founder of Modern Orthodoxy in America, Twersky’s brother-in-law told the Forward. Twersky, the…
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Opinion The Hasidic Community Is Not a Cult
At a recent talk I gave on my new book, “The Pious Ones: The World of Hasidim and Their Battles With America,” a friend in the audience came away with some rather sharp comments, agreeing with some of the points I made, but finally dismissing Hasidim with the words “They’re a cult.” Although the book…
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News $20 Million Hasidic Mortgage Fraud Suspect Bribed Witness in Nechemya Weberman Case
One of the men arrested in a $20 million Satmar family mortgage fraud conspiracy is the same man who was convicted of trying to intimidate a witness against notorious Hasidic sex abuser Nechemya Weberman, the Forward has learned. Abraham Rubin is fresh out of prison after serving three months for trying to bribe into not…
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News $20M Hasidic Fraud Suspects Claimed To Be Millionaires and Paupers — at Same Time
They told the banks they were millionaires, and the welfare agencies that they were broke. Fifteen members of a prominent Satmar Hasidic family were charged in a sprawling fraud case in New York on Thursday, accused of lying to obtain $20 million in mortgages while also receiving hundreds of thousands of dollars in public benefits….
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Breaking News Satmar Hasidic Family Busted in Mortgage Fraud Scheme
FBI agents reportedly arrested more than a dozen members of Hasidic communities in Williamsburg, Monsey, and Kiryas Joel this morning in connection with a mortgage fraud investigation. An FBI spokesman confirmed the arrests to the Forward. Neither the FBI nor the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York has made an official…
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Life When the Mikveh Is an Ordeal of Faith
Mayyim Hayyim Community Mikveh The first time I prepared to immerse in the mikveh, the Jewish ritual bath, I was 18 years old and four days away from my wedding. I sat naked in a white bathtub as the mikveh attendant scrubbed my back with a washcloth and a dollop of baking soda. “You’re lucky…
Most Popular
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Culture Why saying ‘L’shana Tova’ on Rosh Hashanah may not be the correct phrase
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Opinion This is the most disorienting Rosh Hashanah in memory
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Culture How my odious cousin Roy Cohn was responsible for creating Donald Trump — and me
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Fast Forward Was the viral Ta-Nehisi Coates interview a hit piece or fair play? A journalism ethics expert weighs in.
In Case You Missed It
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Yiddish ווי האָבן ייִדן געהיט די ייִדיש־קולטור אױף יענער זײַט „אײַזערנעם פֿאָרהאַנג“?How did Jews maintain their Yiddish culture behind the Iron Curtain?
ייִדישע ליטעראַטן, װאָס האָבן געטרײַ געדינט די קאָמוניסטישע רעזשימען, האָבן גענוצט זײערע פּריװילעגיעס כּדי אָפּצוהיטן ייִדיש.
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Fast Forward All the Jewish NHL players to watch in the 2024-2025 season
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Opinion A two-state solution may seem like a distant dream. Here’s why it shouldn’t be
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Opinion I’m a Holocaust survivor. Here’s why I celebrated my 80th birthday protesting at an Israeli prison
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