About the Author


Rabbi Avi Shafran

Avi Shafran blogs at rabbiavishafran.com and serves as Agudath Israel of America’s director of public affairs


Are Jews Smarter?

Don't let a recent study about enhanced intellectual ability among Jews go to your head.

She Just Doesn't Get It

The essential outrage of "Holocaust on Your Plate" was not that it injured feelings, but rather that it equated human beings with cows, pigs and chickens.

Survivors

Holocaust memorials usually fail to convey something vital: Europe's Jews didn't just die; they lived, too.

Random Suffering?

Not a chance. Adversity -- wherever it strikes, whomever it takes and whomever its spares -- always has a reason, even when it cannot be discerned.

The Shechita Controversy

The "PETA Principle," the moral equating of animals and humans, is an affront to the very essence of Jewish belief.

Soulless

The Greeks thought that physicality was a primary goal of man.

Trains

Contrasting our problems with the difficulties previous Jewish generations had to endure puts some things in to perspective.

Super Powers

As a quadriplegic, Christopher Reeve demonstrated heroic powers.

Sublimating Strife

The fighting in Fallujah may have deep biblical roots

Creatures and Teachers

Maimonides' mystifying rodent and the limits of science.

Life Itself

In the Netherlands emotional pain is sufficient legal justification to assist in one's suicide. What is happening to the immeasurable value in human life?

The Sukkah Still Stands

No matter how vulnerable our physical fortresses may be, we give harbor to neither despair nor insecurity.

A Truly Historic Lawsuit

A lawsuit is being filed against the Jewish people for recovery of property stolen during their exodus from Egypt. The Talmud tells of precisely such a claim lodged over 2000 years ago.

Blackout's Illumination

The Jewish Sabbath is a blackout of sorts.

Bar Mitzvah Motivators

The concept of "bar mitzvah" has drifted incredibly far from its true meaning in these materialistic times.

Back to Peoplehood

The recent National Jewish Population Survey reveals a shrinking Jewish people. Is the solution more numbers?

Whose Abraham?

An interfaith superstar?

Aaron Feuerstein: Bankrupt and Wealthy

Mr. Feuerstein is a legend in the corporate world. His company is now bankrupt and he doesn't regret a thing.

History Abuse

With the recent assault against the Jewish people and Jewish history, Tisha B'Av takes on a special poignancy this year.

Deconstructing Dayeinu

Would it really have been enough?

Brazen New World

Ending a human life is not a medical decision, it's a moral one.

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