Take a deep breath for Rosh Hashanah
On a hot summer's day at the end of August, I climbed mount Hohliecht. I was on holiday in Switzerland with family and friends. Rising 2,168 metres above sea level, it took four of us more than three...
View ArticleBecome an angel for a day -by fasting on Yom Kippur
Can you picture a photograph of yourself as an angelic young child? One in which your face bursts with innocence and excitement.Tim Lott, the Guardian writer, recently quoted George Orwell's challenge...
View ArticleHorn of Plenty
It is one of the most recognised sounds in Jewish life. And, whether dedicated shul-goers or three-times-a-year types, we all stand to attention when we hear it. I am talking, of course, of the sound -...
View ArticleStuck with luck
Instead of congratulations, Jews tend to wish each other "mazeltov" - "good luck" with the emphasis on "good". Fortunes, as Jews know only too well, can be easily reversed. Luck is a dicey...
View ArticleWhen a temporary shelter gives us our best hope of security
Of all the festivals, Succot is surely the one that speaks most powerfully to our time. Kohelet (Ecclesiastes) could almost have been written in the 21st century. Here is the ultimate success, the man...
View ArticleWhy number eight has a special role in the search for happiness
In 2006 an Israeli post-doc, Tal Ben Shahar, broke Harvard University's record for having the most popular undergraduate course in its history. His topic: positive psychology, the science of...
View ArticleThe Chief Rabbi's India initiative is a distraction from local needs
When Chief Rabbi Ephraim Mirvis and his wife Valerie visited India earlier this year, they were moved by the unimaginable poverty they witnessed. It prompted them to establish a new project to enable...
View ArticleThere's more to Friday night candles than meets the eye
God said 'Let there be light!' And there was light" (Genesis 1:3).Jewish tradition recounts remarkable qualities associated with this primeval light. A subtlety in the Hebrew text of the verse suggests...
View ArticleWhy every Israeli hospital may one day have its own pig farm
When the BBC reported earlier this year that American scientists had injected human stem cells into pigs in the hope of growing organs for transplant, some Jews inevitably baulked at the word "pig".But...
View ArticleWhat rabbis can learn from the election of Trump and Brexit
We've been through a shocking time. Millions of ordinary people have vented their anger by voting against establishment figures who weren't paying enough attention to their predicament. Whatever our...
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