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The Balcony by Ruth Calderon

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Past Issues

Copcoming: Haredi Judaism An interview with Artscroll’s Nossom Scherman The music and dress of ultra-Orthodox women Blogging anonymously as a Hasid Chabad’s Divine Sparks Sephardic ultra-Orthodoxy power in Israel The “shift to the right" in Orthodoxy and others... Sponsorship opportunities available

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Haredi Judaism

Yehudah Mirsky: What do we call all these people and groups who choose not to act according to the script laid out by modernization theory, pluralism, and the liberal narrative of secularism’s march through civilization?
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Nosson Scherman and Shmuel Goldin: Rabbi Shmuel Goldin, spiritual leader of the Orthodox congregation, Ahavath Torah in Englewood, New Jersey, speaks with Rabbi Nosson Scherman, general editor of ArtScroll/Mesorah Publications, about Haredi life in Israel and the US, serving in Israel’s defense force, learning, poverty, and the richness of a religious life.
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Samuel Heilman: Over the past 35 years, there has been a gradual shift in the center of gravity of the most traditionalist of American Jewish religious denominations.  That shift is constituted by a consistent “slide to the religious right,” during which elements of what has come to be called “Haredi” Orthodoxy have grown increasingly assertive and public, in many instances becoming the dominant voice and face of Orthodoxy. 
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Sima Zalcberg: There is a tendency to see the ultra-Orthodox society as a solid mass of "black hats." In actuality, however, this society includes a variety of groups that differ from one another in their worldview, way of life, and degree of commitedness to the tradition and halakhah. Moreover, even these subgroups, contain voices which are not only different but sometimes even opposite, on various areas of life.
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Online Diaries: an anonymous blogger on Haredi Life.
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Quote of the Month

"But as for the people who are really learning Torah, we believe they are our protection; the survival of Israel depends on God’s mercy and protection. The Talmud, based on a verse in Jeremiah, teaches that if there was ever a moment when there was no Torah study happening, anywhere on earth, Creation would cease to exist."

Nosson Scherman

Sh’ma and the JCC of San Francisco Present a Public Forum focusing A Jewish Lens on Immigration Policy
March 26 8:00 pm
For more information, contact Rabbi Yoel Kahn, 415-292-1272
Free and open to the public.
RSVP requested: JCCSF Box Office - 415-292-1233 or www.jccsf.org

Sponsored by the Walter and Elise Haas Fund

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Sh'ma serves as a gathering place for independent dialogue -- rich conversation of differing positions presented in an honest, respectful, and sacred conversation. Our readers, like our authors, are intellectually sharp, seeking, concerned and literate. Sh'ma is a publication of Jewish Family & Life! JFLMedia.com