Tradition Podcast
70 episodes - English - Latest episode: 18 days ago - ★★★★★ - 18 ratingsTradition: A Journal of Orthodox Jewish Thought is a quarterly Orthodox Jewish peer-reviewed academic journal published by the Rabbinical Council of America. It covers a range of topics including philosophy and theology, history, law, and ethics.
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Episodes
PODCAST: War in Israel at Yale
March 31, 2024 00:11 - 1 hour - 31.9 MBTRADITION’s most recent issue features a special section with short reflective essays on the events of October 7th and the ongoing war in Israel. In this episode, two of those authors meet to discuss the topics touched on in those very personal pieces of writing. Chaim Strauchler engages with Alex S. Ozar, who serves as a rabbi with the Orthodox Union’s JLIC and the Slifka Center for Jewish Life at Yale University. Alex’s essay, “War in Israel, in New Haven” captures the raw emotions, trauma...
Alt+SHIFT Exit Interview
March 03, 2024 00:15 - 59 minutes - 42.2 MBBecause TRADITION has always aspired to be more than a quarterly print journal and aims to help shape the conversation and have an impact in our religious community, about five years ago we broadened our reach by expanding our digital-direct offerings, producing shorter-form original content distributed on TraditonOnline.org and over social media—this includes the podcast, expanded coverage of books and cultural criticism, and a platform to feature new authors. Since December 2022 Yitzchak ...
A Colonial Protestant Rabbi at Harvard
February 18, 2024 05:13 - 41 minutes - 42.6 MBYisroel Ben-Porat, a doctoral candidate in early American history at CUNY Graduate Center, is writing a doctorate on the Puritans’ use of the Hebrew Bible as a political text. In TRADITION’s recent Fall 2023 issue he offered a historical investigation of an enigmatic early eighteenth-century figure, “Rabbi” Judah Monis—the first known Jewish-born degree recipient and faculty member at Harvard, where he taught Hebrew for almost four decades. Monis converted in advance of his appointment, but ...
AUDIO EDITOR’S NOTE: The Abnormal Matzav
January 28, 2024 01:30 - 8 minutes - 7.03 MBListen to an introduction to TRADITION’s upcoming Winter 2024 issue, with special content related to the ongoing war in Gaza. Jeffrey Saks observes: The initial shock, horror, and trauma of October 7th have in no way abated and all thoughts remain fixed on the “matzav”—our most abnormal situation. Writing from Israel, our editor considers the challenges for our religious community, the heartening reality of Jewish unity, and some sharp questions it poses for our way forward. Listen to this A...
PODCAST: Law and Philosophy in the Guide
January 15, 2024 00:20 - 32 minutes - 29.4 MBTRADITION’s Summer 2023 issue, recently made fully open access, contained a fascinating offering penned by Michael A. Shmidman, our distinguished editor emeritus, titled “Isadore Twersky’s Unique Contribution to the Study of The Guide of the Perplexed.” It is a presentation and analysis of five integral and interlocking components of Rabbi Professor Isadore (Yitzhak) Twersky’s understanding of Maimonides’ formulation of the relationship between the philosophic tradition and the Oral Law, par...
R. Emanuel Feldman Remembers Wars and Hopes for Jewish Revival
November 27, 2023 00:20 - 36 minutes - 29.6 MBAs we continue to wrestle with the state of anxiety for what comes next at this troubling and traumatic time in Israel and around the Jewish world, we take strength from demonstrations of inspiring resilience and unity in our nation. We hope you’ve been following the content recently published on TraditionOnline.org responding to current events. In our upcoming Winter issue we hope to deliver some more substantive writing, tentative and initial as it may be, bringing the lens of Orthodox Jew...
Shalom Rosenberg’s Narrow Bridge of Faith
November 05, 2023 04:07 - 34 minutes - 32 MB“The entire world is a very narrow bridge.” The world, all of life, is a “narrow bridge,” on either side of which is a gaping, terrifying abyss. Someone who does not live this experience cannot understand it. One needs to traverse the bridge, and it is clear from an objective perspective that he is capable of doing so. This is why “the main thing is not to fear at all.” Your greatest enemy is not outside of you, but, rather, inside of you. It is fear itself. So writes Prof. Shalom Rosenberg...
Psalm 139: When God’s Presence Both Overwhelms and Eludes
October 23, 2023 23:01 - 44 minutes - 61.2 MBDuring this time of worldwide Jewish unity, TRADITION is pleased to deliver an episode of our podcast co-produced with our friends at Matan: The Sadie Rennert Women’s Institute of Torah Study in Jerusalem. Our recently released Fall 2023 issue features an essay by Dr. Yosefa Fogel Wruble titled “Psalm 139: When God’s Presence Both Overwhelms and Eludes” which explores two exegetical prisms for Psalm 139 and the theological relevance in understanding this mizmor as a form of emotional strugg...
From Yom Kippur 1973 to Simchat Torah 2023
October 11, 2023 09:13 - 1 hour - 63.6 MBTRADITION and the Rabbinical Council of America brought together authors from our recent issue on “The Yom Kippur War After 50 Years” as they discuss insights from their contributions to our pages and the sudden, tragic timeliness of that issue for events unfolding in Israel. Dr. Shlomo Fischer, Rabbi Jeffrey Saks, Rabbi Dr. Tzvi Sinensky and moderator Mrs. Mali Brofsky. TRADITION has made the content of our entire special “Yom Kippur War After 50 Years” issue (Summer 2023) open access as a ...
Divine Pathos
September 26, 2023 02:00 - 41 minutes - 34.6 MBTRADITION’s Fall 2022 issue featured a lengthy essay by Todd Berman exploring a 6-decade-old critique launched by R. Eliezer Berkovits on Dr. Abraham J. Heschel’s “Theology of Divine Pathos.” In brief, the debate centered on Heschel’s contention that a prophet reacts to God’s emotions, that the navi is guided by God’s own feelings. For Berkovits, Heschel errs by aligning himself with the wrong side of the anthropomorphism and anthropopathism debate. Berkovits was a significant figure in mid...
Materialism and the Rise of “Modern, Orthodoxy”
June 12, 2023 00:17 - 54 minutes - 52.5 MBOn April 23, 2023, TRADITION and the Rabbinical Council of America convened our first TRADITION Today Summit, hosted at Congregation Rinat Yisrael in Teaneck, NJ, exploring “Material Success and Its Challenges.” Among the papers presented at the event was a fascinating item co-authored by Avital Chizik-Goldschmidt and Chaim Saiman, “Material Success and the Rise of ‘Modern, Orthodoxy’” – in which a lot rides on the title’s enigmatic comma. While the papers from the Summit will be appearing ...
The Rav’s Enduring Pedagogical Relevance
May 02, 2023 00:25 - 41 minutes - 42 MBThree decades following the passing of the Rav zt”l his legacy endures and his teachings still inspire – but how do we communicate his Torah to a generation “which did not know Yosef” (R. Yosef Dov Halevi Soloveitchik, that is)? This is a question that is explored from a few different angles in TRADITION’s recent expanded issue on the thought of the Rav. Readers of the special issue will discover that one of the many insightful perspectives on this particular question is offered by Mali Br...
We Read the Rav to Know We Are Not Alone
April 16, 2023 00:15 - 13 minutes - 12 MBOur editor, Jeffrey Saks, offers this audio version of his Editor’s Note introducing TRADITION’s special issue on the thought of Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik zt”l. In Saks’ essay, “We Read the Rav to Know We Are Not Alone in Loneliness” (open access here), he shares his own personal encounter with the Rav’s writings at a pivotal moment in his own religious development, and discusses the important role the Rav played in the American Orthodox scene and in the pages of our journal. Click here...
The Eleventh Plague
April 02, 2023 00:05 - 47 minutes - 44.9 MBHere we are, days before the arrival of Passover. If we are not drowning in cleaning products, chances are we’re doing the equally important work—perhaps more important work—of reflecting on the Exodus story in advance of Seder night. A highlight of this week’s observances is the recounting of the biblical Ten Plagues. In an interesting new book, Dr. Jeremy Brown considers the Eleventh Plague, a kind of catch-all phrase he uses to explore how Jews as a people and Judaism as a religious tradit...
The Hidden Order of Intimacy
March 21, 2023 01:10 - 38 minutes - 37.1 MBAvivah Gottlieb Zornberg is an internationally recognized teacher and lecturer around the English-speaking world and, each week, in multiple settings in Jerusalem, where her unique style of integrating keen readings of the weekly Torah portion with the commentaries of midrash, classical meforshim, Hasidic interpretation, and more, are supplemented by the insights she draws from philosophy, psychoanalytical readings, literature, and culture at large – the “best that’s been thought and said,” a...
The Rav’s Students Across Generations
March 08, 2023 16:31 - 56 minutes - 50.2 MBRecording of Rabbi Chaim Brovender and Mrs. Mali Brofsky in conversation to mark the 120th birthday of Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik zt"l. Hosted by TRADITION and WebYeshiva.org (12 Adar/March 5, 2023).
The Rav’s Enduring Legacy
March 06, 2023 03:59 - 55 minutes - 50.2 MBDr. Tovah Lichtenstein and R. Jeffrey Saks in conversation to mark the 120th birthday of Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik zt"l. Hosted by TRADITION and WebYeshiva.org (12 Adar/March 5, 2023).
R. Hildesheimer and Women’s Education
February 12, 2023 06:49 - 36 minutes - 34.7 MBProf. Marc B. Shapiro’s recent essay “From the Pages of TRADITION: R. Esriel Hildesheimer on Torah Study for Women” (TRADITION, Summer 2022), was the subject of our most recent podcast. Shapiro joined Jeffrey Saks to discuss Hildesheimer’s legacy and that of 19th-century German Orthodoxy; the history of women’s Torah study; trends in Jewish education; and the intersections of Jewish history and thought. Marc B. Shapiro holds the Harry and Jeanette Weinberg Chair in Judaic Studies at the Univ...
Moral Luck
January 22, 2023 03:45 - 43 minutes - 41.5 MBIn the 1970s Moral Philosophy turned its attention to an ancient topic – but coined a new name to organize our thinking about it. That field, now known as “Moral Luck” constitutes a set of fascinating and important philosophical debates. Do we judge people by their intentions, for good or for ill, or by the results of those intentions? This has serious implications for both ethics and jurisprudence, and in civil society as well as within our own religious Tradition. Rabbi Dr. Michael J. Harr...
Sharing Torah with the World
November 28, 2022 12:32 - 32 minutes - 32.1 MBTRADITION’s Summer 2022 issue featured an article by Yakov Nagen, “Sharing Torah with the World: The Jewish People’s Responsibility to Non-Jews.” The essay was part of a cluster of content related to topics in Jewish Universalism. Nagen’s contribution is a learned treatment of issues related to the challenge of being a “light unto the nations” in which he argues that teaching Torah to non-Jews is the most effective way to fulfill our Jewish spiritual mission. His is a provocative thesis, si...
The Best
September 22, 2022 00:15 - 55 minutes - 41.7 MBAs our readers and listeners likely know, since the launch of the TraditionOnline website in the summer of 2019 we have published a weekly feature called “The BEST.” In that column we have asked a wide variety of writers to consider what things “out there” in the big wide world make them think and feel. What elements in general culture potentially inspire us to live better? We have sought to share these insights on cultural objects – both high and low – that might still be described as “the b...
Prozbul’s Disappearance and Resurgence
September 12, 2022 00:15 - 27 minutes - 19.1 MBWith Rosh Hashana around the corner, and the end of the Shemitta year upon us, TRADITION’s editor Jeffrey Saks sat down chat with Shlomo Brody about his recent essay “The Curious Case of Prozbul’s Disappearance and Resurgence” (open access at https://traditiononline.org/the-curious-case-of-prozbuls-disappearance-and-resurgence). Brody’s essay offers a fascinating tour of an episode in the history of halakha: how the rabbinically enacted prozbul document, which helps circumvent the loan forgi...
It Takes a Cosmic Village
August 21, 2022 00:15 - 15 minutes - 10.8 MBThis is an Audio Editor’s Note from TRADITION’s newly released Summer 2022 issue—Rabbi Jeffrey Saks reads his essay “It Takes a Cosmic Village” which introduces a special section on Jewish Universalism. In this column our editor muses on a cluster of essays recently published in our pages, situating them at the intersection of Jewish Universalism and Particularism; or, in Rabbi Soloveitchik’s terms, between the “majestic cosmic sphere” and the humble “here-minded.” Saks considers how these t...
Rabbi Sacks’ Pluralism Reexamined
July 26, 2022 00:25 - 43 minutes - 42.3 MBThe late and lamented Rabbi Jonathan Sacks was a frequent critic of the emergence of a post-truth culture and also a life-long opponent of moral relativism. Yet, in his book, “The Dignity of Difference: How to Avoid the Clash of Civilizations,” he was an ardent proponent of a form of religious pluralism. When first published over 20 years ago his position was both attacked and misunderstood—giving rise to questions about how his Orthodoxy and his devotion to objective truth were able to sit a...
Contemporary (Neo-)Hasidut and Modern Orthodoxy
June 12, 2022 00:25 - 57 minutes - 53.3 MBIn this episode of the TRADITION/Or Chadash series, Shlomo Zuckier discusses the presence of Hasidism in contemporary Modern Orthodox life. Alon Meltzer queries Zuckier about his contribution to TRADITION’s “Rabbi Lamm Memorial Volume,” which analyzed R. Lamm's approach to Hasidut and how it formulated a key element in his manifesto of Torah u-Madda. Exploring the idea of academia and secular learning through the lens of gashmiyut, physical pursuit, and the elevation of it, Zuckier considers ...
The Absurdity of Extremism
May 29, 2022 00:15 - 56 minutes - 57.1 MBIn this episode of the TRADITION/Or Chadash series our editor Rabbi Jeffrey Saks has the tables (and microphone) turned on him and becomes the subject of the interview. Jacquie Seemann Charak of Or Chadash in Sydney, Australia, questions Saks about his recent essay in the Rabbi Norman Lamm memorial volume, “The Extremes Are More Consistent But Absurd,” which explored R. Lamm’s writings on religious moderation as the hallmark of our community. It was also a chance to discuss what we’ve been d...
Dispatch from Ukraine
March 10, 2022 20:58 - 1 hour - 63.8 MBRCA – Rabbinical Council of America and its TRADITION Journal present a special conversation from the frontlines of Jewish life in Ukraine with Rabbi Mordechai Bald, Chief Rabbi of Lviv, in conversation with RCA President Rabbi Binyamin Blau, and TRADITION editor Rabbi Jeffrey Saks. Help support the Lviv Jewish community's emergency fund: https://lauderfoundation.com/ukraine
The Rebellion of the Daughters
February 22, 2022 00:25 - 45 minutes - 37.6 MBIn the period preceding World War I a surprising number of young Jewish women in Habsburg Galicia left their traditional Orthodox homes for life in the Catholic Church (mostly in the Felician Sisters’ Convent in Krakow). Although the Jewish community tended to portray this phenomenon as kidnapping, and some families involved government authorities in their attempts to recover their daughters, the situation was far more complex. In her new book, “The Rebellion of the Daughters: Jewish Women Ru...
Shubert Spero and “Doing” Philosophy
February 15, 2022 00:40 - 47 minutes - 41.6 MBIn TRADITION’s Fall 2021 issue, we published an essay penned by Rabbi Shubert Spero – a longtime contributor to our pages. In fact, this essay, his 26th in TRADITION, arrived 60 years after his first appearance in the journal and coincided with his 98th birthday. We took the opportunity to spend an afternoon chatting with Rabbi Spero in his Jerusalem apartment about this essay, “The Problematic Metaphors of Righteousness,” along with matters related to the philosophy of language and morality,...
R. Yitzhak Twersky Between Law and Spirit
December 19, 2021 00:40 - 54 minutes - 53.2 MBIn TRADITION’s recent Fall 2021issue we published a wide-ranging review essay, authored by Prof. Jeffrey R. Woolf, surveying the scope and significance of the writings of Rabbi Prof. Yitzhak (Isadore) Twersky zt”l, which were recently collected and published in Hebrew as “Ke-Ma’ayan ha-Mitgabar” (Law and Spirit in Medieval Jewish Thought), edited by Prof. Carmi Horowitz and published by Merkaz Zalman Shazar. The essay is available in our open-access archive: https://traditiononline.org/book...
In Praise of Peshara
November 30, 2021 00:25 - 44 minutes - 31.6 MBRav Zalman Nechemiah Goldberg zt”l, who passed away in September 2020 at the age of 89, was a towering rabbinic authority who provided halakhic guidance to Jews throughout the world on a panoply of contemporary issues. He possessed a unique blend of phenomenal erudition and real-world perspicacity. When approached for his expertise on contemporary halakhic questions, such as the difficult 9/11 Aguna cases or various mamzerut issues, he would unflinchingly tackle every question, leaving no sto...
Rabbi Lamm and the Spirit of the Rabbinate
November 14, 2021 02:02 - 39 minutes - 43.7 MBIn this episode of the TRADITION Podcast we talk with two contributors to our recent “Rabbi Norman Lamm Memorial Volume” about R. Lamm’s vision for the American rabbinate. R. Lamm served as a prominent pulpit rabbi for over a quarter-century, first in Springfield, MA, and then at Manhattan’s Jewish Center. As Rosh Ha-Yeshiva of Yeshiva University’s Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Theological Seminary, he presided over the training of multiple generations of young rabbis who went out to have a profound i...
Family and Morality in Turbulent Times
November 07, 2021 01:15 - 42 minutes - 29.8 MBIn this episode of the TRADITION Podcast our editor R. Jeffrey Saks speaks with Rachelle Sprecher Fraenkel, who teaches Talmud and Halakha at Nishmat and Matan in Jerusalem, is a Yoetzet Halacha, and the Director of Matan’s advanced halakha program. Rabbanit Fraenkel’s essay in our “Rabbi Norman Lamm Memorial Volume” explores R. Lamm’s writing, preaching, and teaching on the role of “Family and Morality in Turbulent Times.” Throughout the 1960s and 70s, from his synagogue pulpit and his perch...
The Unrepentant Darshan
October 31, 2021 00:45 - 53 minutes - 41.4 MBIn this episode of the TRADITION Podcast our editor R. Jeffrey Saks speaks with Dr. Erica Brown and Prof. Ari Goldman about their contributions to the “Rabbi Norman Lamm Memorial Volume.” They each wrote about aspects of Rabbi Lamm’s written record as a self-styled “unrepentant darshan” one of the Jewish 20th century’s peerless rhetoricians, who turned the synagogue sermon into an art form and used the power of the pulpit to commutate an array of messages and educate his flock in a most impac...
R. Lamm Memorial Volume Book Launch
September 30, 2021 23:49 - 1 hour - 64.4 MBCongregation Rinat Yisrael of Teaneck, NJ, hosted a special Tikkun Leyl Hoshana Rabba remembering the legacy of Rabbi Dr. Norman Lamm z”l, and celebrating the publication of TRADITION’s Rabbi Lamm Memorial Volume. Speakers: Rabbi Chaim Strauchler, Rabbi Jeffrey Saks, Yoetzet Halacha Tova Warburg Sinensky, Rabbi Tzvi Sinensky. Order the volume: https://traditiononline.org/rabbi-lamm-memorial Watch the video recording of the event at: https://youtu.be/0hbzaeGr6Ew
AUDIO EDITOR’S NOTE: Excavating the Thought of Rabbi Lamm
September 13, 2021 07:17 - 17 minutes - 24.1 MBIn this installment of the TRADITION Podcast we present an audio editor’s column with Rabbi Jeffrey Saks’ essay, “A Man of All Spirits: Excavating the Thought of Rabbi Lamm,” read by the author. This is the introductory essay in TRADITION’s recently released “Rabbi Norman Lamm Memorial Volume.” This special issue of TRADITION contains 35 chapters by our community's leading rabbis, educators, and thinkers, exploring Rabbi Lamm’s literary legacy and contributions to Jewish life and learning. C...
Eric Lawee’s “Rashi’s Commentary”
June 13, 2021 01:00 - 39 minutes - 40.8 MB“It is very unusual for a scholar to identify a subject of manifestly great importance that has barely been addressed, but Eric Lawee’s recently published Rashi’s Commentary on the Torah: Canonization and Resistance in the Reception of a Jewish Classic (Oxford Univerity Press) has succeeded in doing so” – so writes David Berger, reviewing Lawee’s book in TRADITION’s recent Spring 2021 issue. Eric Lawee is a professor of Bible at Bar-Ilan University where he specializes in Jewish biblical int...
Rav Henkin as Posek and Thinker
May 25, 2021 00:45 - 43 minutes - 37.5 MBAs part of the 2021 convention of TRADITION's publisher, the Rabbinical Council of America, Rabbanit Chana Henkin spoke about the legacy of her late husband, R. Yehuda Herzl Henkin zt"l, exploring the influences that helped him develop into a unique posek and thinker. We are grateful to the RCA for allowing us to share this recording with TRADITION's followers. Rabbanit Chana Henkin is the Rosh Midrasha of Nishmat. Rav Yehuda Herzl Henkin zt"l, who passed away in December 2020, was a teacher ...
Rabbi Lamm’s Intellectual Legacy
May 21, 2021 02:26 - 54 minutes - 60.9 MBListen to the recording of the special first Yahrzeit memorial program for TRADITION’s founder Rabbi Dr. Norman Lamm zt”l. Introduction by Rabbi Yosie Levine. Lectures by Rabbi Meir Soloveichik, Yoetzet Tova Warburg Sinensky, and Rabbi Ari Lamm. Closing Remarks by Rabbi Ari Berman. (May 19, 2021) Presented by Yeshiva University, The Lamm Heritage Archives, Rabbinical Council of America, Orthodox Union, The Jewish Center, and TRADITION.
Rabbi Sacks Bookshelves Project
April 15, 2021 01:00 - 39 minutes - 32.3 MBFollowing his passing last November, TraditionOnline inaugurated The Rabbi Sacks Bookshelves Project, in tribute to R. Jonathan Sacks’ impact on the spiritual and intellectual life of our community, and examining aspects of his thought and teaching. Reading R. Sacks’ many books and listening to his lectures, one is not just impressed by his original insights and striking formulations, but also awed by his ability to integrate so many disparate sources. To read his work is to experience a well...
Decision-Making in Acute Critical Illness
January 31, 2021 00:40 - 39 minutes - 52.7 MBThe most recent issue of TRADITION (Winter 2021) contains “A Halakhic Framework for Decision-Making in Acute Critical Illness” by Judah Goldberg. The article explores the array of complicated decision making in difficult, traumatic times, including end-of-life decision making. This framework will help guide the interactions between physicians, clergy, and the acutely ill patient and his or her family in what are always, even under the best cases, complex circumstances. Rabbis Hershel Schacht...
Covenantal Community
January 20, 2021 06:27 - 28 minutes - 29.3 MBIn 1953, Yale theologian H. Richard Niebuhr was asked, “To what extent did religious and specifically Christian convictions influence the development of American democracy; and, to what extent can that democracy be maintained in America, or be reproduced elsewhere, without the aid of such convictions?” In response, Niebuhr put forward a theory of America as a “covenantal community” – a model built on trust and the unspoken voluntary promise on the part of each member of the covenant that ever...
The COVID Vaccine and Halakha
December 22, 2020 16:45 - 55 minutes - 76.2 MBThe arrival of a COVID-19 vaccine is a long-awaited and blessed development that requires our gratitude to God, and the scientists through whom His work is done, for providing humanity the means to eradicate the pandemic and its deadly effects. In this podcast, R. Yona Reiss explains that vaccination constitutes a mitzva requirement based on the imperative of “guarding our lives” and preventing harm to others. According to halakhic triage rules, it is appropriate for those who are most vulner...
Service of God in the Classroom
November 24, 2020 01:00 - 40 minutes - 55.8 MBTRADITION’s recent Fall 2020 issue was largely dedicated to a symposium on Mahashevet Yisrael – the educational challenges and goals of Jewish thought, ably guest edited by Mali Brofsky. Among the 11 essays in the symposium, we published a piece by R. Dov Singer, “Service of God as a Unique Discipline.” Rav Dov is the Rosh Yeshiva of the Makor Chaim high school in Gush Etzion and the founder of the Beit Midrash Lehithadshut and its Lifnim educator training program. In his essay Singer laid o...
The Philosophical Legacy of Jonathan Sacks
November 09, 2020 17:51 - 31 minutes - 43.1 MBTRADITION joins with the Jewish world, and with lovers of wisdom everywhere, in mourning the untimely loss of Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks, who passed away on Shabbat. Rabbi Sacks served as the Chief Rabbi of United Hebrew Congregations of the British Commonwealth from 1991 to 2013, and was made a Life Peer in House of Lords in 2009. For many worldwide, his influence was felt through his dozens of books, countless essays, as well as his translations and commentaries on the Hebrew Bible and praye...
Unbinding Isaac
November 04, 2020 00:10 - 1 hour - 68.6 MBThe story of Akedat Yitzhak, the binding of Isaac (Gen. 22), read in synagogues this Shabbat, has posed significant philosophical challenges throughout the history of Jewish and religious thought. In his newest book, "Unbinding Isaac: The Significance of the Akedah for Modern Jewish Thought" (JPS), Aaron Koller leads his readers on a trek of discovery into this most challenging biblical story — from Soren Kierkegaard’s understanding of the Akeda as teaching suspension of ethics for the sake o...
Jewish Thought in the Contemporary World
October 27, 2020 02:00 - 46 minutes - 63.8 MBTRADITION’s recent Fall 2020 issue features a fascinating symposium on “Jewish Thought in the Contemporary World: Educational Challenges and Goals,” guest edited by Mrs. Mali Brofsky who writes by way of introduction: "Meaning and complexity are the two essential values that lie at the heart of learning Jewish thought. These two concepts are central to an individual’s living a purposeful life, as well as to our creating a thriving culture and society. The search for truth and meaning shapes ...
A Sephardic Response to “Rupture and Reconstruction”
September 01, 2020 01:35 - 38 minutes - 35.8 MB[…]