On My Mind

High Holiday Message from Chancellor Arnold M. Eisen

Sep 02, 2015

Forty years ago this fall, I moved into an apartment in the Kiryat Moshe neighborhood of Jerusalem and began participating in a program called Mishmar Ezrachi, or civil guard.

My Response to Timothy Cardinal Dolan’s Address on the 50th Anniversary of Nostra Aetate

May 20, 2015

The following is adapted from the address I delivered on May 6, 2015, on the occasion of Archbishop Timothy Cardinal Dolan’s Return to JTS for the Annual John Paul II Center Lecture for Interreligious Dialogue.

In Appreciation of Torah—and the Rabbis Who Teach It

May 05, 2015

The following is adapted from the address I delivered on April 29, 2015, at the JTS Convocation honoring members of the Rabbinical Assembly who have served the Jewish community with distinction for 25 years or more.

A Vote for MERCAZ USA: Slate #2 Is a Vote for Conservative Judaism and for Israel

Feb 05, 2015

I write to urge you to support MERCAZ USA: Slate #2 (Masorti / Conservative Movement) in the World Zionist Organization (WZO) elections that are taking place now through the month of April.

Speaking to and About Israel

Jan 15, 2015

At the first-ever Israeli conference devoted to the religious thought and political activism of Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel, former professor of Jewish Ethics and Mysticism at JTS, which took place in Jerusalem a few weeks ago, my subject was the talk that Heschel himself gave in Jerusalem in 1957 at a conference of world Jewish leaders gathered by Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion and future president Zalman Shazar.

Home for the Holidays

Dec 18, 2014

As I was driving in Tel Aviv the other day, a commercial came on the radio that caused me to sit up and take notice. It featured “Ma’oz Tzur” sung to the tune of “Jingle Bells,” followed by a resonant male voice that asked the listener to imagine what might happen if Santa Claus lit Hanukkah candles this year. Many Israelis are making a similar move, the announcer continued, trading in German-made automobiles for Cadillacs: “Shouldn’t you think of joining them?”

From Toronto to Hollywood in Search of the Key to Jewish Cultural Survival

Dec 04, 2014

Author David Bezmozgis, in dialogue with me a few weeks ago before an overflow audience at Beth Tzedec Congregation in Toronto, put his finger on a basic point of Diaspora Jewish life that to my mind is too often skirted, ignored, or denied.

A Talk on Religion, God, and the Internet

Nov 10, 2014

Delivered by Chancellor Arnold M. Eisen, National Library of Israel Conference, Jerusalem, October 20, 2014. As I sat in shul during the Yamim Nora’im a few weeks ago, I wondered—with this talk in mind—how I should feel about being inscribed and sealed for life in an eBook. “Remember us for life, Sovereign who delights in life, and inscribe us in the Book of Life, for Your sake, God of life.”

Betting on Hope

Oct 30, 2014

It’s not often that a museum makes history as well as chronicles it, and rare too when otherwise cautious observers, chastened by the repeated experience of expectations gone awry, remark at the opening of a new museum that it may prove a source of hope and pride that propels an entire society forward.

High Holiday Message from Chancellor Arnold M. Eisen

Sep 10, 2014

This has been a momentous and disturbing year for Jews who care about the future of their people and their tradition. 5774 began with news of prestigious research that cast doubt on the vitality and viability of the Jewish community in America.

Share This Page