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Sarah: Beauty According to the Torah
One of the first episodes in the Torah regarding Sarah, the wife of Avraham, introduces us to her in a very interesting way. Avraham is forced by a famine to leave his home and travel to Egypt. Concerned that the Egyptians, taken by her beauty, will want Sarah for their own, Avraham takes serious precautions…
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Hagar: The Consequences of False Judgements
“Now Sarai, Abram’s wife, had not borne to him, and she had an Egyptian handmaid named Hagar.” Rashi explains that Hagar is Pharaoh’s daughter, that he sent her with Avraham after the whole wife/sister fiasco because he saw the miracles that happened to Avraham and Sarai and said: “It is better that my daughter be…
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Eidel Pappenheim-Dubin: A Forgotten Pioneer of Jewish Women’s Leadership
On February 22, 1917, a beautiful baby girl was born in Vienna to Kalonymus Kalman Pappenheim and Sophie Schiff. She was named Eidel and was the second of seven children born to the Pappenheim family. Time would tell how much Eidel would accomplish in her short 26 years of life. The Pappenheim family were Orthodox…
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Lilith: A Demon, Not to Be Defended nor Glorified
In college, I analyzed the history of vampires in a creative writing class. Interestingly, from each culture researched, the earliest dated origins of vampires came from the Old Testament. No, this is not a comprehensive report on the link between vampires and the various blood-libels against Jews throughout Milena (although, what an interesting topic that…
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The Shabbat Queen: The Life and Legacy of Henny Machlis
She began as an ordinary girl from Brooklyn—yet her life would ascend to extraordinary spiritual heights, placing her among the truly righteous. Who was Henny Machlis, and how did she accomplish so much in just 59 years? Born in 1950 in the United States, Henny was raised in a home that nurtured purpose, Chesed, and…
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Yael: A Woman of Courage and Bravery
There is much that can be learned from the heroic actions of Yael…
