Many Ashkenazic Jews who visit Sephardic congregations comment that they are struck by the vitality and energy of Sephardic tefillah. There is no doubt that

Three disputes regarding tefillah bring to life the difference in approach that we described in last week’s column between Rav Mordechai Eliyahu and Chacham Ovadia

The Rambam, Rav Yosef Karo and Rav Ovadia Yosef. This summarizes what many outside the Sephardic community think constitutes the corpus of Sephardic Halacha. Of

I thought Congregation Shaarei Orah, the Sephardic Congregation of Teaneck, always follows Rav Ovadia Yosef. If so, then why on Tisha B’Av at Shacharit do

Ashkenazim are so accustomed to reciting Nacheim only at Mincha of Tisha B’Av that they are shocked to discover that most Sephardic Jews recite Nacheim

Part II Last week we explored the three opinions as to when to say Aneinu on a fast day. Ashkenazim, led by Rashi and the

The Dilemma This could be an awkward moment. The gabai at an Ashkenazi beit knesset calls a Sephardic Jew for shlishi during Mincha on a

If we are blessed with a clear sky this coming Motzaei Shabbat, almost all of the Asheknazic Kehillot in the greater Teaneck area (save for

The Greatness of Ribi Shalom The greatest halachic authority of Moroccan Jewry in recent times was the universally respected and consulted Sephardic rav of Yerushalayim,

A Sephardic Jew who receives an aliyah to the Torah first recites “Hashem Imachem” (“May God be with you”). The congregation then responds, “Yevarechecha Hashem”

For years, we at Shaarei Orah have been praying Arvit early at the end of the first day of Yom Tov leading into the evening