What Happens After Death?

 https://www.chabad.org/library/article_cdo/aid/282508/jewish/What-Happens-After-Death.htm

While there are numerous stations in a soul’s journey, these can generally be grouped into four general phases:

1. the wholly spiritual existence of the soul before it enters the body;
2. physical life;
3. post-physical life in Gan Eden (the “Garden of Eden,” also called “Heaven” and “Paradise”);
4. the “world to come” (olam haba) that follows the resurrection of the dead.

What are these four phases, and why are all four necessary?

 

The Two Watchmen

 https://www.chabad.org/library/article_cdo/aid/352254/jewish/The-Two-Watchmen.htm

Talmud, Sanhedrin 91a–b

Antoninus said to Rabbi Judah HaNassi: The body and the soul can each absolve themselves from judgment. The body can say: “It is the soul who has sinned. Why, from the day it left me, I lie like a dumb stone in the grave!” And the soul can say: “It’s the body who transgressed. From the day I departed from it, I fly about in the air like a bird!”

"Orthodox" gay marriage and the path to destruction

 https://www.israelnationalnews.com/Articles/Article.aspx/25249

(We cannot fail to note an Israeli Open Orthodox rabbi (Benny Lau) who attended a gay wedding with his well wishes, Rabbi Avi Weiss who, while rejecting Orthodox gay “marriage”, takes a very soft stance on going public on homosexuality, and Open Orthodox Rabbi Dr. Daniel Sperber, who sanctions the idea of “Orthodox” gay marriage, so long as another word, such as “partnership”, is used for it.)

Ra'am MK Mazen Ghainem: If Israel fires on Gaza, I'll topple the government

 https://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/309629

MK Walid Taha of the United Arab List has informed the government that his four-MK-strong party will no longer be voting in the Knesset, nor will it be participating in Knesset committee discussions, “until further notice.”

It appears that the United Arab List (UAL) has been offended by overtures made by Foreign Minister Yair Lapid and Defense Minister Benny Gantz to the predominantly Arab Joint List party, in attempt to garner their support in key Knesset votes and thus to free the coalition of dependency on the UAL and possibly eject the UAL from the government entirely.

Earlier on Sunday, Radio Mekan reporter Amit Segal quoted UAL MK Mazen Ghainem in threats he made on the government. “There’s no love lost between [UAL head] Mansour Abbas and the new government,” Ghainem said. “Bennett and Netanyahu? They’re both bad.”

 

 

As Israel’s biblical farming sabbatical nears, medical cannabis is budding issue

 https://www.timesofisrael.com/as-israels-biblical-farming-sabbatical-nears-medical-cannabis-is-budding-issue/

As many Israelis prepare to “rest the land” during the upcoming agricultural sabbatical year as commanded in the Book of Exodus, a debate has been sparked among rabbinical authorities as to whether locally grown cannabis will be subject to a complex set of guidelines. Will religious Jews be permitted to benefit from the plant in any way while observing the biblical laws of shmita that were set from on high?

The debate stems from the biblical commandment that residents of the Holy Land observe seven-year cycles culminating in a Jubilee every 50th year, with specific laws dictating matters such as loan forgiveness and the return of property titles. Most of the laws, however, deal with agriculture, and include restrictions on planting, tending, harvesting or even claiming ownership of crops that grew in one’s own field.

Scientists Identify Specific Human Brain Circuit for Spirituality

 https://scitechdaily.com/scientists-identify-specific-human-brain-circuit-for-spirituality/

 A new study led by investigators at Brigham and Women’s Hospital takes a new approach to mapping spirituality and religiosity and finds that spiritual acceptance can be localized to a specific brain circuit. This brain circuit is centered in the periaqueductal gray (PAG), a brainstem region that has been implicated in numerous functions, including fear conditioning, pain modulation, altruistic behaviors and unconditional love. The team’s findings are published in Biological Psychiatry.

“Our results suggest that spirituality and religiosity are rooted in fundamental, neurobiological dynamics and deeply woven into our neuro-fabric,” said corresponding author Michael Ferguson, PhD, a principal investigator in the Brigham’s Center for Brain Circuit Therapeutics. “We were astonished to find that this brain circuit for spirituality is centered in one of the most evolutionarily preserved structures in the brain.”

MK Hendel: 'We won't cease demolishing terrorists' homes to placate US'

 https://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/309593

Communications Minister Yoaz Hendel (Derech Eretz) has promised that the Israeli government will not cease demolishing terrorists' homes to placate the US government.

"We do what is good for the State of Israel," he told Kan 11. "The new government's policy is clear when it comes to violations of sovereignty and the management of terror. Sometimes we may disagree with he US government, but most of the time we will go hand in hand."

Hendel added that the first dispute between the Biden administration and Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett's government was with regards to the demolition of a terrorist's home, and that the dispute is not a rift in relations.

'The home of a family should not be demolished for the actions of one individual'

 https://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/309538

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken has raised concerns with Israeli officials over the demolition of the home of the family of a terrorist, State Department spokesman Ned Price said on Thursday.

"The secretary and other senior officials here at the State Department in recent days have raised these concerns directly with senior Israeli officials, and we will continue to do so as long as this practice continues," Price told reporters.

"As we've said numerous times now, the home of an entire family should not be demolished for the actions of one individual," Price added.

 

Private panel of rabbis annuls marriage of abused wife who sought divorce -the Kaminetsky heter

 https://www.timesofisrael.com/private-panel-of-rabbis-annuls-marriage-of-abused-wife-who-sought-divorce/

The private court, headed by Rabbi Daniel Sperber and convened by the Center for Women’s Justice organization, dissolved the marriage on the grounds that the woman would not have agreed to the nuptials had she known of her husband’s criminal record, which included time in prison for assaulting his first wife.

 Sperber said that his ruling did not conflict with the state-approved Chief Rabbinate of Israel, which has a monopoly on marriages and divorces, as he was not granting a divorce but rather invalidating the marriage in the first place.

However, Kobi Alter, the spokesperson from the Chief Rabbinate of Israel, told The Times of Israel that the dissolution was not recognized by the rabbinate and that the woman would not be allowed to remarry via state authorities as she is still considered married.

Groundbreaking ruling in rabbinical court frees 23-year 'chained woman' - the Kaminetsky heter

 https://www.jpost.com/israel-news/groundbreaking-ruling-in-private-rabbinical-court-frees-23-year-agunah-559190

 In a groundbreaking development for divorce rights in Israel, Tzviya Gorodetsky, who has sought a divorce from her husband for 23 years, has been freed from her marriage by a private, ad hoc Orthodox rabbinical court headed by respected Orthodox rabbi and talmudist Rabbi Daniel Sperber.

The ruling could pave the way for more such women to avail themselves of private rabbinical courts, if they believe that they have no chance of ever escaping their failed marriages. It follows other attempts to bypass established religious institutions in such realms as conversion, kashrut and marriage.A similar ruling by another such ad hoc court was issued in 2013.

 The Chief Rabbinate is certain to reject the validity of the divorce, but Gorodetsky could likely remarry in a private Orthodox ceremony if she so wished.

PA orders Palestinian businesses to remove Hebrew signs

 https://www.jpost.com/arab-israeli-conflict/pa-orders-palestinian-businesses-to-remove-hebrew-signs-673265

 Abdullah Kmeil, the Palestinian Authority Governor of the Salfit district in the central West Bank, on Thursday issued a “strict decision” obligating all commercial installations and shops in the area to remove signs and billboards written in Hebrew.

Kmeil, who is also a senior official with the ruling Fatah faction headed by PA President Mahmoud Abbas, ordered the businesses to replace the signs and billboards with ones written in Arabic.

The decision came after many Palestinian businesses in the West Bank, especially those close to settlements, started hanging signs in Hebrew to attract Jewish clients.

Kmeil gave the businesses one week to comply with the decision, according to the Salfit Governorate Public Relations and Media Department.

Kmeil said that the measure “comes in light of a decision that was taken previously and confirming that the occupation is exploiting the scene of the signs in Hebrew for purposes that serve its racist and fascist policy.”

 

High Court rejects petition against Jewish nation-state law

https://www.timesofisrael.com/liveblog-july-08-2021/

Justices rule there are no grounds to throw out the 2018 legislation, say it anchors Israel’s identify as a Jewish state without undermining its democratic character

 

Child-abusing daycare provider sentenced to 9.5 years in prison

 https://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/309504

 The operator of a daycare center in central Israel who was convicted of abusing nearly a dozen infants and toddlers was sentenced Thursday to nine-and-a-half years in prison.

Carmel Mauda, 28, the operator of the ‘Baby Love’ daycare center in Rosh Ha’ayin, received the sentence at the Central District in Lod Thursday afternoon, after arriving accompanied by her father.

Bezalel Smotrich: 'Insane' that divorced fathers shouldn't have anything to eat

 https://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/309500

 MK Bezalel Smotrich, who heads the Knesset's Religious Zionism party, has called on Welfare Minister Meir Cohen (Yesh Atid) to eliminate the discrimination against divorced fathers.

"One of the worst crimes happening today in the State of Israel is the discrimination against divorced fathers," Smotrich said. "It's a complex and complicated issue. It has a lot of facets and small letters."

Smotrich recalled his pre-election promise to change how the issue is managed, prevent parental alienation, and prevent abuse of false allegations as a way of managing divorce.