Anti-Jewish Riots in the Crown of Aragon and the Royal Response, 1391–1392
Mar 13, 2017 By Benjamin R. Gampel | Public Event audio
In his new book, the winner of the 2016 National Jewish Book Award for Scholarship, JTS’s Dina and Eli Field Family Chair in Jewish History Dr. Benjamin R. Gampel uses rich new archival data to illuminate one of the major disasters that struck medieval Jewry: the anti-Jewish riots of 1391-92 in the lands of Castile and Aragon.
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Kohelet’s Pursuit of Truth: A New Reading of Ecclesiastes
Mar 1, 2017 By Library of the Jewish Theological Seminary | Public Event audio | Sukkot
In his book Kohelet’s Pursuit of Truth, Rabbi Benjamin J. Segal, former president of the Schechter Institute of Jewish Studies in Jerusalem, presents an arresting new translation and commentary on Ecclesiastes that unlocks the ancient wisdom of one of the deepest and most controversial books of the Tanakh.
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Communings of the Spirit: The Journals of Mordecai M. Kaplan (Vol. 2 1934-1941)
Dec 5, 2016 By Library of the Jewish Theological Seminary | Public Event audio
Kaplan was a compulsive diarist. His journal of twenty seven volumes is one of the longest on record. Communings of the Spirit, Volume 2 contains in vivid detail the edited selections from 1934-1941. He reacts passionately to the momentous events of the thirties paying particular attention to the rise of Fascism.
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Vulture in a Cage: Poems by Solomon ibn Gabirol
Nov 28, 2016 By Raymond Scheindlin | Public Event audio
Named after Solomon Ibn Gabirol’s own sharp self-description, Vulture in a Cage is the most extensive collection of the eleventh-century Hebrew poet’s works ever to be published in English. Here, vital poems of praise, lament, and complaint sit alongside devotional poetry, love poetry, descriptive meditations on nature, and epigrams.
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Reading Genesis: Beginnings
Nov 2, 2016 By Library of the Jewish Theological Seminary | Public Event audio
Deuteronomy 32:47 says the Pentateuch should not be “an empty matter.” This new anthology from Beth Kissileff fills Genesis with meaning, gathering intellectuals and thinkers who use their professional knowledge to illuminate the Biblical text. These writers use insights from psychology, law, political science, literature, and other scholarly fields, to create an original constellation of modern Biblical readings, and receptions of Genesis.
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Aphrodite and the Rabbis
Sep 27, 2016 By Burton L. Visotzky | Public Event audio
Judaism as we know it is a western Roman religion, argues Rabbi Burton Visotzky. Yes, the very empire that destroyed the Jerusalem Temple in 70 CE served as the culture in which Judaism was nurtured and became the religion of the rabbis that we still celebrate today.
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Kosher USA: How Coke Became Kosher and Other Tales of Modern Food
Sep 14, 2016 By Library of the Jewish Theological Seminary | Public Event audio
Kosher USA follows the fascinating journey of kosher food through the modern industrial food system. It recounts how iconic products such as Coca-Cola and Jell-O tried to become kosher; the contentious debates among rabbis over the incorporation of modern science into Jewish law; how Manischewitz wine became the first kosher product to win over non-Jewish consumers; and more.
Thinking and Killing Philosophical Discourse in the Shadow of the Third Reich
May 25, 2016 By Library of the Jewish Theological Seminary | Public Event audio
In this Library Book Talk, Professor Alon Segev discusses his book, Thinking and Killing—Philosophical Discourse in the Shadow of the Third Reich, which deals with the contribution of eight German thinkers to the discussion about the Holocaust and the Final Solution.
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