Is There a Jewish Continuity Crisis?
Jun 8, 2020 By Michal Raucher | Public Event video | Video Lecture
Dr. Michal Raucher, JTS fellow and assistant professor of Jewish Studies at Rutgers University, examines the phenomenon of Jewish leaders Invoking the threat of a demographic crisis to implore young Jews to procreate at higher rates. Using biblical, rabbinic, and contemporary texts, she’ll consider what it would mean to think about Jewish continuity not solely in terms of creating more Jews but also cultivating and supporting the values central to our tradition.
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The Immigration Crises Then and Now: What Are the 21st Century Possibilities?
Jun 1, 2020 By Ruth Messinger | Public Event video | Video Lecture
We look at our Jewish history as immigrants in ancient and modern times and then consider the status and treatment of immigrants today in the U.S. and elsewhere. We will briefly review U.S. law and practice on immigration and discuss what the options are for making change and consider what the Jewish position should be on these issues.
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Fake News and the Resurgence of Antisemitism
May 18, 2020 By Shuly Rubin Schwartz | Public Event video | Video Lecture
How can we make sense of the resurgence of antisemitism from both right and left a mere 70 years after the Holocaust? Together we’ll examine foundational texts that gave rise to hatred of Jews and Judaism and reflect on what we can learn from them about how best to respond to today’s manifestations.
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Life Under Siege: The Talmud’s Take on Trying Times
May 4, 2020 By Sarah Wolf | Public Event video | Video Lecture
How do we understand the relationship between the multiple complicating factors that arise in moments of communal hardship, such as questions of political leadership, unreliable news sources, physical privation, and economic disparity? The interplay of these challenges is at the core of a Talmudic story about the siege of Jerusalem by the Romans. Through an exploration of the values and priorities portrayed in this story, this class will help shed new light on the tensions of our present moment.
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Beyond the Flag: The Religious Dimensions of Yom Ha’atzma’ut
Apr 27, 2020 By Eliezer B. Diamond | Public Event video | Video Lecture
Yom Ha’atzma’ut, Israel Independence Day, commemorates a historical event – the declaration of the new State of Israel. From the beginning, however, it was also framed as a religious holiday. We will look at how, drawing on the liturgy of Hannukah, Purim, Shabbat and Passover, a holiday ritual was created, one that provides the religious language with which to speak of a fundamentally political event.
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The Self, the Other, and God in 20th Century Jewish Philosophy:
Cohen, Buber, and Levinas
Mar 8, 2021 By Yonatan Y. Brafman | Public Event video | Video Lecture
her, and where does our relationship to the other Other—God—fit in? Modern Jewish philosophers, including Hermann Cohen, Martin Buber, and Emmanuel Levinas placed the intersubjective relationship—the relationship between persons–at the center of their thinking. Dr. Yonatan Brafman explores their reflections—their similarities and differences—in order to grapple with its implications for Jewish ethics.
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Jealousy and Gender in Rabbinic Literature
Feb 28, 2022 By Sarah Wolf | Public Event video | Video Lecture
“Men are more likely to have anger issues.” “Women are more sensitive than men are.” We are all familiar with gendered beliefs and stereotypes about emotion in today’s world. Presumptions about gender and emotion also existed in the time of the rabbis, though not necessarily the ones we’d expect. Join Dr. Sarah Wolf to look at rabbinic texts about jealousy and other emotions that are portrayed as negative or dangerous, noticing how gender roles function in these texts, and to reflect on how rabbinic ideas about gender and emotions can help us shed light on our own.
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Emotions and Reason, Experience and Intellect: Two Views of the Book of Psalms
Jan 31, 2022 By Benjamin D. Sommer | Public Event video | Video Lecture
What sort of religious experience does the Book of Psalms reflect and encourage? Does the book primarily appeal to our emotions, or is it first and foremost a work to be studied on an intellectual level? Join Dr. Benjamin Sommer to see how the Book of Psalms provides its own answers to these questions. By addressing these questions, we will have an opportunity to think about the relative places in Judaism of emotion and reason, heart and mind, and to explore the relationship between prayer and text-study in the Bible and rabbinic Judaism.
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