Joshua Blustein
ARTICLES BY: Joshua Blustein
Why It’s Our Duty to Remember the Past
One of my first childhood memories is my pre-kindergarten “Pilgrim’s Landing” reenactment. Half the class dressed as Pilgrims, and sat in canoes. The other half...
How Should American Jews React to Christmas?
Christmas frequently inspired deadly pogroms against European Jewry, and became known in Yiddish as “moyredike nacht” (fearful night), creating a custom known as “Nittel Nacht”...
Does Hanukkah Make You Uncomfortable? This Year Ask Why
The Festival of Lights has long caused confusion. The Talmud in "Tractate Shabbat" asks bluntly: “What is Hanukkah?” The always reliable New York Times published an...
This Year’s World Series Was a Landmark for American Jews
Andy Warhol famously declared “one’s company, two’s a crowd, three’s a party”— and Judaism agrees. A meal is only considered a real gathering, or zimmun,...
This Year, Remember the Importance of the Shofar
The shofar has long been a popular symbol of Judaism thanks to its usage on the High Holidays. But the shofar was once associated not...
How the Hebrew Bible Helped Birth Modern Democracy
Jews brought many wonderful things to modernity, but one of the greatest Jewish breakthroughs arose due to Renaissance Christian efforts. This innovation was “republican exclusivism,”...
Remembering Leo Frank: Antisemitism Then and Now
August 17th marks the 106th anniversary of the lynching of Leo Frank, an Atlanta Jewish businessman who was falsely accused of murder and then kidnapped...
What Jews Owe to Christopher Columbus
I once had a meeting postponed because the client’s office was shut for Columbus Day. Irritated about rescheduling, someone asked “they still celebrate that?” Indeed,...
Yes, Religious Jews Have Played Professional Baseball Before
For Jewish fans of baseball, this was a big week. The Israeli national baseball team began scrimmaging on its warm-up tour before the Olympics, and...
Passover and Preserving History in 2021
Cecil B. Demille’s famous film "The Ten Commandments" was a massive box office hit. Decades before, in 1923, Demille made a silent film of the...
Jewish Americans’ Ties to Baseball Run Deep
Growing up, I knew I was going to be a Major League Baseball star, and play for the New York Yankees. The only complication I...
Why George Washington Is a Hero to the Jews
My grandfather relished in telling of his immigration to America. Previously Jorge, he decided to be called by the English variant "George" when, together with...
