Journalism by Jewish college students, for Jewish college students.
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…
Feeling caught up in the pressure to align themselves with either the liberal Open Hillel movement or the nascent reactionary Safe Hillel movement, Jewish students at West Virginia International University met and decided to start a new movement in response: Ambiguous Hillel. “We really had no other option,” explained WVIU Hillel president Jason Scheingross. “Our…
I recently published my first op-ed in the Jewish Press. In it, I made the claim — contrary to the beliefs of the far-right wing publication —that those of us who were raised in the left-wing Modern Orthodox world are not, actually lost to secularism, but are instead, re-imagining the world of traditionally observant Judaism…
1. Give $18 million to Carl Levitt. It is a truth universally acknowledged that life after college is hard. With $18 million, I, Carl Levitt, could pay off my creditors and perhaps even live comfortably for the rest of my days. After four grueling years studying at this institution, $18 million would be the least…
I am a product of thirteen years of primary, elementary, and secondary Jewish day school education. I’ve been enrolled in a Jewish day school since I was three years old, and the idea of starting my school day at nine in the morning and ending at 2:30 in the afternoon is totally foreign to me….
When it comes to tedious Torah portions, this week’s,Terumah, has few equals. It trucks on repetitively as Moses describes for us in intricate detail every step necessary for making the Ark of the Covenant, and then the Mishkan, or the Tent of Meeting where the Ark will be held. Every object that will be kept…
This piece originally appeared in the University of California San Diego Guardian in response to a new University of California policy of avoiding conflicts between Jewish holidays and move-in week by cutting a week out of winter break. This decision was made without any student input. It is being reprinted with permission of the author….
San José is an ugly city. The streets are lined with storefronts due for a paint job. Trash and dog droppings line the sidewalks. Every afternoon, like clockwork, the tropical weather brings in a rainstorm that puts most Sunday showers stateside to shame. At night, drug dealers and (legal) prostitutes roam the streets. In this…
Just a few days after my blog post from last week ran, the Israeli rabbinate decided that it would, indeed, accept Rabbi Avi Weiss’ testimony as legitimate for people he vouched for as Jewish. This is a step in the right direction for the Israeli rabbinate, which had previously called Rabbi Weiss’ validity into…
Well, by the Gregorian calendar, we have officially lived in the year 2014 for a week. For one thing, this means I will spend about three more weeks dating assignments “2013,” only to see autocorrect bluntly demonstrate the error of my ways. For another, this means that both the Jewish and secular seasonal winter holidays…
I have a hard time answering the question, “So how do you identify? Like, Jewish-ly?” On the one hand, I grew up in a Modern Orthodox home and attended Modern Orthodox schools since kindergarten, but, for most of my life so far, was part of a haredi community in southern Brooklyn. On the other hand,…
A good deal of time passed in my life where Judaism was very far back in my mind. Jewish life for me used to just mean meeting up with extended family and friends for the holidays, and here and there Friday night dinners with my family were made a little more special by turning them…
The first time I went into sensory overload while at college was during a Kabbalat Shabbat service. The just concluded school week had been stressful, and I probably hadn’t eaten enough that day, so perhaps it is not surprising that I went into a sensory attack that evening, while surrounded by about twenty people singing…
There is quite a lot of talk about denominational unity. “Let’s draw together as a Jewish community!” “Let’s build cross-denominational ties!” “Denominations are irrelevant and we live in a post-denominational era!” It is almost as if we, the eternally factional and rather divisive Jewish people have discovered a magic, unified, cohesive land beyond the rainbow,…
Part 1 in a 3 part series. We might just be the last Jewish organization to respond to the big bad Pew Survey and we’re fine with that. It seems like every response so far is other people telling us what how we need to feel about it, whether we should be scared, take…