Professor Marc B. Shapiro, of Scranton University, recently published a fascinating book titled The Limits of Orthodox Theology: Maimonides’ Thirteen Principles Reappraised which is an expanded version of an article he published 11 years ago in The Torah u-Mada Journal. An excellent article by Steven I. Weiss was published in the Forward newspaper about this book and its controversial nature. ...

I apologize that the first major post on the Hirhurim* blog is about homosexuality. No, the irony was not lost on me. But this was not intended to shed light on the intended meaning of the blog’s name. * Hirhurim is a term that frequently refers to sexual fantasies

In a post titled “Conservosexuality, II“, blogger Zackary Sholem Berger linked to a number of halakhic papers from scholars of the Conservative movement regarding Homosexuality and halakhah. Being the industrious and curious person that I am, I printed out two of the papers to read — one paper by CRabbi Joel Roth titled simply Homosexuality and another by CRabbi Simchah ...

Statement of Purpose This blog is a forum for my thoughts on Torah and other contemporary issues. I will try to keep the ranting to those subjects and not veer off to random annoyances or silliness. Comments are welcome but will not necessarily be answered because I have no need to always get the last word. I will sometimes simply ...

UPDATE: I gave up on trying to maintain a running glossary. Sorry. If you don’t understand a word, e-mail me. This will be a running glossary and will be updated as new terms are added to the blog that require explanation. Anus – Forced; under duress. Related to anussim and ones.Anussim – People who are forced to do something. Related ...