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Jacqueline Snidman-Stren

Jun 27, 2026, 6:11 PM

The Many Faces of Jewish Identity

The Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group with shared origins in the Land of Israel, but Jewish history has unfolded across many different regions over thousands of years. Because of exile, migration, and diaspora, Jewish communities developed distinct ethnic...

Michael Feldstein

Jun 21, 2026, 6:21 PM

What’s in a Name?

Credit: Gemini

Have you ever wondered how we decided on our deeply ingrained customs for naming children? If you grew up in an Ashkenazi household, you probably take it for granted that you name a baby after a beloved relative who has...

Juan Marcos Bejarano Gutierez

Jun 21, 2026, 5:27 PM

Converso Identity and the American Experience

Bima in the Amsterdam Esnoga 1695 by Romeyn de Hooghe

Not a day goes by that I do not remember the wisdom of Rabbi Byron L. Sherwin, z"l. Years ago, he taught a class titled “What is Judaism?" at the Spertus Institute for Jewish Learning and Leadership in Chicago....

Jun 17, 2026, 5:53 AM

The Yidkins Diet

Pesach may be long over, but that old adage, "Matzah, 18 minutes on the lips, a lifetime on the hips," is still just as true. With Summer almost upon us, it can only mean one thing: We all need...

May 31, 2026, 2:37 PM

Searching for the Shalshelet

Where I'm from, we call a shalshelet a ta'am and refuse to forget that it is written with an ayin rather than an aleph.

Finals are officially over, which means I have the headspace to think about something other than chemistry. I am delighted. This is what I’m thinking about: the boy across the table who is really more of a man, but he’s...

May 27, 2026, 4:20 AM

Why the Chareidi & Dati Leumi Divide Goes Deeper Than Strictness

We are looking inside a world that outsiders flatten (David Katash, FrockInStock.com).

It is not a frumkeit ranking, but a question of religious instinct, cultural memory, and which world feels like home. Recently, I saw an online discussion on Imamother — a popular online forum for frum women — about whether there...

May 20, 2026, 4:44 AM

Shavuot, an Almost Forgotten Festival

The Jewish calendar contains three major pilgrimage festivals: Passover, Shavuot, and Sukkot, collectively known as the Shalosh Regalim, the “Three Pilgrimage Festivals.” In Temple times, Jews would travel to Jerusalem to celebrate the festivals at the Beit HaMikdash, the...

Dennis C. Sasso

May 12, 2026, 5:16 AM

ONE (JEWISH) WEEK IN PANAMA

Rabbi Dennis C. Sasso (This serves as a sequel to my previous Times of Israel Blog (May 3, 2026), “150 Years of Jewish Life in Panama.”) Going to Panama is always a homecoming for me. I was born and educated in...

Sam Lehman-Wilzig

May 8, 2026, 11:26 AM

Israel & the Diaspora Moving Apart: Déjà Vu All Over Again

The relationship between Israel and world Diaspora Jews, especially American Jewry, has been deteriorating these past few years. So what else is new? This is a process that has been going on for the past 2,500 years, ever since the...

Dennis C. Sasso

May 3, 2026, 5:06 AM

150 Years of Jewish Life in Panama

Rabbi Dennis C. Sasso The Jewish community of Panama, the oldest in Central America, celebrates this month the 150th Anniversary of its founding. The beginnings of Jewish history in the Americas are as old as the discovery of the New World,...

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