Tag: Covid-19

Contemporary physicians have been heroic in the battle against COVID-19, but what was it like to be one of a handful of Jewish doctors confronting the Bubonic Plague during the 17th-century in Italy? Prolific medical halakhist and historian Eddie Reichman takes a close look at the four Jewish graduates of the Padua medical school class of 1623.

At the height of the cholera epidemic in 1831, Hatam Sofer delivered a timely sermon on a perplexing midrash to Parshat Ki Tavo. The take-home, suggests Elli Fischer, is all-too familiar in the COVID era.

May one opt to participate in a potentially dangerous vaccine trial? This theoretical halakhic question has suddenly become all-too-urgent. Sharon Galper Grossman and Shamai Grossman explore.

Psalm 121, recited fervently in online prayer spaces and from the Senate floor alike since March, is subject to a seemingly mind-boggling array of interpretations. Michael Weiner blazes a path through the interpretive chaos.

Jesse Lempel argues that the halakhic category of pidyon shevuyim might extend to prisoners held in unsafe conditions, safe as during the current pandemic.

Sharon Galper Grossman and Shamai A. Grossman, leading doctors writing from quarantine, explain why even the Noda be-Yehuda, who requires that the sick person be before us, would agree that a public health crisis is subject to the leniencies of pikuah nefesh.

Rav Ronen Neuwirth suggests that the strictures of social distancing enable us to reduce this year's Lag BaOmer bonfires - which he sees as a very good thing.

When Synagogues Reopen, May the Congregation Permit a Bar Mitzvah Boy to Make Up His Torah Reading? Moshe Kurtz weighs in.

What does Shakespeare have to say about the Exodus, Moses, and the power of storytelling? Shaina Trapedo explores how the Bard's work can speak to us during this unprecedented Pesach season.

Stuart Halpern explains how, when faced with uncertainty, danger, and personal and communal hardships, Americans have turned to the story of the Exodus for inspiration.