(JTA) — According to Jewish tradition, the Torah is so sacred that even a single error made on a single letter renders the entire scroll unusable. And yet the Hebrew Bible — including the Torah, its first five books — is riddled with corruptions and alterations that have accrued and been passed down over the millennia….
Confused by the whole Jay Z/Beyoncé/Solange elevator spat? Here’s an easy way to make sense of it. Just imagine Jay Z as Jacob, Beyoncé as Rachel and Solange as Leah. Here’s how it would have gone down in Bible times: 1. “And Jacob kissed Rachel, and lifted up his voice.” Bey and Jay first meet,…
Nigerian women call for the freedom of Chibok’s kidnapped girls / Getty Images Last month, an Islamist armed group called Boko Haram abducted 276 girls from a school in Chibok, Nigeria. Presumably, these girls will be killed or sold into slavery and child marriages. Even though I sit here in Los Angeles, this crisis affects…
One day, when I was in my early 20s and teaching Torah to religious newbies in Jerusalem, I felt the bedrock of belief shudder beneath me. There’s a reason the sages wrote that the air of Jerusalem makes one wise. I could feel the vibe everywhere. I loved how a cosmetician might share a Torah…
A 15th century printed book of the Torah fetched a record $3.87 million at an auction in Paris. Three buyers attempted to outbid each other over the telephone during the sale which the Christie’s auction house organized on April 30, the news website actualitte.com reported Thursday. Christie’s listed the buyer as “anonymous” but said the…
Under pressure from the local rabbinical court, a London Orthodox rabbi ended the practice of women carrying a Torah scroll during prayers at his synagogue. Rabbi Harvey Belovski told congregants last week that the rabbinical court had ordered him to stop a practice that he had initiated last year, in which women carried the Torah…
Have you ever scrolled through Buzzfeed thinking, ‘If only this could be a little more Jewish?” Someone in the wide netherworld of the Internet has heard your prayers and answered them. The result is BuzzTorah, a spoof of the news site that launched a thousand listicles created by Yeshiva University students. The website self-describes as…
A publisher from Berlin is preparing to launch the first German-language children’s edition of the Torah since 1964. The first volume of “Tell your Children-The Torah in Five Volumes” is scheduled to be offered for sale next month by Ariella Books, a German Jewish children’s publisher. The previous edition was released half a century ago…
100% of profits support our journalism
