Rabbi N. Daniel Korobkin, Author at Jewish Journal

Fear or Fury?

September 2, 2004

It\’s hard to believe that a whole year has passed. Almost one year ago to the day, Dr. David Appelbaum and his daughter, Nava, were murdered when a suicide bomber exploded himself at Cafe Hillel in Jerusalem. Dr. Appelbaum, 50, was the head of emergency medicine at Shaarei Tzedek Hospital, and was a rabbinical scholar to boot. He had treated countless victims of terror, Jewish and Arab patients alike. Nava, 20, was to be wed the next day. Alas, she never made it to her chuppah.

These are painful memories that we are tempted to shelve into the recesses of our distant memories. Yet we dare not, just as we dare not forget the holy martyrs of the Shoah and all other martyrs of our people\’s past.

Not by Bread Alone

August 5, 2004

One of my most memorable Torah lessons from elementary school was the one about the manna. This was the magical food that the Jews ate while traveling through the desert. It was some kind of amorphous bread that fell from heaven daily, and the Torah describes it as being like honey wafers. Part of the magic of the manna was that it could taste like whatever one wanted it to. And this is where the imagination of the wide-eyed child was piqued: If you were thinking about pizza, the manna tasted like pizza; if you were thinking about a thick, juicy steak — well, you get the picture.

Lost in Translation

May 13, 2004

Imagine a foreigner hearing some American idioms for the first time, and the ensuing confusion.

In the Eyes of the Beholder

December 18, 2003

Part of my traditional upbringing as a yeshiva bocher was the belief that anything that took my attention away from a page of Talmud was bitul Torah — a waste of time. And while that may have been a good lesson for an easily distracted teenager, I have since discovered as an adult that there is so much Divine beauty in the world that we forfeit if we keep our noses exclusively inside our books.

Roots of the Divine

October 23, 2003

For all of you ecologists out there (and I believe every good Jew should be one), you know there\’s been a lot in the news lately about this new \”Healthy Forests Initiative,\” which was introduced by our government to help thin overcrowded forests. The debate continues among different environmental groups as to whether this is a good thing or a bad thing. But imagine, for a moment, a world without trees at all. Indeed, this could have been the fate of our world had God\’s original plan been realized. But I\’m getting ahead of myself….

The Big Question

July 31, 2003

The fact that Tisha B\’Av falls in the summer is not just a stroke of bad luck. God deliberately destroyed the Temple in the summer. Summer, when the world is outside their closed homes and offices, taking vacations, having fun.

Dear Rabbi Wolpe

November 21, 2002

Dear Rabbi Wolpe,

I admit it.

As an Orthodox rabbi, I\’m genuinely embarrassed at the moment.

Judging by the recent goings-on in the Jewish book publishing world, where certain Orthodox authors have been taken to task for their controversial writings and books have either been banned, forcibly censored or book tours were canceled, it would seem that we don\’t have our act completely together.

Jewish Journal

Connect. Inform. Inspire.

Jewish Journal

Rabbi N. Daniel Korobkin

Fear or Fury?

Not by Bread Alone

Lost in Translation

In the Eyes of the Beholder

Roots of the Divine

The Big Question

Dear Rabbi Wolpe

Jewish Journal

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