Author: Meghan Froy

If you’ve ever sent your partner or child to the supermarket with your shopping list, it’s likely you’ve received a call or text saying that the store is out of a specific item you requested and asking if they can substitute something else. The mishnah on today’s daf discusses the topic of substitutions within the […]

Today we encounter a number of mishnahs that focus on whether a vow not to partake of a particular food extends to forbidding its derivatives.  One who vows that dates are forbidden to him is permitted to eat date honey. One who vows that late grapes are forbidden to him is permitted to eat vinegar […]

Today’s daf finds us in the midst of a series of mishnahs exploring the implications of vows forbidding consumption of various foods. The overarching question animating much of this material is whether a vow concerning a particular food also applies to byproducts of that food or to other similar foods. And as we’ve seen over […]

Jewish history is replete with persecutions, but the systematic murder of two thirds of Europe’s Jews (6 million in total) in the Holocaust, or Shoah, altered Jews and Judaism forever. Since the end of World War II, Jewish communities have grappled with how and when to commemorate the Holocaust. As a result, just as there […]

On today’s daf, the Gemara quotes a teaching from Rabbi Shimon ben Elazar about vows concerning fish.  (A person who says): “Fish [dag] I will not taste,” is prohibited from large ones and permitted to small ones. (A person who says), “Fish [daga] I will not taste,” is prohibited from small ones and permitted to large ones. […]

From the Talmud: In former times, the faces of corpses of the poor were covered to hide the marks of poverty: only the faces of the rich corpses were uncovered. In former times, the poor used a bed made of reeds to carry the deceased while the deceased of the rich were carried on stately, […]

I pay my taxes to the government and the government uses that money to build roads and schools and all kinds of public goods. Does that mean that I personally own a stake in all federally built roads in my country? How about its schools and hospitals? Are we all secretly real-estate moguls without even […]

The lead-up to Hanukkah may be my favorite time of year. Mostly because my number one way of celebrating is to spot the awkward decorative efforts to include Hanukkah in Christmas displays.  You know the type: it’s a tiny Star of David decal in shop windows or the special dreidel page in your kid’s coloring […]

I have an ongoing debate with some friends: If someone brings a box of flavored donuts into work and you want to try them all but you don’t want to eat seven whole donuts, it seems reasonable to start dividing the donuts and serving yourself fractional portions. But what’s the smallest fraction you can take […]