A terrible calamity has befallen one Florida Chabad House when an uninvited man showed up at their Purim party, became highly intoxicated, and subsequently died. Local news outlets pounced on the story, and a huge whirlwind of myths and speculation about what happened is spiraling out of control. In an exclusive interview with Crownheights.info, the local Shluchim described in minute detail exactly what transpired that day.
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Perhaps it was only a matter of time. In a city defined by runaway gentrification — where high-fashion shops like Stella McCartney’s and high-end hotels have nearly nudged out the last of the meatpackers, and where Williamsburg has become hipster central — Chabad has come to the Bowery.
Shneur Zalman Haskelevitch, 35, an orthodox Jew who grew up in Crown Heights, was banned from Israel in 2005. The rare move was taken by Israel in the wake of an intelligence investigation, after it was discovered that he had visited six Arab countries, including Iraq during the U.S. invasion. This week, Kikar Shabbos met up with him in his home in Morocco, and heard all about his unique day-to-day life.
By now many people have weighed into what must have been a very private decision for a famous individual. Of course I am talking about Matisyahu’s beard, or lack thereof.
The Coyotes vs Panthers hockey game last Tuesday was no ordinary game. Chabad of Florida performed a menorah-lighting ceremony on the ice during the first period intermission. The event looked nothing short of a huge Hanukka party. But the event itself was really quite ironic. How odd, I thought, to celebrate Hanukka in a sports arena, given that the concept of sports is emblematic of Greek culture.
Chaya Mushka Seminary of Tzfat students put a whole new spin on Chanukah this year — bringing joy and delight to hundreds of area children from their very special “Chessed” program.
Musings on the fall of Matisyahu’s Facial Locks
Matisyahu is a friend of mine so I was not going to comment on his choice to shave off his beard. It was his personal decision. Live and let live. But I changed my mind when my children told me that they were reading all over the internet that young, impressionable, orthodox Jewish youth were also choosing to shave off their beards following Matisyahu’s lead (I’m assuming these were young men, rather than women, who made the choice). It was then that I decided to weigh in.
The man who kidnapped the Shliach to Ecuador, Rabbi Tomer Rotem, is now claiming that he was the victim of a Chabad conspiracy. Even more surprisingly, Israel’s Channel 10 News believes his story.
About a year ago, a Chabad Rabbi got in touch with me and asked if I would agree to meet a senior Jewish PETA executive named Philip Schein. Philip’s wife Hannah, who also works for PETA, is in charge of PETA undercover investigations.
The annual gathering of Chabad’s global emissaries, the Kinus Hashluchim, elicits a paradox. Here is an organization that is truly international, operating even more outposts than the United States government. Chabad is not only the world’s largest Jewish educational network, it is quite simply one of the world’s largest networks period. Perhaps only the Catholic Church has a more extensive grid of schools and educational outposts. Yet, for all its internationalism Chabad continues to evince a largely parochial mentality. It is global in scope but not in outlook.
In the early 90’s I fell in love with Steve Jobs’ new NeXT computer. I had used a Macintosh since I was 19 but after Jobs’ was kicked out of Apple I gravitated to his new invention which blew the Mac away. As Rabbi at Oxford, I regularly hosted world leaders to lecture to our students and I had to have Jobs. So I arranged a meeting with one of his top lieutenants and traveled to Redwood City, California.
A story about the Rebbe from a Litvish ‘Hoch Ah Chainik’ who used to live in Crown Heights, Bochurim who got lost in Manhattan get invited to join the Occupied Wall Street Hakafos and a closed Chabad House in Williamsburg leads a group to join the Satmar Rebbe for Hakofos in the main Shul on Kent Avenue. Read these readers experiences on Tahalucha!
A riveting new film for women by Chabad Israeli filmmaker Tali Avrahami, The Fence (HaGader) is the intense and inspiring story of a Jewish family during a critical point in history. During the 1800s, the Jewish people were experiencing the devastating Cantonist practice of the Czars–which wrenched young Jewish boys away from their families to complete their childhood and young adulthood in the brutal Russian Army–coupled with the destructive enticements of the assimilationist Haskalah intellectual movement. The film’s message is timeless, and eerily relevant to the era we live in today.
CROWN HEIGHTS [CHI] — League underdogs for most of the season, the Daily Steals Kloppers came all the way back and wept the championships last week, claiming their first ever title – with style!
When he was 18 and still living in his hometown of Chattanooga, Tennessee, Beryl Epstein received a call from his older brother, Mordechai, who was about to join the Israel Defense Forces.
Master of Hebrew calligraphy Michel Schwartz, who was cherished for his big heart as much as for his creative art, passed away at the age of 86. His work adorned the walls and tables of Israeli presidents and prime ministers, but for Schwartz, whose biggest projects included illustrating promotional and educational materials on behalf of the educational arm of Chabad-Lubavitch, the greatest honor was to ignite another Jew’s interest in Judaism.
There was once a young man. He was raised in a good home filled with positive influences. He had the best education in a great community. His parents set him on a straight path towards success, but he had his own ideas of what he wanted from life. And so the downward spiral began. He started indulging in the “pleasures” of life… He demanded meat; he started drinking more wine than normal. His parents tried to curb his newly-formed habits and give him life advice, but to no avail. He declined to listen to them, and worse, he demanded that they fund his selfish habits! No matter what his parents did, he refused to turn his life back around. Left with no other choice, his parents are instructed by the Torah to bring him before the Beis Din (Jewish court) to have him sentenced to death. A tragic ending to what could have been such a promising life…
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