Jerusalem and Athens

The holiday of Hanukkah is, in part, a celebration of the victory of traditionalist Jews over Jews bent on assimilation to Greek Seleucid culture.  As such, the second-century B.C.E. Maccabean revolt has resonated throughout the ages not only as a key historical contest, but as a wellspring for interpretations of the divergent views of the Hebrews and the Greeks. 

Hebraism and Hellenism Reconsidered  Louis H. Feldman,  Judaism.  For almost every supposed difference between the two systems of thought, one can point to exceptions or actual similarities; yet certain very real divisions remain.  SAVE

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Jewish Farm School.

Eating Your Values

The many Jewish laws regarding food—how it gets from the ground and into our mouths in a kosher manner—are central to Jewish life.  But what ethical framework underlies the system of kashrut? Maimonides' justifications for kashrut range from avoiding cruelty to animals and eschewing the idolatrous practices of antiquity to considerations of health.

Yiddish Farm  Devra Ferst,  The Jew and the Carrot.  Where Yiddish-language immersion meets sustainable agriculture. (Interview with Naftali Ejdelman)  SAVE

Locusts, Giraffes, and the Meaning of Kashrut  Meir Soloveichik,  Azure.  Sifting historical and contemporary explanations, one Orthodox intellectual settles in the end on divine love and Jewish difference. (PDF)  SAVE

They Were What They Ate  Susan Marks,  H-Net.  A new volume on the role of food in shaping ancient Jewish identity goes farther and deeper than earlier studies of the subject.  SAVE

Slaughterhouse Rules  Elli Fischer,  Jewish Ideas Daily.  As Jewish ritual slaughter makes multiple provisions for the minimization of animal pain, it's evident that those who seek to ban the practice often have something other than animal welfare in mind.  SAVE

Going Kosher  Sue Fishkoff,  JTA.  Reform rabbis of late are challenging their constituents to develop a dietary practice based on such values as sustainability, morality—and, yes, kashrut.  SAVE

Kosher Nation  Jenna Weissman Joselit,  New Republic.  The expansion of the kosher food industry has, ironically, caused kosher food to become invisible.  SAVE

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The Genesis of Modern Science

Copernicus, Galileo, Kepler, Descartes, Newton, and the other founders of modern science were all believers in the truths of the opening chapter in the Hebrew Bible.

Thomism  John O'Callaghan, Ralph McInerny,  Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.  Thomas Aquinas saw natural law as primarily governing the relations between human beings and God, not the operations of the natural world.  SAVE

Marvels  Eugene Wigner,  Communications in Pure and Applied Mathematics.  The appropriateness of the language of mathematics for the formulation of the laws of physics is a wonderful gift which we neither understand nor deserve.  SAVE

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Photo by Natalie Weinberg.

Rosh Hashanah with the Chief Rabbi

Ten years ago, the first day of Rosh Hashanah—the two-day Jewish New Year—fell on September 18. That was one week after September 11, 2001, when almost 3,000 people were killed by Muslim terrorists. On that Rosh Hashanah, rabbis did not lack for sermon topics.

Endless Devotion  Hillel Halkin,  Jewish Review of Books.  Prayer, says Sacks, is the "language of the soul in conversation with God."  But the struggle to keep it from becoming routine is intrinsic to every religion in which prayer is a regular duty.  SAVE

The Chief Rabbi's Achievement  David Wolpe,  Jewish Review of Books.  Sacks has a gift for providing plausible, if not entirely sufficient, interpretations of the most problematic questions of theology.  SAVE

Where Faith is Weak, Life is Weak  Jonathan Sacks,  Jewish Chronicle.  Intermarriage, assimilation, and vulnerability are not the causes but the symptoms of a transcendent malaise affecting a people once aflame with devotion.  SAVE

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Reconstructionist rabbinical students.

Reconstructing Judaism

At a time when all three major Jewish denominations in America—Orthodox, Conservative, and Reform—find themselves in a state of deep internal fracture, a fourth and much smaller movement, Reconstructionism, has just voted to create a unified body to coordinate the activities of its lay and rabbinical arms.

Reconstructing Halakhah  Daniel Goldman Cedarbaum,  Reconstructionism Today.  Religious law is an essential component of Jewish life, but the traditional system must be brought into line with contemporary democratic sensibilities.  SAVE

Dim-Sum Jews  Ben Weiner,  Zeek.  As a respite from the Chinese-buffet model of optional Jewishness, a young rabbi turns wistfully to the "thickness" and "dense particularity" of cultural Yiddishkeit. (PDF, 2010)  SAVE

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