Written by Naomi Karp, director of student life at Hillel at UCLA. This week’s Torah portion, Vayeira, is jam packed with action, comedy and drama. The penultimate event is the Akeda, the binding of Isaac. To briefly recap: God instructs…
Taste of Torah: the need for continuous personal growth
Written by Rabbi Jacob Rupp, senior rabbi at the Jewish Awareness Movement at UCLA. Contemporary research reveals that millennials, more than ever before, want to find a job that is fulfilling. Gone are the days that we work for the…
Prodigious Babes of Jewish History: Imma Shalom
Exposition of remarkable, yet obscured, women of holy Jewish texts.
Lag Ba’Omer: holiday of the collective soul
This past weekend, the Jewish nation celebrated Lag Ba’Omer. For the average American Jew, Lag Ba’Omer may be a bit of a mystery — there is no Christian equivalent, it is not commercialized in any way, and pop culture has…
On the up and up: is Passover price inflation real?
Perhaps no holiday tests the Jewish imagination to the same extent as does Passover. Each year, irrespective of locale, Jews are asked to explore their ancestral heritage by recreating the Passover story that traces the Jewish excursion from bondage to…
TBT: The history of Chad Gadya and Passover
In honor of Passover and the Internet sensation of dedicating Thursdays to past experiences, I took to Ha’Am’s archives to find an article that our predecessors wrote about this fine holiday. The following article, “Chad Gadya: Not Just for Passover,”…
Ha’Am Winter 2013 Print Issue: A Look At Jewish Traditions at Home and Abroad
In case you missed Ha’Am’s Winter 2013 Print Issue, you can now read all the articles and see the complete PDF online. Enjoy!
When Americans cannot compete, we all lose
Home to the second largest Jewish community, with some 5.2 million Jews, the United States’ political climate is undermining the ability of its citizens to trust their government. Paul Krugman, Nobel laureate in economics, opined in his blog Economics and…
Is G-d racist? The Jewish take on the chosen people
Article contributed by JAM Rabbi Avner Engel ————————————————- Why did G-d create you? Does he need you? To say such a thing would imply that G-d is lacking, which is the opposite of Judaism’s infinite, all-powerful G-d. The only thing…