In the News

Huffington Post By Michelle Schweiger Schecter In an event held on the eve of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s birthday, I had the pleasure of introducing Rabbi Marc Schneier to a group of teens at Renaissance Education, Music, and Sports, a not-for-profit that serves the South Bronx by providing music and sports enrichment programming, as well as after-school and weekend academic tutoring, to elementary, middle and high school students in Upper Manhattan, Harlem and the Bronx. For almost two hours,...

Jewish Daily Forward By Marc Schneier This year, we commemorate the birthday of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. on January 21, the same day that we celebrate the inauguration of Barack Obama to his second term as president of the United States. Martin Luther King Jr. Day also marks the beginning of a year-long observance of the 50th Anniversary of King’s transcendent “I Have a Dream Speech” at the March on Washington that took place on August 28, 1963. Nearly half a century has passed since that historic...

Jewish Daily Forward By Marc Schneier This year, we commemorate the birthday of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. on January 21, the same day that we celebrate the inauguration of Barack Obama to his second term as president of the United States. Martin Luther King Jr. Day also marks the beginning of a year-long observance of the 50th Anniversary of King’s transcendent “I Have a Dream Speech” at the March on Washington that took place on August 28, 1963. Nearly half a century has passed since that historic...

Palm Beach Daily News By Betty Nelander A national prayer honoring the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., written by Rabbi Marc Schneier, will be inaugurated at a special service Saturday at New Synagogue, 235 Sunrise Ave. The prayer has been distributed to thousands of Jewish organizations and in advertising. Schneier, author of Shared Dreams: Martin Luther King Jr. and the Jewish Community, will recite the prayer with the congregation at a commemoration starting at 10:30 a.m., during a Shabbat service...

Global Grind By Russell Simmons Editor’s Note: This article was originally written for The Huffington Post by Russell Simmons & Rabbi Marc Schneier On Jan. 7, exactly two weeks before we are to simultaneously celebrate the life of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and inaugurate Barack Obama to his second term as President of the United States, sinister advertisements went up in dozens of subway stations around New York City, making evident that despite the undoubted strides our nation has made toward...

Jewish Telegraphic Agency By Gil Shefler NEW YORK (JTA) — An interfaith group distributed a specially composed memorial prayer for the Rev. Martin Luther King to U.S. synagogues. The prayer sent out by the Foundation for Ethnic Understanding honoring King is to be recited on Jan. 19, the Sabbath before the federal holiday two days later honoring the slain civil rights activist. “Grant us the wisdom to truly understand that all of humanity is created equally in Your image so that ‘an injustice...

Huffington Post By Rabbi Marc Schneier and Russell Simmons On Jan. 7, exactly two weeks before we are to simultaneously celebrate the life of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and inaugurate Barack Obama to his second term as President of the United States, sinister advertisements went up in dozens of subway stations around New York City, making evident that despite the undoubted strides our nation has made toward achieving justice and equality, bigotry and fear-mongering remain alive and well in America. The...

By Rabbi Marc Schneier The end of year 2012 coincides with the end of days for our Patriarch Jacob, which was the focus of the biblical reading last Shabbat. Jacob, lying on his deathbed, looks over to his children. Will he remember the internecine conflict among his sons, the hatred among the brothers, the attempt at fracticide, and the disappearance of Joseph that caused Jacob so much distress and anguish or will he remember how he, Jacob, provoked his children, favoring one son over the other...

Huffington Post By Rabbi Marc Schneier Hanukkah, the eight day holiday which the Jewish people just observed, is first and foremost, about miracles. Hanukkah commemorates both the miracle of the victory of the Jewish people led by Judah Maccabee in their uprising against their Greek oppressors in 165 B.C.E. and the miracle that the menorah in the reconsecrated Temple in Jerusalem burned for eight days, even though there was only enough oil to light it for one day. To be sure, miracles have always...

The Times of Israel By Rabbi Marc Schneier Miracles have always played a major role in Jewish history; indeed, the very survival of the Jews as a people, despite nearly 2000 years of exile and persecution, is the greatest miracle of all. Yet in the Talmud, our sages remind us that one must not rely on miracles. Yes, miracles can happen, but one has to work terribly hard to make them possible. Over the past six years, I have been privileged to take part in a modern-day miracle; the establishment of...