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• Tolkien b’Shvat: Looking to the Middle-earth folk to save our planet

  January 14, 2013 8:38pm

  Columnist Edmon J. Rodman unearths the connections between the Jewish holiday dedicated to trees and “The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey.”

• Linking to Lincoln on Chanukah

  November 30, 2012 8:53pm

  Columnist Edmon J. Rodman suggests a tip of the stovepipe hat to Lincoln for ordering General Grant to cancel the expulsion of Jews from some Dixie areas on the first day of the holiday in 1862.

• For a Thanksgiving seder, it’s all about the ‘hodu’

  November 12, 2012 6:23pm

  Turning to Mayflower passenger William Bradford for inspiration, columnist Edmon J. Rodman offers an orderly Jewish way to say “hodu,” or thanks, on the quintessentially American holiday.

• Rescued from Kristallnacht, a family Torah reaches a new generation

  October 24, 2012 9:38pm

  Seventy years after her great-great-grandfather rescued a German community’s Torah from the tragedy of Kristallnacht — and her family found it — a California bat mitzvah will read from the scroll.

• Cooling the rhetoric in your sukkah of peace

  September 21, 2012 5:50pm

  Amid a presidential campaign, how best to keep a holiday sense of joy and camaraderie in the sukkah? Columnist Edmon J. Rodman goes to an expert for some advice.

• You ain’t heard Kol Nidre yet

  September 20, 2012 8:14pm

  Preparing to lead the evening service on Kol Nidre, columnist Edmon J. Rodman takes a short drive to the resting place of Al Jolson for some inspiration and checks in with a real live cantor for advice.

• Casting away your sins at Tashlich — it’s not just fish food

  September 14, 2012 3:15pm

  On the first day of Rosh Hashanah, a body of flowing water with fish and some bread crumbs are all that’s needed to begin the transformative process of tashlich. (Edmon J. Rodman) LOS ANGELES (JTA) — Can ridding oneself of a year’s sins really be as simple as tossing a piece of bread into the…

• Celebrating life with a tahara dance

  September 10, 2012 8:32pm

  A dance to interpret tahara, the seldom-discussed ritual preparation for burial of a Jewish body, is introduced at a Los Angele conference.

• For Crypto-Jews of New Mexico, art is a window into secret life

  July 16, 2012 8:11pm

  The upcoming gathering in Albuquerque of the Society for Crypto-Judaic Studies is part of a continuing effort to reveal the stories of those who may have had a hidden Jewish past.

• Now playing at a museum mah jongg table: Jewish pop culture

  July 9, 2012 7:30pm

  The “Project Mah Jongg” exhibit, which originated in New York, is making its way to Jewish museums across America, bringing back memories of bams and craks for generations of Jewish women and hopefully enticing new players.