Introduction
The newest episode of The Jewish Drinking Show explores a common Jewish drinking expression – l’chaim/l’ḥayyim! Based off of his article “L-Ḥayyim”, Ḥakirah 31 (2022): 345-355, Rabbi Dr. Zvi Ron returns to the show (having previously appeared on the show to discuss spilling out drops of wine at the Passover Seder) to discuss saying לחיים! (Sources are available here.)
Bio of Guest
Rabbi Dr. Zvi Ron received semikha from the Israeli Chief Rabbinate and a PhD in Jewish Theology from Spertus University. He served as rabbi of Keneseth Beth Israel Synagogue for ten years in Richmond, Virginia. Along with his wife, Sharon, they moved back to Israel in 2004 with their four children and live in Neve Daniel, Gush Etzion. He teaches at a number of yeshivot and seminaries in Jerusalem. He is the author of two books on Tanakh in Hebrew: ספר קטן וגדול (Rossi Publications, 2006) and ספר העיקר חסר (Mossad HaRav Kook, 2017) about the variable spellings of words in Tanakh. Rabbi Ron also has authored dozens of articles in numerous publications. His newest book, Jewish Customs: Exploring Common and Uncommon Minhagim, was just published this year (Koren, 2024). He is editor of the Jewish Bible Quarterly and was a contestant on The Weakest Link (you can see parts two and three of his appearance (part one was removed for copyright reasons)).
Episode
In addition to being available below in video format, the episode is also available in podcast format on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever else you prefer listening to podcasts: