The Evolving Jew

Rabbi Chaim Kanievsky is now purported to have stated that anyone who uses an iPhone is invalid as a witness, or as a mesader kiddushin. But why does Haaretz  report on this story  with the words "Prominent rabbi reportedly declares marriages and divorces witnessed by those who have Internet access invalid." Why "reportedly"? Why does Harry Maryles  write in The Jewish Press  that he's sure R Kanievsky was either misquoted or misled? Why isn't there a clear process of communication for "gedolim" to communicate to the Jewish world they supposedly represent? Why is everything hearsay? I know that the Charedi world doesn't work this way, but I wish there was a publication and verification process, like there is in the academic and reputable journalistic worlds. Otherwise, we depend on rumor and hearsay about what these rabbinic statements. We should not be having endless conversations about whether a famous rav actually said what he

http://evolvingjew.blogspot.com/2012/12/silent-nacht-holy-nacht.html

There's a new article on Huffington Post by Rabbi Shmuley Yanklowitz titled " 5 Reasons Being an Orthodox Rabbi Compelled Me to Support Gay Marriage " First of all, I want to say that agree with him 100%. But the point I want to make here is another one. We've seen this script before. Several times, in fact, over the last couple of years. A graduate of Yeshivat Chovevei Torah publicly declares support for something that Orthodoxy traditionally rejects. Orthodox Jewish social media then spends weeks obsessing over and over again about whether he can be called Orthodox or not. And in all the debate, virtually no ink is spilled on the actual issues he raised. And that's a shame. For the record, I support gay marriage, 100%. As a human being. As the right thing to do from my personal moral perspective. My religiosity is irrelevant to this issue. And whatever denominational label my coreligionists want to slap on me as a result is truly irrelevant to m

The unusual juxtaposition of Chanukah and American Thanksgiving got a lot of attention this year, and many people excitedly repeated the statistic that this won't happen again for another almost 80,000 years. What many people are unaware of, though, is the reason for this. It's not because of random coincidence. Rather, it's because of the slight "slippage" of the Jewish calendar relative to the solar year. The Jewish calendar is very slowly getting out of sync with the seasons. At the current rate, it'll take around 40 millennia for the holidays to end up in the opposite season from where they are now, and around 80 millennia to come back to their appropriate seasons. So in around 40,000 years, we'll be celebrating Pesach in the Autumn, and Sukkot in the spring. Tisha B'Av will be a marvelously short fast day, ending with an early sunset, and Shavuot will be associated with Christmas in popular culture. Thus far, most of our holidays and ritual