Our Rabbis J, E, P, and D
At the heart of Benjamin D. Sommer’s project is a contrast between the stenographic theory of revelation and what he calls the “participatory” theory, which “puts a premium on human agency and gives witness to the grandeur of a God who accomplishes a providential task through the free will of human subjects under God’s authority.”
Passport Sepharad
The recent offers of citizenship by Spain and Portugal tap into a long, rich, and complicated Sephardi history of dubious passports, desperate backup plans, and extraterritorial dreams.
Pious Censorship
ArtScroll is not alone on Marc B. Shapiro’s hit list of haredi publishers and publications guilty of censorship and deliberate distortions.
Promised Land or Homeland?
The university presses of Cambridge and Oxford have released two new works of Jewish political theory that blend theoretical defenses of Zionism with robust critique of what Chaim Gans calls the “Zionist mainstream.”
Religion and Power
Rabbi Sacks, who is in the end an optimistic thinker, sees a process of internecine violence leading to religious moderation happening within Islam now.
Saladin, a Knight, and a Jew Walk Onto a Stage
Outside of Germany, Nathan the Wise is one of those works more often read than performed, and more often read about than actually read.
Summer of ’36
By 1936, Joseph Roth’s alcoholism was increasingly desperate, and his friendship with Stefan Zweig was frayed. But still that summer gave them an opportunity to recover something of their old friendship.
The Alter Rebbe
In Immanuel Etkes's new biography, we meet the young Shneur Zalman shortly after the death of his master Rabbi Dov Ber Friedman, known as the Maggid (or preacher) of Mezheritch in 1772.
The Hit Man
What music businessman Morris Levy craved even more than the recording artists themselves were the copyrights and catalogues the labels contained. “Copyrights don’t talk back,” he liked to say.
The Inklings
Leo Strauss may be as devastating as C. S. Lewis in his criticism of facile and destructive dogmas, but Hollywood isn’t planning a film version of Strauss’s Natural Right and History any time soon.