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Jul 17, 2026, 5:41 PM

Starting with Words – In Support of IWSTHAB

July 17, 2026 3 Av 5786This shabbat we open the book of words. Words tell our story and help us remember. "Then all of you came to me and said, 'Let us send agents ahead to reconnoiter the land for...

Janet Bond Brill

Jul 13, 2026, 6:56 PM

‘To My Beloved Marylka’: A Jewish Child’s Blessing to the Sister Who Saved Her

A hidden child's First Communion card revealed a private message between two Jewish sisters hiding as Catholic girls. The card is small enough to lose. It has been folded, softened, stained by time or water or hands. Its die-cut edges...

Jul 13, 2026, 12:58 PM

Trapped in China

China and I are not friends. I first realized that long ago when, passing through one of its many airports, an unsmiling immigration officer confiscated my favorite oversized razor. And again, years later, when during a two-day-multiple-airport layover, my then-eight-year-old...

Andy Blumenthal

Jul 12, 2026, 5:25 AM

There Is Still Time Today to Make Yesterday Jealous

It was an ordinary ride that delivered an extraordinary idea. Earlier this week, in Washington, D.C., I stepped into an Uber driven by a retired gentleman with a calm demeanor. Soft religious music played in the background. He greeted me...

Carol Silver Elliott

Jul 10, 2026, 6:48 PM

There are many platitudes about home like, “home sweet home,” “no place like home,” and “home is where the heart is.” Undoubtedly, you can think of others as well as what the word “home” triggers in you. Home is...

Joseph C. Kaplan

Jul 10, 2026, 7:37 AM

I never caught the jigsaw puzzle fever, but my sister is an avid assembler, and during covid, my wife, Sharon, also took them up. Following their lead, I’ll try to construct a metaphoric jigsaw puzzle column, presenting three pieces...

Jul 7, 2026, 1:15 PM

A Country Is Not Loved by Pretending It Is Simple

Yesterday there were two flags hanging outside my parents’ house in Israel: the American flag and the Israeli flag. It was the Fourth of July, which is already a strange and beautiful thing to celebrate from here, and somehow...

Brendon Stewart Freedman

Jul 7, 2026, 12:33 AM

Helping People Live Until They Die

Many people believe that palliative care begins when medicine has run out of ideas, and they are right. But they are also wrong, and wrong very significantly, because of the unspoken assumption that goes with this belief. That assumption...

Eric M. Leiderman

Jul 6, 2026, 3:02 AM

America, the Other Jewish Homeland

Touro Synagogue in Newport, Rhode Island, America's oldest synagogue. Photo by Kenneth C. Zirkel, via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0). President George Washington's 1790 letter to the Hebrew Congregation of Newport. Image courtesy of the U.S. National Archives (public domain).

As Americans celebrate Independence Day this weekend, millions of people will gather for barbecues, parades, fireworks, and backyard parties. In Chicago, where I live, many of those celebrations will include a local tradition: the Chicago-style hot dog. It is...

Andy Blumenthal

Jul 4, 2026, 10:26 PM

The Abyss Taught Me That Connection Is Everything

This week I had one of the most frightening dreams of my life. In it, I was severed from everyone I had ever known or loved—not merely alone, but cast into an emptiness beyond light, beyond warmth, beyond relationship...

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