A Dog’s View of Hanukkah

By Daniel Holtzman December 29, 2019

 These are miracles not because they shake the earth or defy the laws of nature, but rather because I was crazy and tender and hopeful enough to ask for them.

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What Hanukkah Teaches Us About Scarcity

By Noah Strauss December 14, 2017

In Houston, Texas, Laverne Cox looked out on an auditorium of eager listeners at the 2014 National Conference on LGBTQ Equality. In her keynote speech, she made a statement that stood out to me. “The scarcity model is a myth,” she said. Cox was talking specifically about trans women of color working together instead of…

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Is Giving Presents a Jewish Tradition?

By Elizabeth Zakaim December 30, 2016

Gift-giving on Chanukah is so popular a custom that we rarely stop to think about it. Why do we do it? Are we just copying Christmas, or is there some Jewish tradition present in the act of gift-giving? (No pun intended.) To find out how gift-giving became such a prominent aspect of Chanukah, we have…

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What’s the Real Gift of Chanukah?

By Joshua Reynolds December 29, 2016

What are you getting for Chanukah this year? I don’t mean the gifts you’re anxiously awaiting in your mailbox, though gift giving on Chanukah is actually an ancient tradition. I mean, what really is the gift of Chanukah? Is it freedom? Is it independence? Is it survival? Is it the ability to wrap a drone…

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An Israeli Chef Brings “Balaboosta” Back

By Michele Amira December 27, 2016

I consider myself a balaboosta in training, as my Bubbe would say, using the Yiddish word for a Jewish homemaker who has it together. For this reason, my Torah of trying to cook food for family is The New York Times’ best-selling cookbook “Balaboosta” by feminist Israeli chef Einat Admony.   Admony came to my hometown,…

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In Defense of My Americanized Chanukah

By Mari Cohen December 26, 2016

When I was little, I looked forward to the day in December when my dad asked us to dig the “Chanukah box” out of the attic. Out came the electric menorah to put in our window, the glitzy blue and silver garland of dreidels and Jewish stars to hang on our bannister, several rolls of…

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There’s Life After “Stranger Things” – and It’s Called “Red Oaks” Season 2

By Josh Weiss December 15, 2016

Let’s face some unsavory facts: the first season of “Stranger Things” is over and the show won’t be back until 2017. If you’re anything like me, there’s a gaping Eggo waffle-shaped void in your soul where Eleven and the rest of the Hawkins, Indiana gang used to reside. Was it the best new television series…

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A Convert’s Christmas in Southern Oregon

By Megan Dyer January 5, 2015

The span from Thanksgiving through New Year’s is generally a hectic time for me. A week after trying to wrest control over half the Thanksgiving menu from my mother and sister while debating internally if it’s even worth trying to keep kosher on such a day before inevitably stuffing myself to the gills either way,…

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Be the Light

By Miriam Roochvarg December 25, 2014

As I got ready to light the menorah for the last time this year, I could not help but think about the meaning of the shemash, or head candle, amid all the other candles. Each night a new candle is added to the menorah and the light spreads. Come the end of Chanukah, you have…

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Menorah Tears from a Teenage Mother

By Michele Amira December 23, 2014

סְבִיבוֹן סוֹב סוֹב סוֹב Sevivon Sov Sov Sov… This is what my Safta used to sing to me, safe on a kibbutz somewhere in Israel, breathing in the desert air, the palm trees and the smell of olive oil illuminated my hair. It was my Mecca when I met a very handsome IDF soldier then…

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Growing Up an American Jew – 2 Poems

By Sophie Katzman April 18, 2014

2 Poems  by Sophie Katzman:   Descendant’s Blessing Zadie. Zionist. Yellow stars. Young and old yearning for years passed. Yahrzeit. Yiddush: lyb, sholem. War. Woody Allen. Leaving notes on the Western Wall. The V’ahavta. U-blessed by the Orthodox Union. Torah. Tzedakah. Tikkun Olam, we repair the world. Shabbat. Sternberg Sewing. Samuel’s Metal Shop. Schlep. Shylock….

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Hart Levine Brings Grassroots Judaism to Campus with the Heart to Heart Project

By H. B. Rubin March 13, 2014

It all started with Chanukkah caroling. Late one night, in the midst of finals week stress, a few male Modern Orthodox University of Pennsylvania students decided to carol some Channukah songs at the doors of their Jewish friends. As they walked down the hallway, snapping their fingers and singing in a loud messy harmony, they…

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Matisyahu in Concert

By Mati Engel December 29, 2012

What a thrilling experience to see ‘Matis’ perform live, especially this holiday season, on the last night of Chanukah, December 15th, at Terminal 5 in NYC . The Danny Zamir band was the opening band for the night: A chassid who rocks the flute with his Israeli bassist, guitarist and drummer. The audience is eclectic…

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If 1/3 of You Gave $5 This Week…

By David A.M. Wilensky December 13, 2012

Actually, if fewer than 1/3 of the people who visit this website this week gave $5, we would raise $5,000 in a week. Or, if fewer than half of this week’s visitors gave just $3. The point is that we’re a lean and scrappy organization with a budget under $100,000. That’s all it takes to engage Jewish college students…

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PHY: Gifts For Those Who Shit Gold

By Simi Lichtman December 13, 2012

This article is the sixth in the series “Procrastination HaYom”– a week-long series of funny videos, websites, articles, and pictures that will do nothing to help you get that A, but everything to help keep you sane during finals time.   It’s Chanukah, that wonderfully spiritual season of freaking out about what to get everyone who…

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