Welcome to the Forward’s coverage of Orthodox Judaism, which aims for a stricter observance of halachic law than Conservative or Reform Judaism. It includes Modern Orthodox Judaism, as well as Haredi (sometimes called ultra-Orthodox) Judaism,…
Orthodox Judaism
The Latest
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Fast Forward Formerly Ultra-Orthodox Millennials Get Special ‘Off The Derech’ Moishe House
Two not-for-profits, Moishe House and Footsteps, are teaming up to create a center for formerly ultra-Orthodox millennial Jews. Moishe House is known widely for subsidizing co-living spaces for residents who use the spaces as hubs for the local twentysomething Jewish community. The residents of the new Moishe House Crown Heights are all Jews who are…
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Life Orthodox Survivor Of Sex Abuse Exposes Traumas In New Film
You wouldn’t believe she’s only 20. With no film schooling or experience, Baltimore native Miryam Rabinowitz has thrown herself into a film project that tells the story of sexual abuse — or rather, its lonely, complex aftermath. “Still Feeling” tells the story of Yuval Goldenberg, a young woman who was abused during her childhood in…
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Forverts in English Yankel and Leah (Chapter 5): Glancing at the Eyes of the Gentile Cashier
This article originally appeared in the Yiddish Forverts. He took up this thread when he called Miriam the shadchan’te the next morning. “I am still not sure about the way she looks,” Yankel told her. “I have no way of knowing. I can’t even remember from date to date what she looks like. I don’t think I…
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News Orthodox Jews Divide Over Questions Of Whether Yoga, Crystals, Reiki Are Kosher
An Orthodox community is in the midst of a philosophical crisis that’s pitting hard-line rationalists against New Age-leaning mystics — and the publication of a new book by a well-known rabbi has exposed and intensified the struggle. In his recently published “Alternative Medicine in Halakhah,” Lakewood, New Jersey rabbi Rephoel Szmerla gives Jewish legal justifications…
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Life Banned from Print Media, Ultra-Orthodox Women Turn to Instagram
Orthodox women are disappearing. Over the years, Orthodox magazines and newspapers have placed a strict ban on any images of women. And ironically, this erasure has emerged at a time of the community’s increased access to a luxury lifestyle: Orthodox women, decked out in glamorous wigs and haute couture, will ultimately pick up glossy religious…
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Culture Everything You Need to Know About Judaism’s Saddest Day of the Year
Tisha b’Av, the Ninth of Av, is the commemoration of the destruction of Jerusalem’s Temple. And it’s also, basically, Catastrophe Day for the Jews. It’s the day we consolidate all of our thousands of years of sorrow into one, 25-hour long inferno. Here’s what traditional Jews are mourning on this day, according to the Mishnah…
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Forverts in English Yankel and Leah 4: Observing the NYC Skyline – And Her
This originally appeared in the Yiddish Forverts. To read the previous chapter. “I’m available,” Leah said brightly. “Good,” he said, feeling an instant resistance to her enthusiasm. “I’ll see you at eight o’clock?” This time Yankel was able to borrow a different car. It was an almost-new Oldsmobile 98 Regency. “Beautiful car,” Leah said when he…
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News Orthodox Push For Eruv Sparks Fierce Backlash In New Jersey Suburb
More than 200 residents of the New Jersey suburb of Mahwah packed a local park Monday night to celebrate what speakers called a victory against a potentially negative influence on the wealthy town. It wasn’t an upsurge in crime or some kind of unwanted real-estate development that had them so riled up. It was the…
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Culture Why saying ‘L’shana Tova’ on Rosh Hashanah may not be the correct phrase
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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.
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Culture How my odious cousin Roy Cohn was responsible for creating Donald Trump — and me
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Opinion This is the most disorienting Rosh Hashanah in memory
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Culture New conspiracy theory just dropped — Jews are causing the hurricanes
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Opinion Allies at odds, Netanyahu and Emmanuel Macron have more in common than they’d like to admit
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