June 2022

By Adam Starr Buildings can speak. Not with words, but with values—the values of their builders and the communities that use them. Thanks to the extreme generosity of our membership, we at the Young Israel of Toco Hills in Atlanta were privileged to design, build, and move into our brand new state-of-the-art spiritual home on […]

By Alan M. Schwartz Memorial Day 2009 was a milestone in the life of our family. My wife and I had chosen that Monday as the date for our daughter Eliana’s bat mitzvah, for two main reasons. First, it would obviate concerns about Saturday travel by our non–Sabbath-observant relatives (and any time Jews have the

By Justin Sakofs For most of our married life, my wife and I have been members of minyanim with a mehitzah, and presently we are members of Kol Sasson, the partnership minyan in Skokie, Illinois. As a family with two young children, we’ve been at both egalitarian and partnership minyanim over the past five years,

By Vivian B. Mann In the fall of 2015, a young girl, viewing the synagogue models in the Yeshiva University Museum in New York City, asked, “But where would I have been?” Her question prompted the museum to cosponsor (in conjunction with JOFA) a panel discussion on the women’s section (ezrat nashim) in the synagogue.

Figure 1. Cordoba Synagogue, Interior, 1314/5. Photo courtesy of Nicolas Sapieha.Figure 2. Lorca Synagogue, general view of interior, first half of 15th century. After Ramón Avaso Martínez, ed., Lorca: Luces de Sefarad. Lights of Sepharad (Murcia: Editora Regional de Murcia, 2009), p. 209. Figure 3. Worms Synagogue, Ground Plan, after 1213. After Richard Krautheimer, Mittelalterliche

I read every issue of the Journal from cover to cover.I received the Winter2015–2016 issue this week and was stunned to see that it focused on child sexual abuse.I read every word on the spot.I was abused daily by my school counselor from ages 13 to 16. I didn’t tell for all the reasons expressed

JOFA on the MapThis summer, JOFA Chicago launched the Ahuzat Nahala Beit Midrash, a new Torah learning initiative accessible to all members of the Chicago community. The beit midrash is a welcoming and inclusive learning space with a focus on havrutah-style learning. Participants will meet once a month to develop strong text study skills.JOFA Philadelphia

By Eliezer Hirsch The topic of the synagogue mehitzah has generated impassioned discussion spanning more than a century. Widely debated in the United States throughout the twentieth century, mehitzah (and even separate seating) was not always the standard for Orthodox synagogues. In the 1950s, a significant number of synagogues that identified as Orthodox did not

By Blu Greenberg Item: A Modern Orthodox community in Queens, New York, celebrating an aufruf, holds Shabbat services in the social hall of the local yeshiva. The opaque mehitzah separating front from back is hung ceiling to floor, completely blocking sightlines. The rabbi, much beloved by his community, delivers his sermon in a voice inaudible

Walls and Mehitzot: A Big DifferenceBy Bat Sheva Marcus Something there is that doesn’t love a wall,That sends the frozen-ground-swell under it,And spills the upper boulders in the sun,And makes gaps even two can pass abreast.In Robert Frost’s “Mending Walls,” the poet complains about the need for a wall between himself and his neighbor. Walls,