Rabbi Kalman Packouz | |
---|---|
Title | Rabbi |
Personal | |
Born | |
Died | 2019 |
Religion | Judaism |
Children | David Packouz |
Yeshiva | Aish HaTorah |
Kalman Packouz was an Orthodox rabbi who pioneered various Jewish educational initiatives geared towards baalei teshuva ("returnee to Judaism") outreach.
Packouz was raised in Portland, Oregon, and attended Temple Beth Israel, a Reform temple. In 1979, after receiving rabbinical ordination in Jerusalem, Packouz started the first Aish HaTorah branch in St. Louis. Packouz served for ten years as executive director of Aish HaTorah international operations, and was head of the Miami office of Aish HaTorah's worldwide programs. [1] He was a contributor to simpletoremember.com. [2] He was also a special correspondent for the Sun Sentinel . [3] He was married and the father of nine children, [1] including former international arms dealer and inventor David Packouz. [4] Packouz died in 2019. [5]
Packouz spoke out on Jewish continuity through marriage, and in 1976 authored the book, How to Stop an Intermarriage. The book was later expanded and retitled as: How to Prevent an Intermarriage - A Guide For Parents to Prevent Broken Hearts. [6] [7]
In 1992, Packouz launched the Shabbat Shalom Weekly, an electronic publication distributed each week via fax and email. [1]
In 1997, Packouz created Window on the Wall, [8] a 24-hour live webcam from the Western Wall in Jerusalem. [9]
Sukkot is a Torah-commanded holiday celebrated for seven days, beginning on the 15th day of the month of Tishrei. It is one of the Three Pilgrimage Festivals on which Israelites were commanded to make a pilgrimage to the Temple in Jerusalem. Originally a harvest festival celebrating the autumn harvest, Sukkot’s modern observance is characterized by festive meals in a sukkah, a temporary wood-covered hut, celebrating the Exodus from Egypt.
Shavuot, or Shvues, is a Jewish holiday, one of the biblically ordained Three Pilgrimage Festivals. It occurs on the sixth day of the Hebrew month of Sivan; in the 21st century, it may fall anywhere between May 15 and June 14 on the Gregorian calendar.
Yohanan ben Zakkai, sometimes abbreviated as ריב״ז ribaz for Rabbi Yohanan ben Zakkai, was a tanna, an important Jewish sage during the late Second Temple period during the transformative post-destruction era. He was a primary contributor to the core text of Rabbinic Judaism, the Mishnah. His name is often preceded by the honorific title Rabban. He is widely regarded as one of the most important Jewish figures of his time, and his escape from the Roman destruction of Jerusalem may have been instrumental in Rabbinic Judaism's survival post-Temple. His tomb is located in Tiberias within the Maimonides burial compound.
Aish formerly known as Aish HaTorah, is a Jewish educational organization. The focus of Aish is to spread Jewish Wisdom to Jews around the globe utilizing a massive online presence made up of its website Aish.com and various social media channels. In addition to the educational organization there is also a yeshiva and women's seminary as well as several other in-person programs that make up the organization's main campus in Jerusalem.
World Agudath Israel, usually known as the Aguda, was established in the early twentieth century as the political arm of Ashkenazi Torah Judaism. It succeeded Agudas Shlumei Emunei Yisroel in 1912. Its base of support was located in Eastern Europe before the Second World War but, due to the revival of the Hasidic movement, it included Orthodox Jews throughout Europe. Prior to World War II and the Holocaust, Agudath Israel operated a number of Jewish educational institutions throughout Europe. After the war, it has continued to operate such institutions in the United States as Agudath Israel of America, and in Israel. Agudath Israel is guided by its Moetzes Gedolei HaTorah in Israel and the USA.
Yisrael Noah Weinberg was an Orthodox rabbi and the founder of Aish HaTorah.
Shraga Simmons is an Orthodox Jewish rabbi, journalist, filmmaker, brand builder and leader in Torah-themed marketing. He is the co-founder of Aish.com, the educational website and co-founder of HonestReporting, the pro-Israel media watch group. He is also founder and director of the online Torah academy JewishPathways.com.
A Jewish wedding is a wedding ceremony that follows Jewish laws and traditions. While wedding ceremonies vary, common features of a Jewish wedding include a ketubah that is signed by two witnesses, a chuppah or huppah, a ring owned by the groom that is given to the bride under the canopy, and the breaking of a glass.
Kalonimus Kalman Szapiro, was the Grand Rabbi of Piaseczno, Poland, who authored a number of works and was murdered by the Nazis during the Holocaust. He is best remembered for a series of homilies on parshah that were delivered almost every Shabbat during the time he spent with his students in the Warsaw ghetto between the years 1939 and 1942. Shortly after the final entry in this series of meditations, the entire community in the ghetto was sent to the gas chambers in Treblinka. This work is collected under the title Esh Kodesh.
Har HaMenuchot is the largest cemetery in Jerusalem. The hilltop burial ground lies at the western edge of the city adjacent to the neighborhood of Givat Shaul, with commanding views of Mevaseret Zion to the north, Motza to the west, and Har Nof to the south. Opened in 1951 on 300 dunams of land, it has continually expanded into new sections on the northern and western slopes of the hill. As of 2008, the cemetery encompasses 580 dunams in which over 150,000 people are buried.
Yitzchak Shmuel Halevi Berkovits is an American-born Orthodox Jewish rabbi, rosh yeshiva, rosh kollel, and posek in Israel. In 16 years as Menahel Ruchani of Yeshivas Aish HaTorah and halakha lecturer at EYAHT, Aish HaTorah's College of Jewish Studies for Women, he built a reputation as a lucid orator on Jewish law and philosophical topics and a mentor to hundreds of English-speaking, baalei teshuva young men and women. In 2001, he founded The Jerusalem Kollel, a rabbinic ordination and training program which prepares students for kiruv (outreach) positions around the world. In 2019, he was appointed rosh yeshiva of Yeshivat Aish HaTorah in Jerusalem. He also serves as rosh kollel of an international network of evening kollelim run by Linas HaTzedek: The Center for Jewish Values in Israel and the United States, which spreads the awareness of the laws of bein adam lechaveiro.
Orthodox Jewish outreach, often referred to as Kiruv or Qiruv, is the collective work or movement of Orthodox Judaism that reaches out to non-observant Jews to encourage belief in God and life according to Jewish law. The process of a Jew becoming more observant of Orthodox Judaism is called teshuva making the "returnee" a baal teshuva. Orthodox Jewish outreach has worked to enhance the rise of the baal teshuva movement.
EYAHT, was a full-time college for advanced Jewish learning for women in Jerusalem.
The Pressburg Yeshiva, was the largest and most influential Yeshiva in Central Europe in the 19th century. It was founded in the city of Pressburg, Austrian Empire by Rabbi Moshe Sofer and was considered the largest Yeshiva since the time of the Babylonian Talmud.
Denah Weinberg was an Orthodox Jewish Rebbetzin and founder and dean of EYAHT College of Jewish Studies for Women in Jerusalem. EYAHT has over 2,000 alumnae. She was also a speaker on women's issues in Israel and abroad, and published several essays in Jewish women's anthologies. She was married to Rabbi Noah Weinberg, founder of Yeshivat Aish HaTorah. She died in Jerusalem on March 12, 2023.
The Jerusalem Kollel is a rabbinic education program with the stated goal of training kollel couples to assume positions of leadership in Jewish communities worldwide. The intensive 3-year program covers the laws of Shabbat, Nidah, and Issur v'Heteras well as a large body of other legal areas and in addition to Jewish Philosophy and Ethics. There is also an additional training component which includes such areas as public speaking, rabbinic counselling, kashrus, non-profit management among other things.
A Western Wall camera, also known as a wallcam, is a live webcam that displays action at the Western Wall live as it is taking place.
Lori Palatnik is the founding director of Momentum. Formerly called The JWRP, Momentum works to strengthen Jewish identity and connection to Israel through young mothers in their communities. She is an educator, public speaker, and community activist.
Deborah Brin is one of the first openly gay rabbis and one of the first hundred women rabbis. She is now the rabbi emerita of Congregation Nahalat Shalom in Albuquerque, New Mexico.
David Mordechai Packouz is an American arms dealer, musician and inventor. Packouz joined Efraim Diveroli on the 17th of September 2005, in Diveroli's arms company AEY Inc. By the end of 2006, the company had won 149 contracts worth around $10.5 million. In early 2007, AEY secured a nearly $300 million U.S. government contract to supply the Afghan Army with 100 million rounds of AK-47 ammunition, aviation rockets and other munitions. The ammunition that AEY had secured in Albania to fulfill the contract had originally come from China, violating the terms of AEY's contract with the US Army, which bans Chinese ammunition. Packouz was aware that the products were prohibited and would not be accepted, and was instrumental in the covering up of the origins of the ammunition.