Tikkun Olam

I received a comment from "Anonymous" on my previous post , which was about the archeological find  of a 2000+ year old cave from the time of the Hasmoneans .  The commenter asked why that could be a reason to become a religious  Jew.  Good question.  To the average non-Jewish person, perhaps, the find might be interesting in a general way; to an archaeologist or historian, it would be interesting as a historical find which would validate and increase our knowledge of the past.   For a Jew, however, such a find as this means so much more. Look at it this way: we live today in the “Information Age,” right?  We are bombarded with information and have been for years, through the media--through radio, television and newspapers, and in our high-technology era on the Internet through virtual news sites, blogs and now social-networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter.  How can we assimilate all this? How do we know what is truth and what is fiction?   And, for that matter, how ...

I should have written about this on Chanukah, but time did not permit (hat tip to my older son, Mister A ., for sending me this story) so I am posting it now. Those who say that Jews are usurpers in the land of Israel, need to see this video and read the story (the original is in Hebrew; translation below). In brief, a secular Israeli Jew was building his house in Jerusalem, when he accidentally, while digging out his basement came upon a cave five meters underground. It contained writings in ancient Hebrew, and what seems to be the burial place of the last Hasmonean king, Mattityahu ben Yehudah (Mattathias: not to be confused with Matityahu ben Yochanan , the father of Yehuda Maccabee). As a result of his findings, this secular Israeli Jew did teshuva ("returned") and became religious. Hanukkah miracle: a secret burial cave was discovered in a garden house in Givat Hamivtar, Jerusalem. One hypothesis is that the burial cave belongs to none other than the last Hasmone...