[Author: Simon Berg, Vol. 81, #1, Autumn-Winter 2026} Karaite Judaism is a non-rabbinic alternative form of Judaism that emerged from the mid-8th Century CE in the Islamic world in Iraq. It challenged rabbinic Judaism’s beliefs in the ‘Oral Laws’ of the Torah which were
(Author: Joanne Fedler, Vol. 80, #1, Autumn 2025) Editor’s note: January 2025 saw the passing of the distinguished South African artists and cartoonist Dov Fedler. We thank his daughter Joanne for this insightful and heartfelt tribute to her father, which provides at least
(Author: Gwynne Schrire, Vol. 80, #1, Autumn 2025) In Lewis Carrol’s Alice Through the Looking Glass, the walrus and the carpenter go for a walk on a beach. “The time has come”, the Walrus said, “To talk of many things … and why
(Author: Gwynne Schrire, Vol. 79, #2, Summer 2024) Most people associate the South African Jewish Board of Deputies with tackling antisemitism and taking on the Government when its irrational pro-Hamas and pro-Palestine platform interferes with the Constitutional right of the Jewish community
(Author: Gwynne Schrire, Vol. 79, #1, Winter 2024) We do not know what names Adam gave to the objects around him, but as he did not have to keep medical or business appointments, he was unlikely to have thought of giving names to
(Interview with Lynn Joffe, Vol. 78, #3, Spring-Summer 2023) EDITOR’S INTRODUCTION ‘A fizzing, fulsome and fiercely funny heroine, and a novel charged with music, energy, bounce, juice and joy. Like a Jewish Molly Bloom, let loose on history. I love the way
(Author: Eugenie Freed, Vol 79, #3, Summer 2023) Belshazzar the King made a great feast to a thousand of his lords, and drank wine before the thousand. (The Book of Daniel, 5:1) FROM THE CHRONICLE OF VASHTI Belshazzar King of Babylon was
(Author: Shirley Zar, Vol. 78, #2, Winter 2023) Recently, I read the book Kabbalah in Art and Architecture by Alexander Gorlin, which opened my eyes to my understanding of a building with which I as an architect am familiar, but which remains an
(Author: Charlotte Cohen, Vol. 78, #2, Winter 2023) The conversation was intelligent and stimulating. Spoken quite casually, and despite the fact that I had never heard it used in a sentence before, one word stood out: The word was ‘anthropomorphic.’ Upon
(Author: Paul Trewhela, Vol. 78, #3, Winter 2023) Already as a young woman, Tanya Litvinov found herself at the harsh juncture between literature, art and the totalitarian society of the Soviet Union, where her parents were members of the precarious political elite. When