Keep the Faith with Shammai Engelmayer: Recent Episodes
Shammai Engelmayer (Rabbi)
Rabbi Shammai Engelmayer—author, lecturer, Judaica-related adult-ed teacher, and bi-weekly columnist for The Jewish Standard—discusses contemporary issues through the prism of Jewish law and tradition. If you believe Judaism is out of touch with today's world, this podcast may give you reason to reconsider.
It's time to put worrying about nuclear proliferation back on the front burner. A nuclear expert, Eric Weis, explains why in this interview.
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Jewish texts, Christian texts, neither of them matter to the man who claims he wants to make America a Christian nation espousing Christian values. Immigration is the perfect example. On a scale of 1 to 10, when it comes to honoring biblical law regarding "the stranger," Trump rates a ZERO!
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There's no disconnect here. The laws of permitted and forbidden creatures have much to say about the rule of law and what it means to act as if one is above the law. The audio quality may not be great this week, but the message is an important one.
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All things Passover, all things Pesach, are high up on the contemporary issues list, starting with the budge-busting shopping needed to buy the foods we're allowed to have in our homes on Pesach. And what about some of the foods we’re not allowed to have, like corn flakes for breakfast or maybe a hot bowl of oatmeal? Corn and oats are considered no-nos on Pesach—but are they really? Before this podcast ends, you'll discover that you don't need to take out a second mortgage on your house or forego some of your favorite foods just because it is Passover. And that's the topic for this week, the Carefree Guide to Everything, Passover or Pesach Made easy.
I'm privileged to be joined in this episode by Rabbi Aaron Abadi, the man behind the website, kashrut.org. It’s a website you really should get to know throughout the year, not just when Purim ends and the march to Passover begins. Rabbi Abad and I engaged in a rather free-flowing discussion at times, and I hope you find it as interesting and as much fun as I did.
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On Sunday morning, February 9th, I couldn’t help but do exactly the opposite after I ran through my morning news feed. That’s because one item in the news that morning made my heart rejoice and my mind to conjure up the image of Elon Musk running through the White House West Wing muttering the name “Engelmayer” in disgust. You probably know why, and there is danger for our democracy built into that.
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Planning on celebrating New Year's tonight and tomorrow? If yes, listen at your own risk! The kvetch who ruined Chrismukkah is at it again. If you do listen, it runs under 20 minutes and there's a lot of study material packed into it, so you might want to take notes.
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Don't be fooled by what the pundits tell us about why Donald Trump won and Kamala Harris lost. While their analyses have some merit, they skirt the two issues that the results themselves prove were the real reasons Harris lost: she was a she, not a he, and she didn't have the "right" color skin. Judaism rejects both factors--and it does so starting "in the beginning," Chapters 1 and 2 of the Book of Genesis, Sefer B'reishit, where woman, NOT man, is the first human created as we understand what humans look like.
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Given the devastation caused by Hurricanes Helene and Milton and other horrific storms around the world, all blamed on global warming, Sukkot, which arrives Wednesday night, offers us an opportunity to discuss this question: What does “green,” which symbolizes things environmental and ecological, have to do with Jewish festivals? The answer is “everything,” and so, that’s the topic for this week.
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We’re podcasting a few days early this week because the High Holy Days begin tomorrow evening, which is when Rosh Hashanah 5785 begins. Very few people really understand what the purpose of this 10-day period that ends on Yom Kippur is—but we need to understand it because the very future of the world is at stake. And that’s not an exaggeration.
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Shammai's Episode No. 151
We need to take the issue of hate very seriously as we approach the Election 2024 finish line, because of North Carolina Gubernatorial Candidate Mark Robinson’s long well-documented history of hateful rhetoric, including outrageous Holocaust denial comments and statements wishing Adolf Hitler was still alive. We also have to take very seriously the support Donald Trump has given him, at least up until yesterday, including hosting a fundraiser for him at Mar-A-Lago earlier this year, and calling him a rising Republican star. And we also have to take very seriously the support the GOP has given him and still does. Finally, we also have to take very seriously the support and the hate Robinson, Trump, and the GOP nationally are running on. Be afraid. Be very afraid.
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Summer is over and we’re back to our biweekly schedule. The topic for this week is how Benjamin Netanyahu has dishonored the memory of his brother, someone over whose dead body he built his career. That is what Benjamin Netanyahu did. He began building his entire career on the legacy of his dead older brother, Jonathan (Yonatan in Hebrew), whom the IDF calls “one of Israel’s greatest soldiers.” Yoni Netanyahu put hostages before his own safety. It cost him his life at Entebbe. Bibi Netanyahu puts Bibi and his political career before the safety of hostages. He will say and do whatever he deems necessary to stay in office for as long as possible. Friday marks the start of his 18th year as prime minister, albeit not consecutively. Every day that he stays in office, because of his hubris, he not only trashes Yoni’s memory and leaves the 101 hostages in the hands of Hamas murderers, he risks the safety and security of the State of Israel.
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In this special summer episode, the contemporary issue being explored is the one day in every Jewish year that way too many of us choose to ignore (assuming that we even know it exists): the grueling nearly 35-hour fast smack in the middle of summer known as Tishah B'Av, which this year begins on Monday at sundown. Those of us who are aware of it want nothing to do with it because it is the ultimate downer day on the Jewish calendar. A downer it surely is, but that's not what Tishah B'Av is really about. Tishah B'Av is truly a day of uplift. Take 15 minutes and listen to why I say that.
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I contend that former President Trump, because of his rhetoric, is to blame for creating the atmosphere that allowed that horror to happen. I also blame his rhetoric for the culture of violence in America. I cite chapter and verse from his statements since mid-2015 to support this. Someone for whom I have great respect said I was an idiot for thinking this way. This episode gives you the chance to decide whether I am an idiot. I can't wait to read your e-mails.
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As we prepare to celebrate the creation of this democratic republic of ours, two seemingly unrelated events (they are very much related in a profound way) threaten to fundamentally change this country--and not in a good way. Those events are the effective creation of an imperial presidency by the U.S. Supreme Court and President Biden's so-far steadfast refusal to end his campaign for re-election. How these two events tie together, and how we can avert the threat they pose, are what this episode is about.
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Once again, a state’s display of the Ten Commandments has become an issue that will most certainly be appealed all the way up to the U.S. Supreme Court, which narrowly decided the issue 44 years ago, but this time may be different. The Ten Commandments, are not commandments at all, but a preamble to the Covenant God made with Israel, which does contain commandments--613 commandments, not just 10.
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The ignorance being displayed by college campus protestors is astounding--and it bodes ill for this country as well as for Israel. This isn't a very long episode, but it IS an important one.
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The way to have constructive and meaningful s'darim next week is to study the Haggadah beforehand. That requires some help from more modern versions and haggadah commentaries. This episode explains why. It's being released several days early to give everyone time to buy one of these volumes and to study it.
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What do I know about Jewish law? I'm a heretic. I can't tell you how many times I've heard that nonsense over the years—including from some members of my own family. So this week I'm going to let someone else say the things about keeping kosher that I've been saying—an Orthodox rabbi, no less. This episode is a newly edited version of one I presented last year.
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Purim begins after Shabbat ends and lasts until sundown on Sunday. You might think you know all there is to know about Purim. If you do, this episode may show how much more there is to know about the book from which Purim sprung--Megillat Esther, the Scroll of Esther. This episode runs for about a half-hour but I hope you find it both interesting and informative.
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What with last Thursday having been Leap Day, with the leap month of Adar II beginning on Saturday evening with Rosh Chodesh, and the Muslim month of Ramadan beginning on Monday, I thought it would be interesting to leap into a discussion of how the secular and Jewish calendars we use today came to be. Did you know, for example, that there was one year that was 445 days long? Do you know why there is a leap day in the secular calendar, a leap month in the Jewish calendar, or why Ramadan and the other 11 Islamic months regress every 32.5 solar years through the entire secular calendar?
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At 10 a.m. this morning, when I recorded this episode, there already had been 2,266 people who died by guns so far this year. That number is now up to 2,294. That averages out to nearly two gun deaths every hour since the new year began.
Between January 1st and today, there have been 55 mass shootings and eight mass murders.
As of this morning, 37 children under the age of 11 had been killed by guns; it’s up to 38 now. It’s up for teenagers between ages 12 and 17. It was 172 this morning and it’s 173 now.
We are in the midst of a major gun violence crisis that must be addressed. That’s the subject of Episode No. 139.
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The weather these days is a killer--literally. Scores of thousands of people died in 2023 of severe weather-related causes, and deaths are already mounting in the first six weeks of 2024. Judaism has much to say about our role in minimizing the threat climate change is posing on us.
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On Monday, we here in the United States and also in Israel will celebrate Martin Luther King Day. That we celebrate this day here is understandable and commendable. After all, he was a great warrior for equality and justice for all people. But why is this day marked in Israel, too? And why will many synagogues and Jewish organizations here hold their own celebrations this weekend and throughout Monday’s observance?
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We who do not live in Israel have always maintained that we have no right to interfere in the Jewish state's internal affairs. Given the explosion of Jew-hatred we are seeing around the world, however, it is clear that "Jew" and "Israel" are synonymous in the eyes of the world, so this Diaspora hands-off attitude is a luxury we no longer can afford. We need to do all that we can to move Israeli voters away from the extreme right and its ruinous policies.
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We hear a great deal these days about whether Israel is violating international law in the way it’s conducting its war with Hamas in Gaza. The opposite, in fact, is more likely to be true. Given that Israel is the Jewish State, though, a fair question is whether Israel is also violating Jewish law in this war. This episode addresses that question.
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The media are helping to stoke worldwide anti-Semitism in the way they report the war Israel is fighting with Gaza. Why? Well, consider these two facts: The New York Times rehired an avowed Jew-hating, Hamas-loving avowed fan of Adolf Hitler to cover the war from Gaza. And it was just revealed that journalists the major media rely on for their coverage not only may have had advanced knowledge of the June 7th horror (and so could have warned Israel in time to prevent it) but actually went into Israel with the Hamas murderers. There's lots more, and though this is long (about 32 minutes), it's well worth listening to.
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The deadliest mass shooting of 2023 took place Wednesday night, and 2023 is on track to break the record for mass shootings. Here is another look at the issue and what Jewish law has to say.
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Ourleaders here in the U.S., Israel, Canada, and the world are failing us. We who live in the U.S. are paying for it by having a dysfunctional Congress. Judaism offers guidelines for the qualities leaders should have, and it gives us the responsibility to put the right people in leadership positions,
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When will Canada finally own up to its dishonorable history toward the Jews? When will it finally and forcefully own up to its clearly mixed record when it comes to the Holocaust, and when will it finally and forcefully stand up to the anti-Semitism that seems to be growing yet again in Canada, as it’s doing in the United States and elsewhere? These are all subjects of this episode, which was prompted by a disturbing incident that occurred in the Canadian Parliament just three days before Yom Kippur, which continues to send shockwaves around the Jewish world. The fallout from that incident also continues to this day. If those who don’t live in Canada feel Canada’s Jewish problem is of little interest to them, a principle of Jewish law says otherwise, and in uncompromisingly blunt language.
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Most people think the sins for which we seek forgiveness are the "ritual" or "religious" ones: not observing Shabbat or keeping kosher, and so forth. Most people also think that if they pray hard enough, their sins are forgiven by the time Yom Kippur ends. Actually, that forgiveness doesn't happen until the start of the next Yom Kippur--except for the sins between us and God, which are forgiven each year just at the moment Yom Kippur begins. There is a lot of misunderstanding about Yom Kippur and this podcast tries to correct many of these.
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This episode is jam-packed with issues we need to consider during Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, including: Women’s rights; workers’ rights; gun violence and gun control; the plight of the poor and disadvantaged; the influx of migrants coming across our Southern border; how business should be conducted; what our responsibilities are to the environment and ecology; and so much more.
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This is the second episode in a 3-part series designed to help us with the awesome tasks of reflection (already underway) and repentance (it begins three weeks from tonight with the start of the High Holy Days). The topic this week deals with our responsibilities towards the poor and the disadvantaged in our society.
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There’s one week left before the season of reflection and repentance begins with the beginning of the month of Elul. Unless we take the five weeks from today leading up to Rosh Hashanah 5784 to examine who we are and who we should be, how we’ve lived our lives in the past year, and what we need to atone for and correct, the High Holy Days are, to put it bluntly, an exercise in futility and very much a waste of time.
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This week, Israel's parliament, and the behest of a prime minister on trial for serous offenses, spit in the face of Torah law and endangered the state in ways most serious.
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Yes, I did praise the Supreme Court my last podcast, but only because I wanted us to have reason to celebrate on July 4th and three High Court rulings gave us reason to cheer. There is, however, more to fear than to cheer coming out of this court, which is eroding our rights in so many areas.
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It was touch-and-go for a while, but thanks to six justices of the U.S. Supreme Court there’s great reason this coming Tuesday to celebrate the founding of the American Republic 247 years ago on July 4th, 1776. At the same time, there’s also reason to be concerned about the ethics of some of the justices on the High Court. I discuss both in this week's podcast.
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The title says it all. You may be surprised, though, at some of those laws.
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The world has a way of ignoring history when it comes to Israel and the Palestinian issue—and the world’s media plays along.. This is a 30-minute episode but it's filled with information all of us should be aware of given the level of reporting on the conflict and the efforts by the Palestinians, the BDS movement, and even some members of Congress to undermine the legitimacy of Israel.
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Here are some gruesome statistics: On average, nearly 20 people per minute are physically abused by an intimate partner here in the United States. The National Domestic Violence Hotline, in fact, receives an average of 1,000 calls per day from people being abused, most of whom are women. Three women are killed here every day by a current or former intimate partner. That's nearly 1,100 women killed by a partner each year. In Canada, a woman is killed every six days by her intimate partner. That's 60 women each year killed by an intimate partner. Worldwide, 137 women worldwide are killed by their partners or family members every single day. That’s just over 50,000 women killed by someone close to them every year. Domestic abuse is a serious problem, and Jewish law has much to say about it.
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Unless both sides can compromise on some of their most strongly held positions, the U.S. will, for the first time ever, default on its obligations this summer, to a devastating effect here and around the world. The need to compromise is something Judaism has much to say about, and Congress and the Administration should pay serious heed.
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"They" say it never happened. It's all made up. Just a work of pure fiction. Nothing in Egyptian history supports it. So why can't we eat a bagel during Passover? Why do we have to go to all the trouble and expense to vicariously relive events that were invented by anonymous biblical authors? Well, in this 40-plus episode, I demonstrate just how wrong they (the scholars who insist on this) are so very wrong.
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A Passover Primer unlike any you have ever seen before but one you will wish you knew about all along. Vodka before dinner and beer during? Whole wheat bread for luncheon sandwiches? Oatmeal for breakfast? In this episode, we interview an Orthodox rabbi who says it is all Kosher for Passover. No need for a Kosher for Passover stamp, either. Just check the ingredient label of any food you cannot do without on Passover. At the bottom, the label must warn about allergens. If it does not say “wheat or barley,” this rabbi says it is okay to use. Better still, getting the kitchen ready for Passover is no big deal and can be accomplished in a couple of hours, he says.
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I covered some of this in last week’s column in the Jewish Standard, but I have limited space for my columns and there’s so much more to talk about, so even if you read the column, listening to this episode. The word “defund” has only one meaning, regardless of what dictionary we use. To defund something is to take away the money from that something. The slogan “Defund the police” is just another way of saying “let’s get rid of the police altogether.” That slogan, though, is what stands in the way of dealing effectively with police violence. We should be advocating, instead, for the right ways to meet the problems that are so readily evident in such cases as the deaths of George Floyd and Tyre Nichols.
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Does this sound familiar? “The biggest mistake in Judaism that we have today is that it's either black or white. You're either doing everything exactly perfect or you're doing nothing. And that is absolutely not the way the system works and that's not the way it ever was; if you go back in history, it was not this way, if you go back a thousand years and more. In Judaism, everyone has their observance level and everyone's goal in life should be to do better. And it's more important not to steal than to put on tefillin.”
Yes, this is something I say—often—but on this week’s episode, those words were spoken by an Orthodox rabbi, Aaron Abadi, the son of the sainted Rabbi Yitzchak Abadi, one of our leading halachic authorities who has spent most of his nearly 90 years trying to give Judaism back to the people by sensible rulings rather than onerous stringencies. Aaron Abadi is the driving force behind the website based on HaRav Yitzchak Abadi’s teachings: kashrut.org. You should listen to the podcast, and then you should check out the kashrut.org website. I believe you will find both to be quite enlightening.
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The most extremist right-wing government in Israel's history was sworn in on Thursday amid dire warnings from U.S. Jewish leaders about the potential dangers its proposed agenda will have on the relationship between American Jews and the Jewish state. Our man in Israel, longtime journalist Charles Byblezer, offers his insights in this nearly 30-minute episode.
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The title says it all. There is a valid reason to celebrate Chanukah (without giving it a Christmas coloring), and that is the concept it brought into the world: Freedom of Religion. We're still struggling with that today. We should celebrate the Festival of Lights for what it is. Here's why.
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I'm joined this week by our man in Israel, Charles Byblezer, for a very insightful discussion about the goings-on in Israel. A week before the U.S. midterms, Israel held its fifth election is less than four years--and the results are causing hand-wringing and hair-pulling among Jewish leaders here in the U.S. and elsewhere in the Diaspora. The government Prime Minister-designate Benjamin Netanyahu is most likely to form will lean to the far right politically and, just as important, religiously. There even may an attempt to turn Israel into a theocracy, if the No. 2 party in the expected coalition government gets its way.
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I thought I was done with the midterms and the threat they pose to us, but something happened on Saturday in Jacksonville that made me realize there was more I needed to say. Donald Trump is a racist generally and an anti-Semite specifically, and from almost immediately after announcing in mid-2015 that he would seek the GOP nomination, he gave the haters out there the green light to come out of their dark holes once again. And now, Republicans all across the country have taken Trump's playbook and made it their own, as the Jacksonville incident confirmed yet again in the case of Gov. Ron DeSantis, Trump's leading opponent for the 2024 nomination.
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This is NOT a political podcast in the sense of promoting a political agenda. It's about a very serious threat to our democracy in general and to us Jews in particular. To those who say "It can't happen here," the fact is that it has already begun to happen here and the midterms may be our best chance of stopping it before it is too late.
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There is nothing antiquated or embarrassing about Sukkot or its rituals. In fact, in a world beset by repeating environmental disasters caused by global warming, it may well be the most significant Jewish observance with regard to the natural world we live in.
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This week's episode completes the series on many of the matters we must be concerned with--and that we must atone for if we failed to act on these concerns in 5782--in approaching the High Holy Days and Yom Kippur especially. Women's rights...workers' rights...issues involving the migrant wave coming across the Southern U.S. border...how business affairs must be conducted...and so much more are covered here. I refer to the episode as "The Roadmap to Repentance on steroids" because it covers so much territory. PLEASE NOTE that my next podcast will air on October 7 because I need to concentrate on preparing services for Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur.
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The Repentance Clock is ticking. The High Holy Days are now just over four weeks away! This is the second of three episodes designed to help us prepare for making the "accounting of our souls" that the 10 days from Rosh Hashanah through Yom Kippur are all about. This episode focuses on the heavy emphasis the Torah places on our responsibilities towards the poor and the disadvantaged, especially our need to see to it that they have life's basic necessities in adequate supply—and especially wholesome, nutritious food. When you consider that 1 in 10 Americans are considered "food insecure"—12 million children among them—it's easy to understand why the Torah makes this something we need to place on our Repentance To Do Lists.
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The High Holy Days are just over six weeks away! The next three episodes will help us prepare for making the "accounting of our souls" that is the task of the 10 days from Rosh Hashanah through Yom Kippur. This is part 1. Part 2 is in two weeks.
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The absolutely saddest day on the Jewish calendar is just over a week away, and will be ignored by most Jews. Sad day though it is, it actually has a very uplifting message--and it's that message that makes it a day we should never ignore.
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This Saturday evening, we begin a 21-day period of increasingly mournful restrictions. In all, there are 72 mournful days on the Jewish calendar. That averages out each year to one out of every five days on the secular calendar. Five of these days are fast days (such as the one this coming Sunday). But should these days even be there? And do they really represent the tragedies of the past that are claimed for them? There's a lot of food for thought in this episode.
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Be forewarned: Three decisions by the Supreme Court in the last 10 days--including knocking down Roe v Wade--signal that the current conservative majority is in lockstep with the extreme evangelical right's efforts to do away with the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment and turn America into a right-wing Christian nation. They're getting close to accomplishing that and here's what we need to do to stop it in its tracks.
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Climate change catastrophes abound. Wildfires, droughts, floods, and warnings about another above-average hurricane season are all attributed to climate change. The climate IS changing, and not for the better. What isn’t changing is what we’re doing about it. (Then again, Marjorie Taylor Greene says all this carbon in the atmosphere is really good for us.) Scientists have been warning us about all this for the last 50 years. Judaism has been warning us about it from the day Moses came down from that mountain.
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When the Supreme Court's approval rating drops from 58 percent a year ago to 40 percent today--the lowest it's ever been---you know there's a problem. That problem is that the court has become politicized to a point where people no longer trust it to safeguard our rights. It goes about making decisions based on a specious philosophy when it should be approaching cases the way Judaism approaches Torah law.
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We need to be very afraid of those who promote "protecting" the Second Amendment judging by the scary "armed rebellion" talk coming from elected officials, no less. We also need to understand what the amendment ACTUALLY says and why the right--including the conservative Supreme Court majority--have it all wrong. Even the Supreme Court before 2008 said how wrong the right is.
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The values this nation was founded on are the values the Torah teaches us to cherish. It was for these values that nearly 1.3 million people gave their lives from 1776 until today. But are those the values America holds dear today? Or did those nearly 1.3 million martyrs die for nothing?
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What you’ll hear in this episode may surprise many of you and, hopefully, enrage all of you. There’s a lot of attention being paid right now to the battle over a woman’s right to an abortion, but that is symptomatic of a much larger problem in the U.S.: The lack of respect and concern this country has for mothers which, given the consequences you’ll hear about, is far more outrageous than what women generally have to put up with. It puts the lie to the anti-abortionist claim to believe in the right to life.
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As you may recall from previous episodes, what Jewish law has ro say about abortion is not easily explained. But the bottom line is that however one interprets Jewish law, there is no absolute ban and, more to the point, any effort by government to interfere with abortion rights is interfering with our freedom of religion.
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Actually, it has a great deal to teach us, both through the stories it tells and the laws it puts forth. We very much need to absorb those lessons into our lives today.
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This is part 2 of Putting the Exodus into the context of history. I'm putting it out a bit earlier than usual and I hope it will make your Passover even more meaningful. Enjoy the chag!
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What do you get when you double up on Episode # 46? Episode # 92! I didn't plan it that way, but it's how it worked out. This is a somewhat modified rebroadcast of Episode # 46, which was the first of two pre-Passover episodes explaining how the Exodus fits into Egyptian history, something so many scholars insist otherwise. Seriously, they are way off base!
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Okay, so which side are you on? Was Will Smith right in slapping Chris Rock or not? And who is really to blame for what happened Sunday night at the Oscars? You may be surprised at the answer I give. Jewish law, of course, has much to say about how Smith should have responded, the nature of insult comedy, and how this all reflects on our society. And I REALLY WOULD LOVE TO HEAR YOUR COMMENTS TO ALL THIS.
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If anyone ever told that I would publicly condemn anything the American Israel Public Affairs Committee did, I would have called that person crazy. And yet, that is what I am doing in this episode because AIPAC has managed to give the Jew-hating far right in the United States, and the anti-Israel pro-Palestinian lobby all the ammunition they need to "prove" that we American Jews are disloyal to this country.
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M’gillat Esther, the Scroll of Esther, is the centerpiece of our Purim festivities—but did this story really happen? Did it take place in Persia, or is it wearing its own Purim costume, Persian in appearance but, say, Egyptian in reality? Why were our Sages so reluctant to have the story written down, and to inaugurate Purim itself? And did they first have to “clean up” its heroes’ acts because the real Esther and Mordechai (if they were real) were not all what “Esther’s book” makes them out to be? If you’ve ever wondered about any of this, this week’s episode is definitely for you.
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In January, I used the Colleyville, Texas, hostage-taking, as the basis for a podcast on anti-Semitism. Now here I am doing another one just a few weeks later. Recent events, though, make taking another look necessary. These events include two incidents coming a week apart inside the Kentucky legislature, a hate-filled national conference that attracted politicians and policymakers, a university finally acting against Jew hatred on campus, and an environmental group’s clearly anti-Semitic request.
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The end is near, seriously, at least according to a panel of the world's climatologists and other scientists. Either we fix things NOW and in a transformative way (the report's words), or this world of ours and everyone in it are in for a really bad time. Really bad time,
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The politicians say it's time to let our masks down. They follow the polls. The scientists say not yet. They follow the evidence, and especially the appearance of hard-to-detect new strain dubbed the Stealth Variant. It is showing up all around the world. One in five people globally is already infected. The Torah portions we've been reading and will continue to read through next week have much to say about how leaders should lead--and how they should not.
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The level of political discourse here has sunk so low that it poses a threat to American democracy. A member of Congress cheers a former president for saying data collectors should be executed. Another member urges people to send their friends and family members into "liberal frenzies" when they talk about injustice. A senator wants truckers to block our roads even if it will result in higher inflation and emptier shelves. Another senator thinks people who cause violence on planes should nevertheless be allowed to fly on those planes. Judaism, of course, has much to say about such political discourse, including that some who use it "should be thrown to the dogs."
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Calling Israel an apartheid state is wrong on several levels. This podcast is focused, though, on the potential danger to the world if the nations of the world cut off all contact with it. Just listen to what Israel has given to the world since just this last December!
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A woman on the Supreme Court? A BLACK woman, no less? Too many people don't think women are qualified to hold any responsible position. Too many others don't think black women especially are so qualified. The Torah has three words for such people: Get over it! Women are men's equals in EVERY way. And ALL people, regardless of any artificial designators meant to keep us apart from each other, are descended from the First Couple and are ALL EQUAL TO EACH OTHER.
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Hand a protestor a bottle of water in Alabama and you can go to jail for "incitement to riot." Deliberately drive your vehicle into a crowd of protestors and "unintentionally" injure one or more of them, and you are free of any liability in Oklahoma. These are two of the ways Republican legislators and governors have created to diminish our right to peacefully protest. Live in a traditionally Democratic district in many "red" states, and you may not be allowed to vote. American democracy is under attack by elected officials who have sworn sacred oaths to defend that democracy. Jewish law has much to say about our right--our obligation--to protest injustices and our right--our obligation--to see to it that every citizen has the right to vote.
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The FBI says last Shabbat's hostage crisis in Colleyville, Texas, had nothing to do with anti-Semitism. The FBI is wrong. It had everything to do with it, as you will hear. There is a bigger problem, though, with what the FBI said: That kind of denial game by law enforcement agencies is one of the reasons Jew-hatred is increasingly on the rise here--and it's even worse in the rest of the world. There's a lot packed into this podcast and it really is important that you hear all of it.
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The Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. was a good friend of the Jews and of the State of Israel. He saw blacks and Jews as allies, struggling to break the shackles of racism and to help make this world a better one than it is. This is a longer than usual podcast, but there is a lot of history here about anti-Semitism in America from 1776 on, and some of the facts presented may even surprise many people. It may be a long episode, but it's really one you should listen to.
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Twice this week, abortion either directly (on Monday) or indirectly (today, January 7) is before the Supreme Court. In today's case, it likely will be raised in a COVID-19 vaccine mandate case, with at least two justices arguing--hypocritically--that freedom of religion allows people who oppose abortion on religious grounds to refuse the current vaccines. What the two justices ignore are freedom of religion rights. As to why they will bring abortion into the case (as they have in the past in mandate cases)--you really need to listen to this episode.
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The title says it all. This episode explains what CRT is, what it is NOT, and how the far right is using it to promote its claim that "the Jews" are out to destroy the white Christians in this country.
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A case argued on Wednesday before the Supreme Court very likely will result in a ruling that could effectively end any notion that a wall exists between church and state. That ruling may also cause great harm to our nation's public school system. It also may highlight the hypocrisy of conservative judges who claim that they are only following what the founders put into the Constitution. In this case, certainly, they will be ignoring what the founders meant when they ratified the First Amendment.
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According to Gallup, its current conservative majority has driven the Supreme Court down to its lowest approval rating since Gallup began monitoring this in 2000. Lower federal courts rate better, but not by much, and that too is dropping given some recent rulings. There are many reasons for this—including fears about Roe v Wade and the refusal to delay Texas' anti-abortion law until the court decides the case—and this level of disapproval has helped fuel calls for court reform. A commission exploring the issue meets again on Tuesday and plans to submit its final report by month's end. There's much in Jewish law that's relevant to the debate,
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The title says it all. This is a slightly edited version of the original podcast from last year. Happy Secular Sukkot (oops, I meant Thanksgiving).
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The song "It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas" can apply nowadays to Chanukah, as well. It, too, is beginning to look a lot like Christmas. In trying to fit in with the broader world around us, how far should we go? At the same time, how should we relate to "the other" in a general way?
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When you consider that there are 320 monuments and street names throughout the world memorializing the perpetrators or abettors of the Holocaust, especially including in New York and elsewhere in the United States, as well as in Canada, you must realize that there’s a serious problem that must be addressed. Add to that teachers in a Texas school district being told that under a new state law they must teach their students both sides of the Holocaust, meaning they also must teach Nazi Germany’s defense of its murderous actions. A series of surveys undertaken by the Holocaust Taskforce of the Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany identifies a large part of the problem—too few people in the U.S., Canada, the United Kingdom, France and elsewhere have even a basic knowledge of the Holocaust, if they heard of it at all.
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Tuesday's election demonstrated yet again that the values we Americans should espouse and practice are woefully out of whack. The trivialization of the meaning of Thanksgiving—and with it the meaning of Chanukah and the meaning of Christmas—played a huge role in that.
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A lot of ink and air time has been spent on Alec Baldwin's accidental shooting on a film set, killing its cinematographer and wounding its director. As tragic as that incident was, however, most incidents of gun violence go unreported or under-reported—such as a 21-year-old mother being accidentally shot in the head by her 2-year-old son—and that's an even greater tragedy. The greatest tragedy of all, though, is that little is being done to control the availability of guns and, in some states, legislators are making it even easier to get guns.
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Last Monday was the 25th yahrzeit of the assassination of Yitzchak Rabin 26 years ago. The secular anniversary will be marked on Thursday, November 4. A religious fanatic named Yigal Amir pulled the trigger. but all of us had a role to play in encouraging him. We still haven't learned that lesson—and that poses a threat to the Jewish future.
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When you consider that there are over 3 million reported incidents of domestic violence every year in the United States, mostly against women, you know we have a problem. Here is the bottom line: spousal abuse of any kind is prohibited by Jewish law. Those authorities who "fuled" that wives may be beaten by their husbands are offering their opinions, often influenced by the broader culture in which they lived—but those "rulings" have no support in the Torah or the Talmud.
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In 2018, the last full year for which statistics are available, nearly 680,000 children were victims of abuse or neglect and nearly 1,770 children died in this country because of that abuse or neglect. Close to 61 percent of these children were victims of neglect, while nearly 11 percent were physically abused, and 7 percent were sexually abused. In fact, according to the Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network, every 9 minutes a child is abused sexually—and 82 percent of them are young girls. The topic for this week, therefore, is child abuse of every kind and what Judaism has to say about it. And we begin by focusing on the sexual abuse of children, probably the cruelest of all forms of child abuse. In the early portion of this podcast, there is an interview and the audio is not great during it, but you really need to hear it. The last deals with abuse in general.
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The first 11 chapters of the Nook of Genesis have nothing about Israel or its people. The so-called "origin story of the Jewish people" begins with the origin story of humanity as a whole. There's a lesson in those chapters too many of us humans, Jews included. have yet to learn.
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In too many places in the Jewish world, the likes of the Rev. John Hagee, Sens. Ted Cruz and Josh Hawley, and a host of others are hailed as friends of the Jews. They are not our friends, and they are not friends of American democracy. Everyone who is not a right-wing Evangelial Chrostian needs to be afraid of them; be very afraid, We Jews esecially, Here are some reasons why.p
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There are good reasons why the Supreme Court will not uphold Texas' new anyi-abortion law, but the odds are slim. It's all up to how convincing John Roberts can be in arguing with his conservative colleagues. Meanwhile, here is an updated version of Episode No. 18 from July 2020 on Judaism's take.
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Seriously, everyone knows what the High Holy Days are really about, right? Wrong, Listen in and find out why.
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The High Holy Days aren't about our ritual sins, they are all about how we behave towards ourselves, towards others, and even to the so-called lesser life forms and even our environment. There's a helpful checklist to help us make that accounting, which is discussed here.
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Global warming—climate change—is very real, and the early Atlantic and Pacific storm seasons we're having, the massive early and intense wildfires we're seeing, the extreme weather patterns we're experiencing, etc., all are the result. Judaism, based on clack-letter Torah law, has much to say about what we need to do to save our planet.
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Wildfires, tropical storms, climbing COVID rates, an apartment building collapse—things happen that shouldn't have happened, that could have been preventedm but all Congress does, to borrow from what John Adams said in the musical 1776, is “piddle, twiddle, and resolve. not one damn thing do [they] solve; piddle, twiddle, and resolve. nothing's ever solved ."
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Was the First Temple destroyed on Tishah B'Av? Was it the Babylonians who destroyed it, or was it the Edomites, and when did they destroy it? Should we even have three weeks of mourning leading up to Tishah B'Av, or even nine days? These are all important questions—but the one not to be questioned is that Tishah B;Av is a day of great tragedies throughout Jewish history, and it is NOT a day we should ever ignore,
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In no other country at no time in history, have we been as free as we are in the United States, and we have broken through virtually every "glass ceiling," able to climb the highest heights. But is there a price we're paying for it—a price we have imposed on ourselves?
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Compromise made this country great. The lack of compromise is doing the opposirte. Our politicians in Washington would do well to heed what Judaism has to say about compromise.
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I hate to break it to those people (Bernie Sanders, for example, who think being Jewish and being a Zionist are two differemt things. They're not.
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Given the assault on the right to vote and a pending Supreme Court ruling. this week's entry discusses what Jewish law has to say about this issue.
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When you consider the state of the world today, you have to acknowledge that it is in pretty bad shape. We especially have a role in repairing this world. Only, too many of us don't want that burden on our shoulders.
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The war is over (we hope), but only for now. As for who won, the answer is Hamas. Find out why here.
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Of course the Torah says nothing about a free press or sets ground rules for journalists. If you think that, you really need to listen to this one—and then send it to any Fox News Fans friends you may have.
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Republican governors and legislators are proposing and even enacting into law legislation that would limit, if not eliminate, peaceful protests. They use false facts to buttress their claims. Peaceful protests are one form of speaking truth to power—and speaking truth to power is something Judaism has always seen as an obligation.
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In many ways, this is a continuation of last week's episode because it discusses some of the laws in Leviticus 19. Then again, it stands on its own as an indictment of sorts of labelling Judaism as a religion—and missing the whole point of who and what we are, and why.
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We're in the midst of counting each day from the slavery of Egypt to the moment when God reveals His purpose for us as His "Kingdom of Priests and Holy Nation." Counting from 1 to 49, however, was never the point. WHY we count and HOW we count is what this episode is about.
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If you think the U.S. electoral system is messed up, it's nothing compared to how messed up Israel's system is. Four elections in two years have failed to produce a viable government and a fifth election in late summer/early fall is a very real possibility. Charles Byelbezer joins us from Israel to give us an update.
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Mass shootings make headlines, but underreported are how many people in the U.S. dies each year because of guns (44.000 ;ast year). Even worse, among those 44.000 killed were 5,100 children ages 1 to 17—over 1,000 more than any other year since 2014, and a 50 percent increase over the number of children killed in 2019. The Torah has a law to cover the this public safety nightmare, and we have a role to play, as well.
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The Sages of old said all festive meals, Pesach included, should include "meat and fish." My guest this week advocates going a different route (or should that be root?). Please note that there will be no podcast next week.
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Last week, I explored the first part of the Exodus story, that of Joseph (and Jacob). This weekI look at the other end of those 430 years. I may be wrong, of course, but from Joseph to Moses, there is a perfect fit IN HISTORY for this biblical tale so many scholars say never happened. IT DID HAPPEN!
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Passover will be here three weeks from tonight. So many biblical scholars and critics insist it's a made up story. If so, "why is this night be different from all the other nights"? Why should we go to all the extra trouble of preparing that Passover brings to the table, literally and figuratively? They say it never happened because there is no record of it found in the history of Egypt or anywhere else outside the Bible. Well, listen to the podcasts this week and next and decide for yoiurself who's the one blowing smoke—the Torah, or the scholars.
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With Passover just over four weeks away, this topic is as timely as you can get. Why do Passover foods cost so much and what can be done about it?
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All hail Marduk. All hail Ishtar. Purim is upon us and here are some things you may not have known about what arguably is the most joyous—and even silliest and most raucous—festival of the Jewish year (and also the LAST festival of the TRUE Jewish year, but that's another story).
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Considering that social justice issues are finally back on the American agenda, here's a look at how the Torah always kept social justice at the top of its agenda—a timely discussion expecially because it's what this week's Torah portion is all about.
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I know that many people, women especially, think the Torah is anti-woman. Nothing can be further from the truth. In fact, the Torah attests to the complete equality of women. which puts the Torah squarely in support of the Equal Rights Amendment.
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Seriously, Moses held up his staff and a sea split? He hit a rock with it and water poured out in such great quantity that it quenched the thirst of a vast multitude? If you don't believe such things, how can you believe anything the Torah says? Here's how. Let me know what you think after listening to this episode. Go to www.shammai.org and e-mail me, please.
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Two events—President Biden's moves to upgrade our environmental efforts and the coming next Thursday of the minor festival known as Tu B'Shevat—come together to determine this week's topic.
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You'll probably be surprised to discover who it was who was the first person in recorded history to be impeached and removed from office, and its aftermath has lessons some people especially need to learn today.
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There really is a connection between the two topics, but it's not the way I had hoped to start the 2021 podcasts.
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If every cloud has a silver lining, where is that to be found in the dark cloud we call COVID-19? It IS there, in tghe lessons we are being taught about our world and our responsibilities to that world and everyone in it.
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It's a serious question, but don't assume you know how I answer it until you get to the end,
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There's much that's problematic about Chanukah, but there's a very good reason to celebrate it—as long as we celebrate it, and not turn it into something it's now and was never intended to be.
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The title says it all. A happy—AND SAFE—Thanksgiving to all.
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If (hopefully not when) his white supremacist supporters take to arms to "pay back" the ones who "stole" the election from the man who greenlighted them these last four years, he's already used "dog whistles" to tell them who their main targets should be—the Jews. And no, I'm not being unnecessarily alarmist. The evidence is all in his words, echoed by some of his appointees and political allies, and some of those words are already being taken seriously.
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I'm guessing that most people don't realize that Jewish law requires us to vote in elections—and to count every vote that's cast. That's this week's topic.
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This may sound political, but it's really a warning. President Trump's reliance on fake science to fuel his callous disregard for the lives of the people he leads. This podcast is about that fake science and it's about who we should be listening to over the next weeks and months as the COVID-19 rates continue to climb back up.
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Bluntly stated, one candidate running for president fails on every count, from the Jewish view of what a leader should be. You won't be surprised about who it is I believe that leader is.
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We're beginning the annual Torah reading cycle this Shabbat and we begin at the beginning, Creation, the chapter that most people believe is the biggest fairy tale of them all. I hope this podcast changes that perception for you.
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This episode is guaranteed not to win me many friends among the ritually rigid Jewish communities here and abroad, but it had to be said. Jews who should know better are blatantly violating a prime Torah-originated directive and add to their sin by bringing disgrace to God's Holy Name.
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We moderns may think Sukkot is just one big antiquated festival filled with silly rituals and, yes, even an embarrassment of sorts, Well, think again—and listen to the reasons why.
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Yom Kippur is NOT about such things as keeping kosher or keeping Shabbat merely because we're supposed to. It's about understanding what these rituals are really about—and what Yom Kippur is really about: How we relate to other people and to the world around us. Also, there's no "absolution" at the end of Yom Kippur because that's when repentance actually begins.
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This is the second installment of my High Holy Days series. Tere nay be a few surprises here. A happy, healthy, SAFE, and peaceful 5781.
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When you consider the image of God sitting on a throne and reviewing a list of who was naughty in 5780 and who was nice, it makes it difficult to take Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur too seriously—and that would be a mistake.
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We're doing things a bit differently this week. In an effort to discover how High Holy Days services can be more meaningful, especially for peoplr who don't often attend synagogue during the year, if at all, we've brought just such a sometimes shul-goer and a cantor (he's also a rabbi) for a conversation.
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The Torah, including in this week's reading—Ki Tetzei—has much to say about our responsibilities to the so-called "lower life forms" on our planet, and the kosher laws have a role to play in that concern, as well. We also have two very special guests from Southern California who understand those responsibilities and act on it in their daily lives.
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A 4 1/2/-year-old knows more about keeping safe amid COVID-19 than many adults, especially if you believe some recent surveys
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How we and the other adults behave serve as influenbces on our children, with frightening results according to one important survey. And it is compounded by the kinds of dirty campaigning we're currently being subjected to.
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The Ten Commandments are viewed by so many as being the ultimate religious document, the only words God ever spoke to an entire nation. Non-Jews especially see this as the only words God spoke and its contents are the only "commandments" God cares about. But are these really commandments? And are they even meant to be commandments? And is this a "religious" document at all? That's this week's topic.
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The Supreme Court ended its term with an abortion ruling—but not one conservatives were hoping for. Judaism's take on abortion is this week's topic.
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The federal government has resumed executions (although the timing is suspicious to my mind). People on both sides like to say "the Bible suppoorts me on this." Does it?
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Judaism is not about mourning past tragedies; it's about living life in a way that will improve the world. Tishah B'Av is the exception. It's all explained here. Shabbat Shalom.
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It's the July 4th weekend—the "secular Shavuot. America has given us much to be thankful for—but America also has much to be thankful for to us because its Jewish roots are showing (although maybe not as much as the promise of America would require). There's lots here that may pleasantly surprise you.
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Demonstrations, whistleblowers, tell-all books—these are all in the news, and they also are different ways of speaking truth to power. Speaking truth to power is something Judaism takes very seriously and, from the Torah on, requires it of us.
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Benjamn Netanyahu's plan to annex parts of the West Bank is foolhardy and selfishly motivated. It also most likely violates a number of Jewish laws.
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Benjamikn Netanyahu's plan to annex parts of the West Bank is foolhardy and selfishly motivated—and it probably violates many Jewish laws.
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That's what the Tanach (the Bible) says, it's what the sages tell us, and it's what we've seen with our own eyes in our lifetime But the wrong words don't just kill people; they can also kill ideas whose time has come. The idea behind "Defund the Police" is such an idea and deserves support. It won't get all the support it will need to succeed because of one word: Defund. It sends the wrong message—and one that is unintended by most of its supporters.
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If, as the Torah tells us, we're all descended from the original First Couple through their son Seth, then color, race, ethnicity, even religion, are artificial devices designed to separate us from our borthers and sisters—meaning all humanity. So where is OUR outrage when events such as what we're seeing today occur? There's more. Please listen and send this podcast to all your contavts. Please.
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Shavuot is arguably the most important of the three pilgrimage festivals, and the one most Jews probably aren't even aware of much less celebrate it. Here's why they—we, everyone—should, and also why we have the Shavuot customs of decorating homes with flowers, eating cheesecake, blintzes, and other dairy foods—and pulling a Torah-study all-nighter.
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On Jerusalem Day, Yom Yerushalayim, a look at what the city means to all Jews, how it is being used as an excuse for not making peace with Israel, the truth about the PA's and Hamas' "desire for peace" being stymied by Israeli intransigence, and what we need to do to counter the lies.
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The cost-benefit analysis approach being taken by the politicians—and vehemently opposed by the scientists and medical professionals—will cost lives. The Torah also weighs the benefits to the risks. In its case, it weighs the benefits to life vs. the risks to life—and it always comes down on the side of life. Meanwhile, people are running out of money for the basic necessities, including food. The Torah has much to say about that, as well.
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Considering the maternal mortality rate in this country—we rank 55th in protecting women from pregnancy to a year after birth—we also do a poor job honoring mothers or their needs.
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If ever there was a way to graphically demonstrate how the way Jewish law works differs from secular law, the order keeping meat-packing plants open is it. Sadly, though, some Jewish communities ignore what Jewish law has to say.
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What do Earth Day, Passover and Shavuot (the two festivas that bracket it) have in common? The Torah! To find out how, listen to this episode. You may be surprised at what you hear.
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What to do with those stimulus checks the federal government is doling out.
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Although God did not send us the COVID-19 pandemic, there are lessons in it He taught us long ago that we need to learn now—sadly, the hard way. Among them, the equality and value of all people (we are all the same family, after all), the responsibility we all have to provide adequate health care for all people, and the honor due to and the authority of physicians.
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The Torah commands us to rejoice on Shavuot and on Sukkot, but no such commandment is given for Pesach, Passover. Ever wonder why?
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This series of podcasts explores contemporary issues through the prism of Jewish law and tradition. It is hosted by Rabbi Shammai Engelmayer. In this episode, he discusses "the Blame God Game." As is the case virtually every time a natural disaster strikes, be it a hurricane or a pandemic, so many religious leaders and others, especially on the right, are claiming that the COVID-19 pandemic is punishment from God. God doesn't act that way. In many ways, the blame rests on human shoulders, ours included.
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