Disclaimer: I felt this issue was important enough of a mussar lesson to come out of retirement briefly. As you surely know, most people don’t realize I’m in retirement, there are still several thousand folks actually reading the drivel I…
Tag: halacha
Hilchos Ice Bucket Challenge
by Rabbi Yerachmiel Kalonymous Eiswasser The so-called Ice Bucket Challenge or Nisayon D’li Kerach in halachic terms has brought the machle (illness) ALS (Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis) to the attention of Jew and gentile alike. This time-honored minhag, referred to as…
I’m obsessed with wearing shatnez
My parents bought me my first good suit for my bar mitzvah, they told me that since I was going to be responsible for mitzvos, I should take it to the local shatnez tester and get it checked out. The…
New sefer on Hilchos Prison
With more and more Orthodox Jews going to prison these days (obviously it’s due to antisemitism and those who are moser) one has to wonder about the strange halachic conundrums that must come up. How does one know what time…
10 best tznius posters and letters
I’m not exactly sure when certian people in the frum community decided to make tznius into the cause of all the calamities that befall the Jewish people, but it seems that the two major causes of evil in this world…
The 25 best Jewish loopholes
Look, if Judaism wasn’t full of tricks, shortcuts, and loopholes, I’m pretty sure that the religion would have died already. One of the reasons that Judaism has survived, is because you can pretty much find a way out of anything,…
How breaking halacha made me a better Jew
In response to The Tablet article on a woman who stopped covering her hair I grew up in a regular frum home in Brooklyn, everything was normal, I went to bais yaakov, got married, and had a regular frum life,…
The Carpool is the latest breach in tznius
It’s unfortunate that our society has begun the downward spiral in morality, but since the beginning of time, each generation has had it’s own yetzer harahs and these days The Carpool has become a serious nisayon that we have only…
Will frummies finally celebrate Thanksgiving this year?
Thanksgiving is one of the few goyishe holidays that is actually a debate in the frum community. Unlike most other goyishe holidays, Thanksgiving is a new world holiday and therefore there is some sort of mesorah to celebrate it. It…
Shabbos Toilet Paper
For the first time in my life I was assigned the task of cutting toilet paper for shabbos. In my modern orthodox youth we used tissues and it wasn’t until years later that I heard of cutting toilet paper on…
The Halachos of Halloween
I’m pretty sure that the only goyishe holiday celebrated en masse by Jews is Halloween, on Christmas we go to Chinese Food thereby not celebrating it, on Thanksgiving we push it off to shabbos, and sometime after Easter we buy…
Should we beat up men who refuse to give their wife a get?
I guess it’s the question of the week and it seems that pretty much everyone in the frum community supports such practice, I know I do, I just think it’s a shame they got caught by the FBI. There’s been…
Rav Ovadia Yosef: The last lenient gadol!
I don’t normally do posts on folks who pass away unless they were as cool looking as Rav Ovadia Yosef. He was the Sephardic gadol hador and we mostly know him as that Arabic imam look alike who wore sunglasses,…
Women should not be allowed to eat in the sukkah
I’ve gotten this picture from several folks and I just don’t understand what the big deal is? I think it’s like anything most of the klal is not used to and would be the same response toward any mitzvah in…
Do you really need to ask a Rav?
Do You Really Need To Ask A Rav? By Esterina Seto The purpose of this article is to challenge the firmly entrenched idea within the Torah community that rabbinical counsel should be sought in all crucial life decisions or halachic…
Women of the Wall is a sham
Pretty much the entire Jewish world is talking about Women of the Wall, they have either desecrated one of the worlds holy sites or made it holy by standing up for women’s rights, but I’m not sure that either are…
Dear R’ Heshy: Are vegans going against halacha?
Dear R’ Heshy, I know we’re friends on Facebook, but I’m not sure if you saw the tumult on HaRav HaGaon Eliyahu Finks Facebook beis medrish today. He asked his chassidim, whether or not Heimishe Vegans were a possibility. Naturally,…
Halachic Debate: Is there kosher sefira music?
I am not a learned guy, sure I pasken for myself, can leaf through a mishna brura and try to talk in learning with any folks who may be interested, but I do not write halachic diatribes. However, I do…
What is the halachic way to wipe your butt?
Hi Heshy, I was reading https://www.frumsatire.net/2011/03/16/strange-orthodox-jewish-beliefs-and-customs/ which is amazing, and was wondering if you had any idea what the sources were, or where I could find out more on: the halachic way to wipe your butt. I swear there’s a good reason…
Off The Derech Community writes Halachic Guidelines
In the early 90’s when the Kids At Risk movement began it wasn’t anything to get too excited over, basically a bunch of yeshiva kids with ADHD who would roam from yeshiva to yeshiva until they hit the end of…
Gender Bending
Gender Bending by Chaya Miriam Fried I, like everyone else, pretended to be shocked when the halachic ruling was released today allowing select couples to choose the gender of their burgeoning babies with the help of a rav, of cour$e.…
Is Gambling Assur?
Is Gambling Assur? by Chaya Miriam Fried I’ve been told that there are quite a few ins and outs regarding the halachos of gambling. Most of them, though, deal with dice games. In Tractate Sanhedrin, dice gamers are called kubiustos…
Dear Heshy: I saw a frum woman wearing a bikini and covering her hair!
I just received the following, and I’ve been getting them for years : Greetings, thought would like this…my family and I are hanging by the pool…and there is this obvious young Lubavitcher long beard, baseball cap and his wife with…
Hilchos Christmas
Guest post by Eliyahu Fink Last week, a friend of mine asked his Facebook friends if Santa Claus was mechuyav to go to Church on Christmas. I answered “oisek b’mitzvah patur min hamitzvah”. That question and answer spawned an idea…
Frum Inconsistencies: Don’t Judge Judaism by the Jews
One of the toughest things I’ve had to do recently is to try and explain frum inconsistencies to people who couldn’t get a grip on reality. The reality that Orthodox Jews are not perfect and in fact they are inherently…