Holidays

When Temple Chai Executive Director Joe Miller first heard of the proposal to turn the synagogue into a part-time homeless shelter, he was more than a little skeptical.

For rabbis, it’s their annual golden opportunity to reach a much larger audience than usual. For members of a congregation, they can be either enlightening or entertaining highlights of the services, or dreary and sometimes infuriating sessions. In any scenario, there’s no better barometer of the state of American Jewish life than the controversies that inevitably attach themselves to High Holiday sermons.

Jewish families around the world begin Rosh Hashanah meals by dipping apples in honey, symbolizing their hope for a sweet New Year. They also drizzle honey into holiday cuisine.

Forget Valentine’s Day. Jews have a romantic holiday of our own.

An estimated 1,500 or more people gathered at Castles & Coasters in Phoenix on May 14 for Chabad of Arizona’s community Lag B’Omer celebration.

What holiday is not mentioned in the Torah or anywhere until the 13th century and has no particular foods associated with it? The answer is Lag b’Omer. The Torah commands us to begin on the second night of Passover and count the omer. Omer, which means sheaf, was a measure of grain from the new barley harvest cutting, brought to the Temple on the 16th of Nisan.

Gluten-free matzah might sound like a bad joke – after all, regular unleavened bread tastes pretty cardboard-like already.

When Rabbi Robert Kravitz pulled off his tie at the Latino-Jewish Seder on March 21, he said it was symbolic of seeking freedom. Wearing a tie, he said, is a custom that feels confining and men do it to themselves out of social convention. So he liberated himself of the tie and continued leading the seder, reading from the “Freedom Celebration Haggadah” created for this annual event.

Two weeks before Passover, Rabbis Elana Kanter and Michael Wasserman of The New Shul were leading a model seder – a very special one, using a brightly colored, easy-to-hold Haggadah with visual images.

At first glance, the drab town of Bershad, Ukraine, 160 miles south of Kiev, seems nearly identical to the other settlements that dot the poverty-stricken district of Vinnitsa.

Born into a Catholic family with a Jewish surname, I should have expected I would one day find myself leading a Passover seder.

From the wizardry of Harry Potter that echoes with Passover’s themes to a cartoon frog who wisecracks his way through the seder, this year’s new crop of Passover books for kids offers something for all ages and interests.

Rabbi Pinchas Allouche will present "Passover on Fire! An Instructional Demo Seder" 7-8:30 p.m. Tuesday, April 4, at the Ina Levine Jewish Community Campus, 12701 N. Scottsdale Road, Scottsdale.

I love serving light foods that are naturally kosher for Passover. With so much matzah, vegetable and fish dishes are often a welcome addition in my home.

TEL AVIV – Wonder Woman, Rosie the Riveter and a female Israeli fighter pilot walked into a bar. They were just a few of the heroines out in Tel Aviv Saturday for the night of Purim.

How Purim is a call to leadership

In the Book of Esther’s Chapter 4, verse 14, Mordechai encourages his niece, Queen Esther, to use her influence with King Ahasuerus.

The most important aspect of most Purim pastries is their shape. Most Ashkenazic Jews only know of hamantaschen, the triangular pastries filled with prunes or other fruit fillings. This word is taken from the German words mohn (meaning poppy seeds) and taschen (referring to pockets). Some say the pockets refer to Haman who stuffed his pockets with bribe money.

Temple Chai will offer a session of Goat Yoga for Tu B’Shevat. Participants will meet at 11 a.m. Saturday, Feb. 11, at Temple Chai, 4645 E. Marilyn Road, Phoenix, and caravan to Gilbert for a noon session of yoga on a goat farm. To attend, email Rabbi Bonnie Koppell, rabbikoppell@templechai.com.

Jewish News received hundreds of submissions for this year’s Hanukkah art contest. Thank you to all the synagogues and schools who spread the word and to all the young artists who participated. The winning piece, featured on the cover of this issue, is by Rachel Milrad, 8, a student at Torah Day School of Phoenix. On these pages are some of the other beautiful submissions we received and others can be found on our website, jewishaz.com.

Jewish News asked children what their favorite thing about Hanukkah is. In addition to the most popular answers of presents, chocolate gelt and latkes, here are their responses:

NEW YORK   — Ever since I moved here from Israel, every late November felt like the beginning of a month-long assault. Every store, business and doctor’s office blared Christmas songs, streets were decorated with ostentatious light shows and seemingly everything became green and red — which, as an art school grad, I found personally offensive to my design sensibilities.

Sunday, Dec. 18

You can fire up your creativity this Hanukkah with a variety of Hanukkah and Judaica DIY (do-it-yourself) items at Pinspiration, a “Community Meets Creativity” studio in North Phoenix that’s ready to serve the artsy, as well as the not-so-creative, Jewish community this Hanukkah season.