In November of 1938, my grandparents left their own town of Essen, Germany and walked the streets of another village where no one would recognize them. A German constable had warned them to leave town so as to avoid getting caught up in the night of destruction that lay ahead. They watched as Nazi Brownshirts burned books and shattered the windows of Jewish properties. As my grandfather clung in terror to my indomitable grandmother, they vowed they would leave the country of their birth forever. Within months, they stepped onto the streets of Richmond, Virginia. Today, we celebrate the inauguration of America’s 46th president. It is especially important for Jews to remember our stories of immigration. The countries we fled were those where elections were subverted, where mobs upended governments, where democracies disintegrated beneath lies, oppression, and deceit. Our ancestors looked to this nation because they realized, as imperfect as [...]

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of light, it was the season of darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair. These are Charles Dickens’ opening words to A Tale of Two Cities. I memorized them as a high school freshman, never imagining that I would live in times that could be characterized by those dialectically opposite phrases, and yet here we are. Without question, it has been among our worst years and yet, for some the best year: there have been births, a few weddings, B’nai Mitzvah and other celebrations. At a time when the science is clear and the grim count of COVID-19 deaths reaches towards 400,000 of their fellow [...]

Mark Twain is attributed with saying: “history doesn’t repeat itself, but it often rhymes.” As Jewish Americans struggle to understand and process the events of the past years, it is clear that there are lessons to be learned from history. This, even though we live in unprecedented times where technology, scientific advances, and the rapid pace of communications changes everything. As two seminal events coincide this week, (Martin Luther King Day and the inauguration of President Joe Biden) a retrospective with an eye to what we might learn for our own times is in order. On July 25, 1958, Reverend King said the following in a speech to the American Jewish Congress: My people were brought to America in chains. Your people were driven here to escape the chains fashioned for them in Europe. Our unity is born of our common struggle for centuries, not only to rid ourselves of [...]