Last week, the small and unassuming mikve (ritual bath) in Hod HaSharon witnessed the unfolding of a remarkable scene in the annals of Jewish history. One by one, six young Chinese men, all descendants of the Jewish community of Kaifeng, China, immersed themselves in the...
[caption id="attachment_10673" align="alignleft" width="300"] Eran Barzilay (back row) with some of the Chinese community in Kaifeng[/caption] Two years ago, following the devastating fire that ravished Israel’s Carmel mountain range, the Jewish community in Kaifeng, China, decided it wanted to donate money to help rebuild the Yemin...
[caption id="attachment_10561" align="alignleft" width="300"] Participants in the seminar[/caption] When most people think of the Inquisition and the subsequent expulsion from the lands where Jews had lived for hundreds of years in Europe, the immediate connotation is with Spain and Portugal. But the perpetrators of the Inquisition...
[caption id="attachment_10538" align="alignleft" width="280"] Rabbi Nissan Ben-Avraham conducts his virtual class[/caption] Spanish speakers can now get an hour-and-a-half dose of “live” Jewish study – entirely online – thanks to Shavei Israel’s emissary to Spain, Rabbi Nissan Ben-Avraham, who has developed an innovative, interactive video course on...
Perhaps more than any other holiday on the Jewish calendar, Hanukah celebrates the determined survival of the Jewish people. Over two millennia ago a small band of fighters, led by Judah the Maccabee, fought against the Hellenist rulers of ancient Israel who sought to assimilate...
[caption id="attachment_10074" align="alignleft" width="295"] Michael Freund and Mayor Júlio José Saraiva Sarmento of Trancoso signing the agreement[/caption] Isaac Cardoso was a Jewish physician and philosopher born in the small village of Trancoso, Portugal, in 1603 to a family of Bnei Anousim (people whose Jewish ancestors were compelled...
[caption id="attachment_10054" align="alignleft" width="300" caption="Jewish community in Bello, Colombia"][/caption] BELLO, Colombia — They were committed evangelicals, devoted to Jesus Christ. But what some here called a spark, an inescapable pull of their ancestors, led them in a different direction, to Judaism. There were the grandparents who wouldn’t eat...
[caption id="attachment_9975" align="alignleft" width="300"] Ariel and Moria under the chuppah[/caption] As they stood under the wedding canopy in the Archipova synagogue in Moscow, Ariel and Moria Shishliannikov were fulfilling a dream they have cherished for years. It’s not the first time they’ve been married. But it is...
Her journey is an inspiring one – and not just the trip on the bus to our meeting. Through remarkable determination, she has pulled herself up, arriving in Israel as a Bnei Menashe immigrant with her family at the sensitive age of only 12, to...
[caption id="attachment_9706" align="alignright" width="300" caption="Xue Fei"][/caption] "My deep Jewish soul was elevated" - Xue Fei, 24, from Kaifeng, China, tells his story for Rosh Hashana. I was born into a regular Chinese family: A father, a mother and a child – me. My...
