Musings from Students of the Pardes Institute of Jewish Studies in Jerusalem
Posted on March 8, 2012 by Leah Stern
Most people have never even heard the word shtender. They think I am making up a pretend word, though to my knowledge it is Yiddish. I said it recently to an Israeli friend and the closest word I could use to explain it was the word מעמד, which means a stand, but that isn’t even Continue Reading »
Posted on March 4, 2012 by Derek Kwait
When I woke up to a snowstorm this morning, I was so happy I could dance. It wasn’t just snow, it was big-flaked, sticky snow, the kind you could make snowballs out of were there enough of it, and it looked for all the world like there would be before too long. I grabbed my Continue Reading »
Posted on February 29, 2012 by The Director of Digital Media
Today is the annual Pardes Yom Iyum shel Chesed – the Day of Kindness in commemoration of Benjamin Blutstein and Marla Bennett. In a few minutes, the entire Pardes community is going out to do service throughout Israel in honor of these two amazing individuals whose lives were cut so short.
Posted on December 28, 2011 by The Director of Digital Media
Many students have been lucky enough to study with Tovah Leah Nachmani – her ‘Personalizing Prayer’ class is a favorite for students seeking to connect to Jewish tradition in a meaningful, personal way, and we appreciate her for being such an incredibly deep listener. Below is a dvar Torah she recently wrote, with a bonus Continue Reading »
Posted on December 16, 2011 by Shibley
Our parasha, Vayeishev, concludes this week with Yosef sitting in the prison of Pharaoh. Yosef has just concluded interpreting the dreams of his fellow prisoners, the cupbearer and the baker, both of whom had committed relatively minor crimes in the eyes of Pharoah. Why would Yosef care about the dreams of anybody? Remember, Yosef has Continue Reading »
Posted on December 13, 2011 by Leah Stern
Hello Pardesians and World, I am writing to you from a small cafe in Tel Aviv. I must confess that I was at a loss as to what to talk about in my next blog post. I was going to try to follow my theme of faces in jerusalem of my first blog post, but Continue Reading »
Posted on October 29, 2011 by Derek Kwait
Once upon a time, a Middle-Eastern nation wanted to build a tower with its top in the heavens to make a name for itself. This tower would be a powerful monument to their civilization’s unsurpassed greatness and modernity. They even refused to announce what the final height of the building would be until it was Continue Reading »
Posted on October 25, 2011 by Derek Kwait
(X-posted from my home blog Yinzer in Yerushalayim) We had all of Sukkot off, plus 3 days, making for 2 weeks of free time. Many of my peers went on trips through the country of went camping. While I didn’t do either of those, I had an adventurous holiday nonetheless. The adventure started before Sukkot Continue Reading »
Posted on April 2, 2011 by Tamara Frankel
Much ink has been spilled over the seemingly cryptic laws of ritual purity and the illness of tzaraat recounted in Parshat Tazria. Actually I learned this week from Chief Rabbi Jonathan Sacks (of the UK) that the original translation of the disease of as “leprosy”. This is a misnomer since the biblical disease of tzaraat Continue Reading »
Posted on September 22, 2010 by Mosheh
Before coming to learn at Pardes I lived in Chicago for five years. Having moved from the suburbs of Detroit, I was quite taken aback by actually living in the ‘big city’ for the first time in my life. One of the things which really struck me was all the homeless people on the streets. Continue Reading »
