Author: David Rutman

Photo Credit: Jewish Press Dear Dating Coach, I was introduced to a wonderful guy that I like on so many levels. We have the same sense of humor, he is smart, ambitious, and we really seem to see eye to eye. He is however, a bit more modern in his approach to Yiddishkeit than I […]

Photo Credit: CLKER {Originally posted to the JNS website} Anyone who has, as I have, spent his professional life covering the Jewish world as a journalist is not likely to spend much time wondering why Jews are so smart. I don’t think that “genius” is the best word to describe those in the organized Jewish […]

Photo Credit: Wikimedia / Mtattrain MTA New York City public bus (illustrative) Two unidentified, armed goons attacked a 15-year-old Jewish boy while on a public bus in Brooklyn on Tuesday. The attackers threatened Zachary Hershkovich at knife-point, grabbing his earbuds and his kipah while making anti-Semitic remarks, according to a report published by the New […]

Photo Credit: courtesy, Low family Cecile Low in her youth In the beautiful but remote town of Valhalla, New York under a cloudless blue sky, several dozen Jewish men huddled around the grave that was opened for Cecile Low, z’l, in the neatly manicured Sharon Gardens Jewish Cemetery in Westchester, chanting Kaddish, the traditional Jewish […]

Photo Credit: Jewish Press The Rema (Shulchan Aruch 95), writes that it is a custom to take three steps forward before saying Shemone Esrei. The Darkei Moshe says this custom is based on the Rokeach who writes that the three steps correspond to the three times the word “vayigash – and he drew near” appear […]

Photo Credit: Jewish Press Parshas Vayigash tells us that Yaakov, before bringing his family to Egypt, “sent Yehudah ahead of him to prepare [l’horos] ahead of him in Goshen” (Bereishis 46:28). “L’horos,” says the Midrash, is related to the word “Torah.” Yaakov’s purpose in sending Yehudah ahead of him was to establish a yeshiva in […]

Photo Credit: Jewish Press “When they related to him all the words Yosef had spoken to them, and he saw the wagons that Yosef had sent to transport him, the spirit of their father Yaakov was revived” (Bereishis 45:27). Rashi tells us that these wagons hinted to the topic – eglah arufah – that Yosef […]

Photo Credit: Wikimedia / Bazman1987 New York Hatzolah ambulance (illustrative) This may not have been the first time that Grafton E. Thomas attacked Jews in Monsey. The FBI has allegedly impounded a car registered to the mother of 37-year-old Grafton Thomas, the man suspected of stabbing Chanukah guests with a machete in the Monsey home […]