by YAKOV M. RABKIN (Professor Emeritus of History at the Université of Montréal) The weekly reading - Ki Tissa (Exodus 30:11 - 34:35) poses the difficult question: how a human is to act...
https://www.shamaileibowitz.org/2024/03/we-and-god-cannot-start-from-scratch.html
Moses issues an ultimatum to God: “If you don’t forgive Israel, erase me from Your book” (Exodus 32:32). God forgives Israel but erases Moses from the Torah portion of Tetzaveh anyway ...
https://www.shamaileibowitz.org/2022/02/the-contagious-case-of-missing-moses.html
> "YOUR STORY IS AN INSPIRATION TO OUR GENERATION, TO ALWAYS BE PROUD > JEWS AND TO FIGHT FOR HUMAN RIGHTS FOR ALL." That's the main message my son Niv delivered in a vide...
https://www.shamaileibowitz.org/2022/01/yeshiva-boys-visiting-poland-pay.html
Shamai Leibowitz writes about music, language, Jewish topics and current events.
https://www.shamaileibowitz.org/2021/06/avigayil-leibowitzs-inspiring-speech-at.html
My son Niv was selected by peers and teachers as valedictorian and gave an inspiring speech:
https://www.shamaileibowitz.org/2021/06/nivs-inspiring-valedictorian-speech.html
Today we celebrate Juneteenth , and I’m going to talk about a major principle of criminal law: nullum crimen sine lege which is Latin for “no crime without law” This principle is a ...
https://www.shamaileibowitz.org/2020/06/did-story-of-wood-gatherer-violate-rule.html
Born on June 1, 1804, Russian composer Mikhail Glinka is considered the father of Russian nationalism in music. This is primarily because of his two operas: A Life for the Tsar and Ruslan and Ly...
https://www.shamaileibowitz.org/2020/06/mikhail-glinka-father-of-musical.html
Parshat Bechukotai opens with a series of blessings that will happen if the people of Israel will be loyal to God. One of those blessings is that they will be victorious over their enemies. Giv...
https://www.shamaileibowitz.org/2020/05/unity-can-be-curse-too.html
Shamai Leibowitz writes about music, language, Jewish topics and current events.
https://www.shamaileibowitz.org/2020/03/the-miniature-aleph-uniqueness-or.html
by Abigail Leibowitz (published June 12 in the Washington Jewish Week) On June 4, the Muslim community in the United States celebrated Eid al-Fitr, the Muslim festival marking the end o...
https://www.shamaileibowitz.org/2019/06/textbook-definition-of-discrimination.html
If you were stranded on an island without a Jewish calendar and no internet connection (oy gevalt!), how would you know what number to count in the Omer? Every year, on the second night o...
https://www.shamaileibowitz.org/2019/04/the-magic-formula-for-figuring-out-omer.html
Mazel Tov to my son Niv and the Berman Hebrew Academy NCSY JUMP Team for winning the national Boardroom competition in New York City yesterday with their creative initiative - Helpful Halacha !...
https://www.shamaileibowitz.org/2019/04/berman-academy-wins-national-jump.html
How can we make halacha (Jewish law) more accessible and easy-to-understand? My son Niv and his teammates at Berman Hebrew Academy have initiated an innovative tech project: > Text th...
https://www.shamaileibowitz.org/2019/02/ancient-halacha-meets-modern-technology.html
Concert pianist Leon Fleisher marked his 90th birthday by performing a series of live concerts with the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra . I attended his January 5 performance at the Strathmore...
https://www.shamaileibowitz.org/2019/01/i-saw-90-year-old-pianist-leon-fleisher.html
(In memory of my father Elhanan Leibowitz z"l upon his yahrtzeit. My son Niv delivered this drash this past Shabbat - Veterans Day weekend.) We are honoring this weekend people who made a sa...
https://www.shamaileibowitz.org/2018/11/whats-more-important-prayer-or-people.html
In the recently-concluded midterm elections, in which Democrats took control of the House, we had record turnout . From a Jewish perspective, this raises an interesting question: Is there a r...
https://www.shamaileibowitz.org/2018/11/is-there-religious-obligation-to-vote.html
Happy birthday to concert-pianist Evgeny Kissin! Born October 10, 1971, this Russian-Jewish wunderkind has wowed audiences since he debuted with two Chopin piano concertos in Moscow at age 1...
https://www.shamaileibowitz.org/2018/10/happy-birthday-to-amazing-evgeny-kissin.html
In their song Nowhere Man , the Beatles sing about a man who "knows not where he's going to." That seems to be a description of Moses in this week's parashah - Vayelech (Deuteronomy 31:1-30) - w...
https://www.shamaileibowitz.org/2018/09/sometimes-its-necessary-to-just-chill.html
While America certainly had, and still has, its share of failures and blunders, today, Independence Day, is an opportunity to reflect on America's achievements and accomplishments. And as m...
https://www.shamaileibowitz.org/2018/07/i-hear-america-singing.html
(Published in the Washington Jewish Week on June 20, 2018) The National Library of Israel maintains the Piyut and Tfila Website - a musical repository documenting and preserving authen...
https://www.shamaileibowitz.org/2018/06/surviving-holocaust-melody-inspires.html
In Niv's grade they studied this year what is arguably the most famous speech in American history -- Abraham Lincoln's Gettysburg Address . So when Niv ran for student council at the Berman H...
https://www.shamaileibowitz.org/2018/06/famous-speeches-aspen-hill-address.html
Happy 189th birthday to American composer and pianist Louis Moreau Gottschalk! I admit I had never heard of him until I started listening intensively to WETA and WBJC – but he is a br...
https://www.shamaileibowitz.org/2018/05/louis-moreau-gottschalk-grand-american.html
Happy birthday to the great German mathematician Carl Friedrich Gauss , born on this date in 1777. The only child of poor peasants, he grew up to become the "Prince of Mathematicians," and...
https://www.shamaileibowitz.org/2018/04/karl-friedrich-gauss-and-omer-challenge.html
Yesterday was Johann Sebastian Bach’s 333rd birthday, and in honor of the occasion, I’d like to share a wonderful arrangement of his prelude no. 1 from the Well-Tempered Clavier . Bach’...
https://www.shamaileibowitz.org/2018/03/gronich-arranges-and-sings-bach.html
Did you know that Maoz Tzur's most popular melody - the one you're familiar with - is derived from a 16th-century Protestant Choral? We can wonder, then, how this beautiful melody would soun...
https://www.shamaileibowitz.org/2017/12/maoz-tzur-in-style-of-bach-mozart.html