Cannabis, also known as marijuana, was not invented in the 1960s. It’s been around for at least 10,000 years. It was just as widespread then as it is today, and for most of that time, it was legal. Cannabis has…
If I sometimes sound as though I am against Islam, or against this or that political stance, you should know that I am not. I am against any radicalization, as it separates us from each other. About two weeks ago,…
A year after the 18-year-old unarmed Michael Brown was shot to death by a police officer in Ferguson, Missouri, the town is once again in turmoil. A lot has happened since Brown’s killing last year. Today’s America is not as it…
Each year come Tisha B’Av, we mourn the ruin of the Temple due to our baseless hatred. And yet, each year we make our mutual hatred more entrenched. So what good are our tears? A Bad Day for the Jews…
The recent hate crimes perpetrated by Israeli Jews against Jews and Arabs have opened a bleeding wound in the Israeli society. It is not the first time that Israelis carry out such crimes against Jews or Arabs. In 1983, peace activist, Emil Grunzweig, was…
We keep wondering why the world hates us; we should know that it hates us only because we hate each other. The last three decades have seen the world going from bad to worse. Soviet Communism has disintegrated, the American…
I landed back in Israel last Monday after having been abroad nearly two weeks for congresses with my students in South and North America, a (very successful) lecture in Queens, NY, and meetings with media personnel and opinion leaders. It…
Today’s Judaism is fractured and fragmented into more pieces than probably anyone can count. The Three Weeks, or Bein ha-Metzarim (“Between the Straits”), that begins on the 17th of Tammuz (commemorated last Sunday) and ends on the 9th of Av (commemorated this…
We may think that a war between Christians and Muslims has nothing to do with us, but as we all know, when there is trouble in the world, the Jews are held responsible. Last Sunday, July 17, I had a…
Last night, I gave a lecture at the Rego Park Jewish Center in Queens, New York. The topic was “What makes people single out Jews, and what can counter anti-Semitism’s sharp rise.” Admittedly, I was not very hopeful. I had…
Many people ask me how I feel about the LGBT community and want to know what the wisdom of Kabbalah has to say about the dispute concerning gender identity. The Torah, we all know, forbids same sex relations, as it…
Time and again, Jews are persecuted and terrorized. Being Jewish myself, I often ponder the purpose of this relentless agony. Some believe that the atrocities of WWII are unimaginable today. And yet, we see how easily and abruptly the state…