Essays
Senior Column: One Thread Throughout the Before and After Times
The Chicago Maroon, June 2, 2021
What ties together my time at the University of Chicago? I’ve been thinking over that question a lot as I crawl, in denial, towards the end of my undergraduate years here. But it’s tough to unify an experience that was shattered in two so dramatically for me and so many others.
Renew Our Days
Included in When We Turned Within (Vol 2): Reflections on COVID-19
A short meditation on a prayer during a devastating pandemic.
Proceeds from the anthology will support UJA-Federation of New York's COVID-19 relief efforts.
Buy the anthology (paperback or Kindle) here: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B08L9S68T4
A Warped Prayer at Midway Airport
Included in When We Turned Within (Vol 2): Reflections on COVID-19
A strange trip through an airport in Chicago turned into a prayer and a challenge.
Proceeds from the anthology will support UJA-Federation of New York's COVID-19 relief efforts.
Buy the anthology (paperback or Kindle) here: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B08L9S68T4
Jewish life revolves around being ‘people of the people’'’
The Forward (Scribe Contributor Network), May 26, 2020
When my grandfather passed away from COVID-19 on April 24, I thought we might only have ten men, for an Orthodox Jewish prayer quorum, at his graveside funeral. I was wrong. Only his wife, his three sons and the synagogue’s rabbi could see him off.
The Holy Land
Memoryhouse, Autumn 2019, pp. 36-37
As my travels continued, I would encounter devastation among the living. In the middle of my journeys, while en route to the kibbutz collective community of Maale Gilboa, eighty miles outside of Jerusalem, for a weekend getaway, I had an hour stopover in a northern town...
"Like a Fleeting Dream": U-Netaneh Tokef, Dreams, and the Meaning of the High Holy Days
The Lehrhaus; September 20, 2017
U-netaneh Tokef is the centerpiece of the Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur Mussaf services. It’s stirring and emotional (“And let us now relate [the holiness of this day]”). Tradition has it that this prayer was authored by the medieval sage Rabbi Amnon of Mainz. [...] Though scholars doubt the facts of Rabbi Amnon—even his existence—its reception in traditional lore makes its theme worthy of consideration.
A Prayer in the Forest
Tablet Magazine; June 7, 2017
Our sleepover in the woods was a success so far, but someone had to throw out the garbage before we went to sleep. Taking the box, my counselor’s bag, and a weak flashlight with me, I set out into the forest in the dark. (Following camp rules, I had left my cellphone at home.) It wouldn’t take me long to discard the trash in the main camp two minutes away; then I’d return and fall asleep beneath the stars. But I made a wrong turn along the way. I had no idea where I was...
The Caretaker at Har HaMenuchot
The Jewish Link of New Jersey; July 27, 2017
Before visiting Har HaMenuchot, I had never been to a cemetery that I would describe as beautiful. But there was a certain beauty to Har HaMenuchot. Instead of being marked with foreboding gray tombstones, the graves were marked with rectangular, low headstones made of tan Jerusalem stone.
"Bright" Falters, But Netflix Still Shines
The Chicago Maroon; January 8, 2018
The significance of Bright, now streaming on Netflix, has nothing to do with its mashup of genres or star power. The fantasy/buddy-cop hybrid featuring Will Smith is the streaming service’s next and largest (to the tune of $90 million) attempt at disrupting the film industry.