Search results for: Jewish law (halakhah)

What does it mean to have a Jewish state? For one thing, when living in a non-Jewish society, we often rely on non-Jewish neighbors to help us navigate difficult areas of Jewish practice, such as running hospitals on Shabbat. In a predominantly Jewish society in which many public services are run by the state, alternative solutions must be developed in order to foster Shabbat observance in the public arena. In this virtual tour of the Zomet Institute’s “Experiential Visitor Center”, students go behind the scenes to understand how the Zomet Institute’s Rabbis and Engineers solve techno-halachic problems by developing innovative and ingenious devices that enable Israeli society to maintain Shabbat observance in a modern context.

“She’s a creep!” Well, everyone recognizes that as lashon hara. But many people don’t realize that an off-hand remark or look made by one of our best of friends can be lashon hara too. That’s why Torah Live chose real-life friend situations, to teach viewers the laws of Shmiras HaLoshon (guarding one’s tongue) for Chapter Two of The Lost Light. To do this, we created our own girls’ school, dubbed “Torah Live High School” by production manager Sharon Katz. The scenes were actually filmed in an elementary school in the town of Efrat. They illustrate how easily we can fall into the trap of speaking lashon hara, even when that’s not the intention.

We are very proud to have been selected to pilot a new halacha course with Rabbi Yosef Zvi Rimon and his institute for halacha, Merkaz Halakha. Last year, the Academy piloted a successful curriculum in the laws of kashrut with girls in Advanced Jewish Studies Program that was prepared in Israel especially for the Academy. Building on that program’s success, we expanded the project this year with new materials for teaching the laws of Shabbat and a special unit on shmita. The pilot of the Shabbat curriculum for sophomore girls is led by Mrs. Yitzhak and Rabbi Segal.