Sunday, March 07, 2010

Eruvin in the News: East Coast

A Jewish Ritual Collides With Mother Nature

By Samuel G. Freedman

Last Saturday morning, as a blizzard sputtered out its last squalls over Passaic, N.J., Chaya Leah Smolen sent her husband and several children off to synagogue. She issued the children a message that might seem to contradict the essence of winter motherhood: do not carry any tissues.

To that admonition, she added others. The children shouldn’t take their toys or candies, the diversions that usually make Sabbath service easier. Later, after the worshipers had returned, there was a serious theological discussion about whether it was permissible to make snowballs. Read on...

Eruvin in the News: Marlboro, NJ 2

Council Approves Eruv for Orthodox Residents

By Rebecca Morton

MARLBORO — Applause erupted in Town Hall on Feb. 18 as members of Marlboro’s Orthodox Jewish community rejoiced at the Township Council’s approval of the establishment of an eruv in the community.

Mayor Jonathan Hornik said the topic of an eruv was brought to him by the former administration after he was elected Marlboro’s mayor two years ago. Hornik said he did not know enough about an eruv at that time and he eventually researched the topic with the help of members of the Orthodox Jewish community. Read on...

Eruvin in the News: Marlboro, NJ

Marlboro Votes to Establish Jewish Sabbath Boundary

By Alesha Williams Boyd

MARLBORO — The township will join about 25 communities in New Jersey in establishing an eruv for the local Orthodox Jewish community.

An eruv is an area where observant Jews may travel on the Sabbath without the traditional Sabbath prohibitions on such activities as carrying keys or pushing carriages. Eruvin boundaries often are identified by walls, bodies of water and wire running over or along the sides of utility poles. Read on...

The Bais Ephraim Revisited

  As I have written on numerous occasions the argument that the Bais Ephraim maintains that pirtzos esser [breaches of ten amos wide] is ...