YU Study: DNA, Not Lifestyle, Is Key to Longevity

Jerusalem Post

Healthy centenarians lucky enough to have inherited “longevity genes” can thank their genetic makeup for their long lives. Unlike everybody else, they didn’t have to watch their diet, exercise daily or avoid alcohol to reach that age. They didn’t even have to stop smoking – although tobacco use would certainly harm their descendants.

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Video: Rabbi Dr. J. Immanuel Schochet — What is Faith?


Watch this brilliant clip to learn what real faith is all about. It’s not blind belief and acceptance of information or values. Rabbi Dr. J. Immanuel Schochet illuminates the fundamental connection between faith and knowledge. True faith that is rooted in knowledge is exhibited in a person who synthesizes information and allows the logical consequences of this reality to have an affect on the way he or she lives.

Modesty Helps Women Be Friends

by Jennifer Fulwiler – NC Register

One of the things I’ve found most refreshing about religious culture is the understanding of the importance of modesty. Though each woman may have different ideas about exactly what it means to be modest, there is a general agreement that putting forth some level of conscious effort to avoid looking like a backup dancer in a Snoop Dogg video is a good thing. And it’s fascinating to see the effect that it has on women’s interactions with one another.

Op-Ed: Counselors, Please Stop Scar(r)ing Our Kids

First of all, I would like to genuinely thank all the staff that have helped my son grow tremendously in Gashmiyos and especially in Ruchniyos over the first part of the summer. My son has really gained a lot and has noticably excelled and matured of the short four weeks he spent at camp. There is one thing however I would like to address:

Israelis in Berlin Finally Have a Synagogue of Their Own

Flanked by Chabad-Lubavitch Rabbis Shmuel Segal, left, Yehuda Tiechtel, and two local Israelis expatriates, Israeli Chief Rabbi Yonah Metzger helps inaugurate the new Chabad-Lubavitch Israeli Center in Berlin.

Israelis visiting and living in the fastest growing section of Berlin now have a synagogue to call their own. Since its doors officially opened last month, the new Chabad-Lubavitch Israeli Center has attracted more than 100 locals and tourists to Sabbath services and affiliated programs.

Bloody ‘Night Out Against Crime’ in Crown Heights

Police block off Nostrand Aveune. Inset: a makeshift memorial at the scene of the murder.

CROWN HEIGHTS [CHI] — Traditionally, the first Tuesday of August is known as the National Night out against Crime, a night where residents come out of their homes and together with police ‘take back the streets’ from crime. This year it wasn’t so in 71st Precinct where a man was shot dead on Carroll Street and a Jew was attacked on Crown Street.

Ukraine Scribe Lauded for Torah Restorations

Dnepropetrovsk sofer Reb Reuven Margolin

The United Jewish Community of Ukraine bestowed its “International Award” on Chabad-Lubavitch Rabbi Reuven Margolin of the National Scribal Center in Dnepropetrovsk in recognition for his work on restoring two centuries-old Torah scrolls and saving them from an almost certain burial.

City’s Defense of Jewish Community a Factor as Circumcision Ban Falls

by Mindy Rubenstein – Chabad.org

Illustration photo: A S. Francisco group opposed to circumcision tried to outlaw the practice by bringing the question up for a referendum.

A proposed ban on circumcision failed a legal test Thursday as a S. Francisco judge, ruling that the initiative conflicted with a state law prohibiting local governments from regulating doctors, struck the item from the upcoming municipal ballot.