According to Kipa, the Ministry of Culture, headed by Minister Chili Tropper, is "looking into" the possibility of opening running a program called "Israeli Shabbat" (שבת ישראלית) . This Israeli Shabbbat program would include, possibly, the opening of museums on Shabbos for free, sponsored by the ministry.

It is being reported that an employee at the Anne Frank House in Amsterdam was banned from wearing his yarmulke on premises.

It seems that the reason given was that "wearing the skullcap might endanger the neutrality of the foundation which runs the museum and 'influence its work combating antisemitism'."

All's well that ends well. After appealing the decision and 6 months of discussions about the matter they decided to allow him to wear the kippa.

talk about cultural appropriation! The Anne Frank House, commemorating a Jewish child that was hiding out from the Nazis, feels it must remain neutral on all symbols, including Jewish ones. They are taking the Jewishness out of the commemoration of a Jewish girl hiding out because she was Jewish! Had she been not Jewish, she would not have been in hiding, so the Jewishness is integral to the incident and even the commemoration. You cannot just turn a Jewish situation like that into a neutral symbol of oppression, though you can rally around the banner of the oppression in that incident and apply it globally to all victims of oppression, but of course you cannot deny the Jewish aspect of it.

I would guess, humorously, that they probably allowed Mr Vingerling to wear his kippa when working in the attic, and the problem was only in the rest of the house.

Yesterday I took my family to The Biblical Museum of Natural History.

The museum is in the Bet Shemesh [Northern] Industrial Zone and is a gem.

The entire family (we were a group of about 25 family members from under 3 years of age until mid-60s) enjoyed the visit to the museum.

The museum was founded and is operated by Rabbi Natan Slifkin. While some might worry about the old cherem on some of his works, they can rest assured that he has kept all controversial materials out of his museum in order to keep the museum in the consensus, and so that everybody can enjoy and learn..

The tour starts with a presentation by Rabbi Slifkin in which he talks about some of the issues the museum deals with, the types of animals and displays, some of the biblical discussions of animals, and the like, and ends with a video of Rabbi Slifkin "in the wild" with the king of the animal kingdom.

From there the tour moves on to the room with all the displays. On display is a variety of taxidermied animals alongside live animals and pieces of animals, as well as his famous display of exotic shofars. He has some items on display that is just mind-boggling how he got those items, at all, and specifically to Israel.

Rabbi Slifkin leads the tour through the displays, stopping at each item and explaining its history, its relevance in the Tanakh and often some discussion around it, such as analysis of the name, how the animal came to Israel or how it was indigenous to Israel but no longer is, debates over names of animals on the Torah and what they might refer to, and the like. Some of the displays can be held by the people, such as snakes and reptiles, as well as some others. The tour is both exciting and fascinating.

At the end, they have a small petting zoo of rabbits and guinea pigs and chicks outside that the kids can play with for a while.

Everybody had a great time.

Not only should you include a visit to the Biblical Museum of Natural History on your touring itinerary, but schools should make this site a regular visit on their annual schedule of educational sites.

Here are some pictures from our visit:

One of the latest issues in the news the past few days is the fight over an exhibit in a museum.

The science museum in Haifa is bringing in an exhibit of the human body. 2 cadavers will be on display.

The haredi rabbonim, and the Chief Rabbi of Israel, have called for the religious to boycott the museum and not go to the display. They are upset about "kavod hameis" - dignity/respect for the dead.

I am not really sure how that works. The cadavers donated themselves (during life) to science for the purpose of research. Once could make a case to say that kavod hameis would be to allow their benefit of the learning from these bodies that their display will offer. Also, these bodies are not those of Jews, so there should be no issue of insistence of burial and kavod due to being Jewish (not to say goyim deserve less kavod, but when the non-Jew requested his body be on display, I am not sure the same usage of the term "kavod" applies).

But I can accept it.

I do just want to mention that growing up in Chicago we had one of the best science museums in the world - the Museum of Science and Industry (Chicago). The place is amazing. We always enjoyed two exhibits the best - the Coal Mine exhibit where you go down in a cable car into a "real" coal mine. That is way cool. Even as an adult I enjoyed that.

The second exhibit, the one that is my favorite, is one they have had on display called "Body Slices". Body Slices is a display in a glass case of the human body. The bodies were sliced up at different parts to pieces 1/2 inch thick, so you see the different parts of the body from the angle of a slice of meat - with all the bone and other matter in place. So you see exactly what constructs each part of the body, no imagination required.

I was always fascinated by "Body Slices", and for some reason the gore of it never bothered me (even though I normally cannot look at human gore).

So, while I guess it is not kavod hameis for the museum to display this new exhibit, it is a shame because such exhibits can really be fascinating and educational.