Talmud of America
My recent posts..."Talmud of America" Pardes Institute, a non-denominational study center based in Jerusalem, offers immersive Jewish learning around the world. One project is “Talmud of America,” which aims to illuminate and interpret, through Jewish eyes, some...
Twilight Zone
My recent posts...Twilight Zone בֵּין הַשְׁמָשׁוֹת Bein hashemashot, literally, between the suns. בֵּין הַשְׁמָשׁוֹת A twilight zone of time, or rather, out of time, between one day and the next. Our sages of old used this concept to explain certain miraculous...
When to Pray Yizkor
My recent posts...My edited comments from this past final day of Pesach. Ellie’s mom, Julia Helfman, died on her 95th birthday, December 24, 2025. This was the first Yizkor service Ellie feels obligated to attend. She said, “I’m now a member of a club I was not eager...
Timing
It had become a Kremer household Pesach tradition, or rather, a pre-Pesach tradition. Somewhere within a couple of days prior the first seder and noon on erev Pesach, something would go awry in the kitchen.
Preparing for Shabbat
It took several tries this morning before we connected with Hannah in Tzfat. She’s been busy, she said, and has a meeting in a few minutes.
From our first-born’s first Shabbat at home, we have been blessing our children every Friday with the traditional formula of safe-keeping (bemidbar/Numbers 6:24-26). It got a bit more challenging when they left home, but we nearly always succeeded in reaching them by phone before candle-lighting.
When we spoke with Hannah, there was a lot of noise in the background. After blessing her, I asked what she was so busy doing. “Getting ready for Shabbat,” she said. The only details she shared in the short call were that some people were baking challah, and a rabbanit (Orthodox female counterpart to a rabbi) was coming soon for candle-lighting.
A war is raging. Hamas calls for an international day of rage to sow fear and chaos, and tells Gazans to stay in harm’s way (just another example of using civilians as pawns, human shields). The Lebanese border is far from placid.
We’re concerned about … so many things: the anticipated calumny of false moral equivalence, the excuse (as if one were needed) for more anti-Jew attacks everywhere, the short duration of world-wide empathy, the blindness of Arab countries, the unhelpful threatening pronouncements of some Israeli mouthpieces. So many things.
And our daughter’s combat search-and-rescue unit is preparing for Shabbat. We are so proud.
(below is the traditional parent blessing for children)
Shabbat shalom ! שַׁבַּת שָׁלוֹם
