Religion

The modern phenomenon of fan fiction involves readers writing creative pieces that answer questions left open in favorite works of literature.  This also describes the ancient tradition of midrash, where readers write stories filling in gaps in the Bible. 

In Fan Fiction on the Book of Genesis educator Sarah Rosenson discusses the questions left open in the first book of the Bible and includes questions for the characters in the stories, which can serve as prompts for conversations or creative writing.  Some chapters also describe paintings by famous artists depicting the scene, and how they seem to have answered at least one of the questions.

Fan Fiction on the Book of Genesis is perfect for anyone interested in reading Bible stories through a new and creative lens, people who enjoy creative writing and want to challenge themselves to write fan fiction/midrash on the Bible, and people who teach classes on the Bible in both Jewish and Christian settings and want ideas for discussion topics and questions.  

28 мая 2007 года в Питерсберге, штат Кентукки, открылся Музей сотворения мира. Целью музея является научное доказательство того, что Вселенная была создана менее десяти тысяч лет назад Богом. Музей пользуется огромной популярностью, привлекая миллионы посетителей. Cвоими фигурно подстриженными кустами и контактным зоопарком с верблюдами музей вызывает в памяти образы религиозного Диснейленда. Внутри посетителей на каждом шагу встречают динозавры и реконструкция Эдемского сада с Древом Жизни, змеем, Адамом и Евой.

Сьюзан Л. Троллингер и Уильям Вэнс Троллингер — мл. проводят для читателей увлекательную экскурсию по музею. Троллингеры живо описывают и анализируют множество экспонатов, плакатов, диорам и видеоматериалов — от зала «Культура в кризисе», где на видео изображены грешные аморальные персонажи, смотрящие порнографию или размышляющие об аборте, до зала «Естественный отбор», где плакаты доказывают, что естественный отбор не приводит к эволюции. В книге также прослеживается становление креационизма и история христианского фундаментализма в Америке.

28 мая 2007 года в Питерсберге, штат Кентукки, открылся Музей сотворения мира. Целью музея является научное доказательство того, что Вселенная была создана менее десяти тысяч лет назад Богом. Музей пользуется огромной популярностью, привлекая миллионы посетителей. Cвоими фигурно подстриженными кустами и контактным зоопарком с верблюдами музей вызывает в памяти образы религиозного Диснейленда. Внутри посетителей на каждом шагу встречают динозавры и реконструкция Эдемского сада с Древом Жизни, змеем, Адамом и Евой.

Сьюзан Л. Троллингер и Уильям Вэнс Троллингер — мл. проводят для читателей увлекательную экскурсию по музею. Троллингеры живо описывают и анализируют множество экспонатов, плакатов, диорам и видеоматериалов — от зала «Культура в кризисе», где на видео изображены грешные аморальные персонажи, смотрящие порнографию или размышляющие об аборте, до зала «Естественный отбор», где плакаты доказывают, что естественный отбор не приводит к эволюции. В книге также прослеживается становление креационизма и история христианского фундаментализма в Америке.

«Святилище нации в честь Непорочного зачатия Девы Марии» — монументальное религиозное сооружение, возведенное в самом сердце политической жизни США — Вашингтоне, округ Колумбия. С начала строительства и по сей день этот католический храм вызывает самые разные чувства: им гордятся, его игнорируют, его критикуют.

В своей увлекательной и оригинальной книге Томас А. Твид предлагает взглянуть на святилище как на ключ к пониманию американского католицизма XX века. Свой рассказ он выстраивает вокруг шести тем, каждая из которых связана с конкретными элементами материальной культуры храма — изображениями, реликвиями, архитектурными деталями и молитвенными пространствами. Так, первый камень в основании базилики становится отправной точкой для размышлений о «кирпичном» католицизме и стремлении Церкви утвердиться в американском институциональном контексте. История сбора средств на Алтарь Девы Марии раскрывает женское измерение католической духовности, а рассказ о филиппинской часовне Богоматери Антиполо – пастырские усилия Церкви в работе с иммигрантами.

Совмещая тонкие эстетические наблюдения, неожиданные архивные находки и глубокий культурный анализ, Твид создает многослойный образ «Американского Храма» как пространства, где пересекаются история, идентичность и противоречивый опыт американского католицизма.

В своем исследовании Михаил Цанк показывает, как иудейские, христианские и исламские писания придают провиденциальное значение судьбе города и как современный Иерусалим терзают волны библейских фантазий, стремящихся к взаимоисключающему исправлению статус-кво. Прослеживая историю Иерусалима от древнеиудейских времен и до современности, автор предлагает читателям уникальное сочетание подходов и контекстов, включая урбанистику, риторику власти, историю искусства и архитектуры, библейскую герменевтику и современные ближневосточные исследования.

«Ислам в Турецкой Республике» — это захватывающее путешествие по духовному и политическому ландшафту страны, уже более века балансирующей между Востоком и Западом, между традицией и модернизацией. От радикальных реформ Ататюрка до ожесточенных споров о хиджабе, от тайных залов суфийских обителей до бурных парламентских дебатов о месте религии — автор показывает, как ислам в Турции менялся и продолжает меняться вместе с самой республикой.

В центре внимания — ключевые фигуры и темы: кемалистская революция, пересечения суннизма и суфизма, судьба алевитской общины, роль политических партий, религиозных учебных заведений и женщин. Опираясь на богатый этнографический материал, собранный за почти тридцать лет работы в Турции, Ким Шивли не только раскрывает исторический контекст, но и помогает понять сегодняшние реалии, включая стремительный взлет Реджепа Тайипа Эрдогана и его Партии справедливости и развития.

Эта книга для всех, кто хочет глубже понять Турцию, турецкий ислам и тонкую грань между светским и религиозным в современном мире.

Дитрих Бонхёффер (1906–1945) — немецкий лютеранский пастор, теолог, а также участник движения Сопротивления нацизму. Он много размышлял и писал о политической жизни, однако делал это не как теоретик или активист, а как христианский богослов. Его идеи о политическом сопротивлении можно понять лишь в контексте его теологии, поскольку большинство его высказываний на эту тему было связано с его церковной деятельностью. В книге подробно изложены его взгляды на политическое сопротивление, в том числе на насильственные формы.

Майкл Дейонг показывает, как Бонхёффер смотрел на мир через призму христианства: сотворение мира Богом, его грехопадение и искупление через спасительную жертву Христа. Он также рассматривает ключевые лютеранские идеи, которые формировали взгляды Бонхёффера на политику. Затем автор переходит к анализу политических взглядов немецкого теолога, его пониманию роли церкви и государства, а также его теории и практики сопротивления.

Among scholars of Jewish Studies, the process, history, and literature of exiting one’s native religious community is increasingly recognized as a new area within the field which, ironically, has a history stretching back to antiquity. By presenting scholarship from a diverse range of disciplines—including history, sociology, psychology, and gender studies—this volume deepens and broadens readers’ understanding of the complexity of the topic of taking leave of the Orthodox community in which one has been raised and establishing a different kind of life that is outside of its borders.

The goal of this book is to suggest that Jesus as a creative artist was heavily influenced by the Hebrew Bible’s Book of Proverbs. It posits that he created some of his short parables from specific verses found in Proverbs, suggests that he expanded some basic sapient themes present in this book when composing his parables, and shows him reacting negatively to the commonly held belief that this Book’s overall concept of wisdom is that the wise are rewarded and the fools are punished by God through their own self-destructive choices and subsequent actions. Thus this text points to Jesus as an inventive artist, a concept not usually associated with him, and it complicates simplistic ways of defining biblical wisdom. Part I demonstrates how Jesus might have created his tales from specific proverbs found in the Book of Proverbs. The overarching theme for these parables is wisdom: Jesus as wisdom (I Cor. 1:24) speaking wisdom in new ways.

Part II discusses Jesus as a self-actualized artist who creatively designed these tales. It examines what shaped Jesus’ artistry, what might have been the sources of his literacy, why he might have chosen to expand individual proverbs imaginatively in order to create his moral tales, and how his wisdom enhanced conventional attitudes toward wisdom as the former included and clarified his new ""kingdom of God"" concepts. This book could be used in courses treating Literature and the Bible, Biblical Art, The Humanity of Jesus, and Wisdom Literature Common to Christians and Jews.

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Цель этой небольшой книги — показать, что евангельский Иисус находился под сильным влиянием Книги Притчей из древнееврейской Библии (Ветхого Завета). Как объясняет Кэрол Дж. Ламберт, некоторые из его притч, вероятно, были задуманы как комментарии к конкретным стихам этой книги. Кроме того, он творчески переосмыслял ключевые идеи Притчей, связанные с темой Премудрости, а также оспаривал интерпретацию, по которой мудрые неизменно получают награду, а глупцы — наказание. Во второй части книги исследуется, что повлияло на творческий метод Иисуса: какими могли быть источники его образованности, почему он избрал путь расширения содержания отдельных библейских притч и каким образом его мудрость обогатила традиционные представления — например, концепцию «Царства Божьего».

Автор представляет Иисуса как мыслителя и рассказчика, искусным образом сочетавшего глубокое знание письменной традиции с силой живого слова. Книга будет полезна не только специалистам по Новому Завету, но и всем, кто интересуется библеистикой, историей религии и духовным наследием Иисуса из Назарета.

Препятствует ли Православная церковь свободному развитию культуры? Сторонники западноцентричных моделей полагают, что да. Тем не менее американский славист Дональд Островский демонстрирует, что непредвзятое изучение феномена «интеллектуального молчания» древней Руси рисует куда более сложную и многослойную картину.

Большая часть древнерусской культуры остается скрытой от восприятия: вера здесь превалировала над критикой и рассудком, а диалектическая логика не только не считалась необходимой, но и воспринималась как помеха прямому созерцанию божественного

В приложении книги публикуются статьи научной дискуссии из журнала Russian History No 46 (2019), дополняющие и углубляющие основное исследование. Для всех, кто интересуется православием, культурой и наследием Древней Руси.

Противостоят ли религия и биология друг другу в вопросе о происхождении человека? Принято считать, что они дают взаимоисключающие ответы. Однако, по мнению Теренса Кила, в современной теории происхождения рас отчетливо прослеживаются следы христианской интеллектуальной традиции. Религиозные представления не были окончательно вытеснены из науки — напротив, они по-прежнему во многом формируют ее облик. 

Книга заинтересует всех, кто занимается историей религии и науки, исследует проблему человеческого разнообразия или размышляет о соотношении веры и разума.

That the God of the Hebrew Bible and rabbinic literature, "the God of the Jews," is perfectly good is challenged by apparently immoral acts of that God, by contemporary standards, as well as by the classic problem of evil. In this book, Jerome Gellman aims to alleviate the first challenge, the so-called ideological critique, for the traditional believer by recommending replacing the God of the Jews with a different God, a "Jewish God," one in whom many traditional Jews have come to believe. And the problem of evil is lightened for the traditional believer, mainly by a possible theodicy explaining much evil. The book is at once analytic in style and Hasidic in broad orientation.

RUS:

Абсолютная благость Бога древнееврейской Библии и раввинистической литературы — «Бога евреев» — нередко ставится под сомнение. Критика исходит как из сферы морали, где Его поступки воспринимаются как противоречащие универсальным человеческим нормам, так и в связи с «аргументом от зла», утверждающим, что количество зла в мире перевешивает любое добро. Обращаясь прежде всего к религиозному читателю, Джером Геллман стремится преодолеть первую из этих трудностей — так называемую идеологическую критику, — предлагая заменить образ «Бога евреев» на «еврейского Бога», в Которого верят последователи иудаизма. Вторая проблема — теодицея — получает у Геллмана новое осмысление, укорененное в еврейской философской и этической мысли.

Книга написана в аналитическом ключе, но при этом вдохновлена богословскими моделями хасидизма.

What does it mean to wonder in awe or terror about the world? How do you philosophically understand Judaism? In How to Measure a World?: A Philosophy of Judaism, Martin Shuster provides answers to these questions and more.

Emmanuel Levinas suggested that Judaism is best understood as an anachronism. Shuster attempts to make sense of this claim by alternatively considering questions of the inscrutability of ultimate reality, of the pain and commonness of human suffering, and of the ways in which Judaism is entangled with the world. Drawing on phenomenology and Jewish thought, Shuster offers novel readings of some of the classic figures of Jewish philosophy while inserting other voices into the tradition, from Moses Maimonides to Theodor W. Adorno to Walter Benjamin to Stanley Cavell.

How to Measure a World? examines elements of the Jewish philosophical record to get at the full intellectual scope and range of Levinas's proposal. Shuster's view of anachronism thereby provokes an assessment of the world and our place in it. A particular understanding of Jewish philosophy emerges, not only through the traditions it encompasses, but also through an understanding of the relationship between humans and their world. In the end, Levinas's suggestion is examined theoretically as much as practically, revealing what's at stake for Judaism as much as for the world.

Что значит испытывать благоговение или страх перед миром? Как философски осмыслить иудаизм? В книге «Как измерить мир? Философия иудаизма» Мартин Шустер предлагает ответы на эти и многие другие вопросы.

Эммануэль Левинас считал, что иудаизм следует понимать как анахронизм. Шустер пытается осмыслить это утверждение, исследуя вопросы непостижимости высшей реальности, непреодолимости страданий, а также то, каким образом иудаизм вплетен в повседневность. Опираясь на феноменологию и классическую еврейскую мысль, автор предлагает оригинальные интерпретации ключевых фигур, вводя в традицию современные голоса — от Маймонида до Теодора В. Адорно, Вальтера Беньямина и Стэнли Кавелла.

Позиция Левинаса рассматривается не только с теоретической, но и с практической точки зрения, это позволяет глубже понять, что именно поставлено на карту — как для  иудаизма, так и для мира в целом.

This book explores how modern religious thought and religious Zionism have addressed the profound question of evil, with a particular focus on the Holocaust. It delves into the theological and philosophical challenges posed by absolute, undeniable, and inexplicable primal evil. The awareness of this primal evil serves as the foundation connecting the chapters, which trace the perspectives of influential thinkers such as Rabbis Zvi Yehuda Kook, Yosef Dov Soloveitchik, and Eliezer Berkowitz, as well as figures like Rabbi David Hartman and Eliezer Goldman.

Through a combination of philosophical and theological inquiry alongside historical and conceptual analysis, the book creates a rich mosaic of religious thought in the modern era. It also examines the responses of leaders and activists to the enduring question of evil in the shadow of Auschwitz.

Modern Orthodoxy is a form of American Judaism that affirms the traditional tenets and practices of Orthodox Judaism while at the same time maintaining an openness to contemporary cultural and intellectual developments. Beginning in the post-World War II era, Living in Both Worlds shows how a fledgling Modern Orthodoxy carved out an identity separate and apart from unacculturated ultra-Orthodoxy to its right and Conservative Judaism to its left, and follows its development through the first quarter of the twenty-first century as new, divisive issues such as feminism, LGBTQ rights, and the spread of academic biblical scholarship challenged its coherence, and a rejuvenated ultra-Orthodoxy contested its religious legitimacy.

Despite its general absence from the Jewish liturgical cycle and its limited place in Jewish practice, the Book of Job has permeated Jewish culture over the last 2,000 years. Job has not only had to endure the suffering described in the biblical book, but the efforts of countless commentators, interpreters, and creative rewriters whose explanations more often than not challenged the protagonist's righteousness in order to preserve Divine justice. Beginning with five critical essays on the specific efforts of ancient, medieval, and modern Jewish writers to make sense of the biblical book, this volume concludes with a detailed survey of the place of Job in the Talmud and Midrashic corpus, in medieval biblical commentary, in ethical, mystical, and philosophical tracts, as well as in poetry and creative writing in a wide variety of Jewish languages from around the world from the second to sixteenth centuries.

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Несмотря на отсутствие в еврейском литургическом цикле и ограниченное место в еврейской религиозной практике, Книга Иова определяет еврейскую культуру на протяжении последних 2000 лет. Усилия бесчисленных комментаторов, толкователей и творческих переписчиков сосредоточились на попытках доказать Божественную справедливость страданий, обрушившихся на Иова. Книга Джейсона Кальмана описывает богатую традицию осмысления этой библейской книги в древних, средневековых и современных еврейских текстах, таких как Талмуд, мидраши и средневековые трактаты еврейских мудрецов.

This groundbreaking volume bridges ancient wisdom and contemporary Jewish spirituality, offering fresh insights into Hasidic homilies as dynamic sources of meaning and renewal. Featuring nineteen scholars and educators, the book delves into the mystical depth and poetic imagination of these texts, revealing their power to inspire ethical and spiritual growth. Through close readings and practical reflections, the contributors explore innovative pedagogies for hermeneutical and existential transformation. With a programmatic introduction by Elie Holzer, this collection offers a rare look at the lived experience of teaching Hasidic homilies, addressing classroom dilemmas and spiritual impact. Essential for seekers and educators, it opens new pathways to renewed Jewish spirituality and divine-centered living.

Zionism and Jewish Culture examines the history of Zionism from a new perspective, arguing that Zionism was not only a political project, but also a major cultural force in modern Jewish life. To understand the growth of this movement and its success in establishing a modern Jewish state, the book examines the cultural world of pre-state Zionist activists, offering an understanding of the basic ideological challenges they faced—challenges that Israel is still grappling with today. It asks, how did the early Zionists define the relationship between Israel and Jewish tradition? How did they envision the ideal balance between the Jewish people’s welfare and the Land of Israel? What was their view on Western versus Eastern principles in defining the state? And what was their vision for the future of the Jewish state? In exploring these topics, this book enables a deeper understanding of the forces that continue to shape Zionism and Israel today.

From Tiberias With Love is a journey to rediscovering the magic and mystery, the intimacy and depth of a lost moment in the history of a remarkably relevant conscious community in the Galilee that still has much to teach us. In the year 1777, a group of spiritual seekers from Eastern European set sail in search of a promised land, far away from the internal and external conflicts plaguing those souls seeking the infinite within this finite world. Some who set sail identified with the burgeoning Jewish spiritual renewal movement of Hasidism, while others seem to have just come along for the ride. Weathering challenges both socioeconomic and geographic, this emigrating group sought to establish a center for a burgeoning hasidic ethos that would radiate to the Diaspora from its renewed center in the Holy Land in Palestine. Tiberian Hasidism provides a model of an intensive contemplative life that is particularly appealing to contemporary spiritual seekers for many reasons, including: its deep focus on mystical theology; devotional practice; and the ecstasy of deep friendship rather than allegiance to an institutionalized religion. This volume focuses on the teachings of letters of love from Vitebsker and Kalisker in Tiberias to their disciples in Eastern Europe known as the Iggrot Qodesh, still so ripe for excavation, offering an authentic roadmap to future contemplative pathways ripe for our age.

In the early twentieth century, Baptists were the fastest-growing non-Orthodox religious group among Russians and Ukrainians. Heather J. Coleman traces the development of Baptist evangelical communities through a period of rapid industrialization, war, and revolution, when Russians found themselves asking new questions about religion and its place in modern life.

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В начале ХХ века баптисты были самой быстрорастущей неправославной религиозной группой среди русских и украинских христиан. Хезер Колман прослеживает развитие баптистских евангелических общин в период стремительной индустриализации, войны и революции, когда остро встали новые вопросы о религии и ее месте в современной жизни.

This three-volume book investigates the Russian transformations of one of the central concepts of Greek Christology, the self-humiliation or kenosis of Christ. The author applies rhetoric (paradox, metaphor, metonymy) as a means to elucidate mechanisms of theological persuasion and to trace the representations of the humiliated Christ and his imitations in various media from liturgy and iconology to everyday practice and literary fiction. The exploration of post-Christian literature of the 19th and 20th century (N. Chernyshevskii, M. Gor’kii, N. Ostrovskii, Ven. Erofeev, Vl. Sorokin) demonstrates the existence of a kenotic Christology after Christianity.

RU

This three-volume book investigates the Russian transformations of one of the central concepts of Greek Christology, the self-humiliation or kenosis of Christ. The author applies rhetoric (paradox, metaphor, metonymy) as a means to elucidate mechanisms of theological persuasion and to trace the representations of the humiliated Christ and his imitations in various media from liturgy and iconology to everyday practice and literary fiction. The exploration of post-Christian literature of the 19th and 20th century (N. Chernyshevskii, M. Gor’kii, N. Ostrovskii, Ven. Erofeev, Vl. Sorokin) demonstrates the existence of a kenotic Christology after Christianity.

This book thoroughly examines Genizah fragments of Tractate Eruvin in the Babylonian Talmud from Cambridge University Library's Taylor Schechter collection. While previous research has focused on cataloging and categorizing the fragments and providing short, generalized descriptions, this study systematically explores whether the versions in the Genizah fragments contain significant differences compared to the print and manuscript versions of Tractate Eruvin. It also aims to note these differences and to investigate to what degree they affect or change our understanding of sugyot from Tractate Eruvin in light of the comparison between the Genizah version and the print version. 

This three-volume book investigates the Russian transformations of one of the central concepts of Greek Christology, the self-humiliation or kenosis of Christ. The author applies rhetoric (paradox, metaphor, metonymy) as a means to elucidate mechanisms of theological persuasion and to trace the representations of the humiliated Christ and his imitations in various media from liturgy and iconology to everyday practice and literary fiction. The exploration of post-Christian literature of the 19th and 20th century (N. Chernyshevskii, M. Gor’kii, N. Ostrovskii, Ven. Erofeev, Vl. Sorokin) demonstrates the existence of a kenotic Christology after Christianity.

RU

This three-volume book investigates the Russian transformations of one of the central concepts of Greek Christology, the self-humiliation or kenosis of Christ. The author applies rhetoric (paradox, metaphor, metonymy) as a means to elucidate mechanisms of theological persuasion and to trace the representations of the humiliated Christ and his imitations in various media from liturgy and iconology to everyday practice and literary fiction. The exploration of post-Christian literature of the 19th and 20th century (N. Chernyshevskii, M. Gor’kii, N. Ostrovskii, Ven. Erofeev, Vl. Sorokin) demonstrates the existence of a kenotic Christology after Christianity.

Israel and the Nations: The Bible, The Rabbis, and Jewish-Gentile Relations explores the Jewish theology and law (Halakhah) relating to non-Jews. It analyzes biblical, talmudic, medieval, and contemporary Jewish writings about gentiles and their religions.

The Bible challenges the Jewish people to be “a blessing for all the families of the earth.” Yet throughout history, Jewish experience with gentiles was complex. In the biblical and talmudic eras most gentiles were assumed to be idolators. In the Middle Ages most rabbis considered their Christian neighbors idolators, and Christian enmity sharpened the otherness Jews felt toward their Christian hosts. Muslims were monotheists, but Jewish-Muslim relations were sometimes positive and at other times difficult. With the advent secular tolerance in modernity, Jews found themselves in a new relationship with their gentile neighbors. How should Jews relate to gentiles today, and what are the bounds of Jewish tolerance and religious pluralism?

The book will interest both Jewish laypersons familiar with Jewish tradition as well as scholars of theology and interfaith relations

Israel and the Nations: The Bible, The Rabbis, and Jewish-Gentile Relations explores the Jewish theology and law (Halakhah) relating to non-Jews. It analyzes biblical, talmudic, medieval, and contemporary Jewish writings about gentiles and their religions.

The Bible challenges the Jewish people to be “a blessing for all the families of the earth.” Yet throughout history, Jewish experience with gentiles was complex. In the biblical and talmudic eras most gentiles were assumed to be idolators. In the Middle Ages most rabbis considered their Christian neighbors idolators, and Christian enmity sharpened the otherness Jews felt toward their Christian hosts. Muslims were monotheists, but Jewish-Muslim relations were sometimes positive and at other times difficult. With the advent secular tolerance in modernity, Jews found themselves in a new relationship with their gentile neighbors. How should Jews relate to gentiles today, and what are the bounds of Jewish tolerance and religious pluralism?

The book will interest both Jewish laypersons familiar with Jewish tradition as well as scholars of theology and interfaith relations

There is something deeply problematic about the ways that Jews, particularly in America, talk about “Jewish identity” as a desired outcome of Jewish education. For many, the idea that the purpose of Jewish education is to strengthen Jewish identity is so obvious that it hardly seems worth disputing—and the only important question is which kinds of Jewish education do that work more effectively or more efficiently. But what does it mean to “strengthen Jewish identity”? Why do Jewish educators, policy-makers and philanthropists talk that way? What do they assume, about Jewish education or about Jewish identity, when they use formulations like “strengthen Jewish identity”? And what are the costs of doing so?

This volume, the first collection to examine critically the relationship between Jewish education and Jewish identity, makes two important interventions. First, it offers a critical assessment of the relationship between education and identity, arguing that the reification of identity has hampered much educational creativity in the pursuit of this goal, and that the nearly ubiquitous employment of the term obscures significant questions about what Jewish education is and ought to be. Second, this volume offers thoughtful responses that are not merely synonymous replacements for “identity,” suggesting new possibilities for how to think about the purposes and desired outcomes of Jewish education, potentially contributing to any number of new conversations about the relationship between Jewish education and Jewish life.

This study vividly illustrates the “Jewish-Arab symbiosis,” highlighting the shared spiritual language and rich, intertwined worlds of Islamic and Jewish philosophy, theology, and mysticism.

This revised and supplemented second edition features some of the author's most probing essays and speeches on antisemitism, published here for the first time.

A 2023 Foreword INDIES Book of the Year Finalist in the Religion Category

“With clarity and penetrating insight, Alex Ryvchin unravels the mystery of antisemitism… Mandatory reading for anyone concerned with the ethical fate of the human race.” 

― Isaac Herzog, President of the State of Israel

The 7 Deadly Myths traces antisemitism from its earliest origins to the present day and uncovers the dangerous conspiracy theories that have corrupted reasoning and led people and nations to diabolical acts. Exploring some of the most significant events in history and uncovering little-known villains, this book answers the questions of how antisemitism takes hold, how it is transmitted and how it inspires violence to the present day. Written in a clear and compelling style, this book is essential to understanding why this ancient hatred continues to plague society, inspiring pop stars, athletes and demagogues alike. It is a crucial resource for policy makers, students and the reading public seeking to understand racism and how it can be stopped.

Completed shortly before Hamas carried out its barbaric October massacre, Hate Speech and Academic Freedom takes up issues that have consequently gained new urgency in the academy worldwide. It is the first book to ask what impact antisemitism has had on the fundamental principles the academy relies on for its identity—academic freedom, free speech rights, standards for hiring or firing faculty members and administrators, and the ethics of academic conduct and debate. Antisemitic hatred is spreading at a fever pitch. What steps can counter it? What damage to students is done when departments embrace anti-Zionism? Should faculty members face consequences for promoting antisemitism on social media? Should universities make a new push to adopt the IHRA Definition of Antisemitism?

This book discusses psychological aspects of dehumanization and of the human tendency to dominate, control and potentially murder those considered less than or “other” by the dominant group. It explores how increasingly severe dehumanization resulted in the genocide of six million Jews in the second World War. Psychological and behavioral strategies Nazi aggressors and ordinary citizens used to mislead themselves during this process are described. Understanding the sequence of events from dehumanization to murder has implications for the apparent tendency of human beings to harm and potentially kill those who appear “different”, or who are made into the “other”. Efforts to prevent genocide should actively challenge dehumanization of weaker populations whenever possible, even when dehumanization appears mild, “insignificant,” or “innocuous.”

In twenty-first century America, antisemitism is on the rise, especially on the extreme left, the radical right, and within political Islamism. Expressions of this oldest hatred are also increasingly prevalent in popular culture, where they are spread by politicians, entertainers and celebrities, the media, social justice activists, and religious leaders, as well as in universities, in schools, on the streets, and even, in some instances, by Jews. Once, Jews regarded the United States as die Goldene Medina–the Golden Land–where they could escape persecution and finally be free. However, this dream has not been realized and major trends are moving in the opposite direction. In Poisoning the Wells, leading scholars analyze contemporary antisemitism in the United States.

Hebrew University Professor Emeritus and Israel Prize recipient Eliezer Schweid (1929-2022) is widely regarded as one of the greatest historians of Jewish thought of our era. In Siddur Hatefillah, he probes the Jewish prayer book as a reflection of Judaism's unity and continuity as a unique spiritual entity; and as the most popular, most uttered, and internalized text of the Jewish people. Schweid explores texts which process religious philosophical teaching into the language of prayer, and/or express philosophical ideas in prayer’s special language – which the worshipper reflects upon in order to direct prayer, and through which flows hoped-for feedback. With the addition of historical, philological, and literary contexts, the study provides the reader with first-time access to the comprehensive meaning of Jewish prayer—filling a vacuum in both the experience and scholarship of Jewish worship.

Patriots without a Homeland dissects an important underexplored theme in Hungarian Jewry: Modern Orthodoxy. 

This study clearly demonstrates that beginning from the late nineteenth century, a strong modernizing trend developed within Orthodoxy based on the adoption of Hungarian national identity alongside the preservation of tradition. Modern Orthodoxy was receptive to the Hungarian language, culture, and religion. However, the attempt to integrate failed.

The book traces the journey of Hungarian Jews from Emancipation to the Holocaust and seeks to understand the reasons for the Jews’ complete trust in Hungarian integrity. For instance, why did they believe until the very last moment that the Holocaust would not affect them? How could they fail to notice the impending disaster?

This is the story of a community that felt rooted in the land and contributed greatly to its well-being, but was eventually rejected: the story of patriots without a homeland.

One of the most basic questions for any legal system is that of methodology: how one interprets, analyzes, weighs, and applies a mass of often competing legal rules, precedents, practices, customs, and traditions to reach final determinations and practical guidance about the correct legal-prescribed course of action in any given situation. Questions of legal methodology raise not only practical concerns, but theoretical and philosophical ones as well. We expect law to be more than the arbitrary result of a given decision maker’s personal preferences, and so we demand that legal methodologies be principled as well as practical. These issues are especially acute in religious legal systems, where the stakes are raised by concerns for respecting not just human, but divine law. Despite this, the major scholars and codifiers of halakhah, or Jewish law, have only rarely explicated their own methods for reaching principled legal decisions. This book explains the major jurisprudential factors driving the halakhic jurisprudence of Rabbi Yehiel Mikhel Epstein, twentieth-century author of the Arukh Hashulchan—the most comprehensive, seminal, and original modern restatement of Jewish law since Maimonides. Reasoning inductively from a broad review of hundreds of rulings from the Orach Chaim section of the Arukh Hashulchan, the book teases out and explicates ten core halakhic principles that animate Rabbi Epstein’s halakhic decision-making. Along the way, it compares the Arukh Hashulchan methodology to that of the Mishna Berura. This book will help any reader understand important methodological issues in both Jewish and general jurisprudence.

Hebrew University Professor Emeritus and Israel Prize recipient Eliezer Schweid (1929-2022) is widely regarded as one of the greatest historians of Jewish thought of our era. In Siddur Hatefillah, he probes the Jewish prayer book as a reflection of Judaism's unity and continuity as a unique spiritual entity; and as the most popular, most uttered, and internalized text of the Jewish people. Schweid explores texts which process religious philosophical teaching into the language of prayer, and/or express philosophical ideas in prayer’s special language – which the worshipper reflects upon in order to direct prayer, and through which flows hoped-for feedback. With the addition of historical, philological, and literary contexts, the study provides the reader with first-time access to the comprehensive meaning of Jewish prayer—filling a vacuum in both the experience and scholarship of Jewish worship.

A Winner of the Association for the Study of the Middle East and Africa 2023 Bernard Lewis Prize

Landes, a medievalist and historian of apocalyptic movements, takes us through the first years of the third millennium (2000-2003), documenting how a radical inability of Westerners to understand the medieval mentality that drove Global Jihad prompted a series of disastrous misinterpretations and misguided reactions that have shaped our so-far unhappy century. These misinterpretations in 2000, 2001, 2002, and 2005, contributed fundamentally to the ever-worsening moral and empirical disorientations of our information elites (journalists, academics, pundits). So while journalists reported Palestinian war propaganda as news (lethal journalism), they were also reporting Jihadi war propaganda as news (own-goal war journalism). These radical disorientations have created our current dilemma of pervasive information distrust, deep splits within the voting public in most democracies, the politicization of science, and the inability of Western elites to defend their civilization, and instead, to stand down before an invasion.

Jewish Partisans of the Soviet Union is a classic compilation of original Russian and Jewish sources on the anti-Nazi resistance in Eastern Europe. 

It is rooted in decades of research motivated by a desire to set the record straight on Jewish participation in resistance movements, a phenomenon often overlooked when not actively concealed. 

As the son of Jewish partisans in Nazi-occupied Eastern Europe, Jack Porter presents here the result of his decades-long research: first-hand accounts and interviews with survivors and partisans, as well as some of their original work, and a seminal English translation of Partisan Brotherhood, a historical document gathered by Russian-Jewish intellectuals in 1948 at the height of anti-Semitic hysteria, written mainly by non-Jewish Soviet partisan commanders recounting the deeds of the Jewish fighters in their units.

Since the turn of the millennium, rapid advances in technology, globalized markets, and atomized politics instigated in the American and Israeli Jewish communities questions about the morals of food consumption. 

Contemporary issues such as workers’ rights, animal welfare, environmental protection, among others, intersect with basic Jewish food ethics: while Jewish communities respect ancient laws, they also appreciate the importance of progress and look forward to a more repaired world. In these pages, readers will have the unique opportunity to delve into the minds of the brightest Modern Orthodox thinkers of the current generation. The contributions contained in Kashrut & Jewish Food Ethics by members of the progressive Orthodox Jewish association Torat Chayim are rich in detail and offer new paradigms for the practical observance of kashrut that have swirled in the ether for generations.

Could a religiously observant Jew, in good conscience, run as a libertarian candidate, promoting a libertarian platform? Or, would doing so betray fundamental Jewish values? 

Running in Good Faith? Observant Judaism and Libertarian Politics considers the seemingly irreconcilable values and political commitments of Judaism and libertarianism. The latter prizes individualism, self-ownership, private property, and freedom, whereas the former emphasizes community, charity, and service of God. But are these differences so sharp? This book seeks to determine if this is an essential clash or merely an apparent one, and to stimulate a broad discussion of Judaism, values, politics, and political philosophy in order to call into question what people think they know, about both Judaism and libertarianism.

Since the turn of the millennium, rapid advances in technology, globalized markets, and atomized politics instigated in the American and Israeli Jewish communities questions about the morals of food consumption. 

Contemporary issues such as workers’ rights, animal welfare, environmental protection, among others, intersect with basic Jewish food ethics: while Jewish communities respect ancient laws, they also appreciate the importance of progress and look forward to a more repaired world. In these pages, readers will have the unique opportunity to delve into the minds of the brightest Modern Orthodox thinkers of the current generation. The contributions contained in Kashrut & Jewish Food Ethics by members of the progressive Orthodox Jewish association Torat Chayim are rich in detail and offer new paradigms for the practical observance of kashrut that have swirled in the ether for generations.

There is something deeply problematic about the ways that Jews, particularly in America, talk about “Jewish identity” as a desired outcome of Jewish education. For many, the idea that the purpose of Jewish education is to strengthen Jewish identity is so obvious that it hardly seems worth disputing—and the only important question is which kinds of Jewish education do that work more effectively or more efficiently. But what does it mean to “strengthen Jewish identity”? Why do Jewish educators, policy-makers and philanthropists talk that way? What do they assume, about Jewish education or about Jewish identity, when they use formulations like “strengthen Jewish identity”? And what are the costs of doing so?

This volume, the first collection to examine critically the relationship between Jewish education and Jewish identity, makes two important interventions. First, it offers a critical assessment of the relationship between education and identity, arguing that the reification of identity has hampered much educational creativity in the pursuit of this goal, and that the nearly ubiquitous employment of the term obscures significant questions about what Jewish education is and ought to be. Second, this volume offers thoughtful responses that are not merely synonymous replacements for “identity,” suggesting new possibilities for how to think about the purposes and desired outcomes of Jewish education, potentially contributing to any number of new conversations about the relationship between Jewish education and Jewish life.

Hebrew University Professor Emeritus and Israel Prize recipient Eliezer Schweid (1929-2022) is widely regarded as one of the greatest historians of Jewish thought of our era. In Siddur Hatefillah, he probes the Jewish prayer book as a reflection of Judaism's unity and continuity as a unique spiritual entity; and as the most popular, most uttered, and internalized text of the Jewish people. Schweid explores texts which process religious philosophical teaching into the language of prayer, and/or express philosophical ideas in prayer’s special language – which the worshipper reflects upon in order to direct prayer, and through which flows hoped-for feedback. With the addition of historical, philological, and literary contexts, the study provides the reader with first-time access to the comprehensive meaning of Jewish prayer—filling a vacuum in both the experience and scholarship of Jewish worship.

Over a career spanning forty years, David G. Dalin has written extensively about the role of American Jews in public life, from the nation’s founding, to presidential appointments of Jews, to lobbying for the welfare of Jews abroad, to Jewish prominence in government, philanthropy, intellectual life, and sports, and their one-time prominence in the Republican Party. His work on the separation of Church and State and a prescient 1980 essay about the limits of free speech and the goal of Neo-Nazis to stage a march in Skokie, Illinois, are especially noteworthy. Here for the first time are a collection of sixteen of his essays which portray American Jews who have left their mark on American public life and politics.

Patriots without a Homeland dissects an important underexplored theme in Hungarian Jewry: Modern Orthodoxy. 

This study clearly demonstrates that beginning from the late nineteenth century, a strong modernizing trend developed within Orthodoxy based on the adoption of Hungarian national identity alongside the preservation of tradition. Modern Orthodoxy was receptive to the Hungarian language, culture, and religion. However, the attempt to integrate failed.

The book traces the journey of Hungarian Jews from Emancipation to the Holocaust and seeks to understand the reasons for the Jews’ complete trust in Hungarian integrity. For instance, why did they believe until the very last moment that the Holocaust would not affect them? How could they fail to notice the impending disaster?

This is the story of a community that felt rooted in the land and contributed greatly to its well-being, but was eventually rejected: the story of patriots without a homeland.

“‘Jewish identity’ is such a complex idea—neither simply a religious, nor cultural, nor ethnic ‘identity,’ but all of those things combined (and more). This important volume rejects narrow definitions and resists the way that ‘identity’ has been oversimplified and flattened in Jewish communal contexts. Along the way, it offers new paths for other communities struggling with concepts of identity to follow as well.” — Felicia Herman, Executive Director, Natan Fund

There is something deeply problematic about the ways that Jews, particularly in America, talk about “Jewish identity” as a desired outcome of Jewish education. For many, the idea that the purpose of Jewish education is to strengthen Jewish identity is so obvious that it hardly seems worth disputing—and the only important question is which kinds of Jewish education do that work more effectively or more efficiently. But what does it mean to “strengthen Jewish identity”? Why do Jewish educators, policy-makers and philanthropists talk that way? What do they assume, about Jewish education or about Jewish identity, when they use formulations like “strengthen Jewish identity”? And what are the costs of doing so?

This volume, the first collection to examine critically the relationship between Jewish education and Jewish identity, makes two important interventions. First, it offers a critical assessment of the relationship between education and identity, arguing that the reification of identity has hampered much educational creativity in the pursuit of this goal, and that the nearly ubiquitous employment of the term obscures significant questions about what Jewish education is and ought to be. Second, this volume offers thoughtful responses that are not merely synonymous replacements for “identity,” suggesting new possibilities for how to think about the purposes and desired outcomes of Jewish education, potentially contributing to any number of new conversations about the relationship between Jewish education and Jewish life.

“The Jewish Metropolis gives readers a fascinating whirlwind tour of Jewish New York from the 1620s to the 2020s. Every essay is enlightening, erudite, and thoroughly enjoyable.” —Tyler Anbinder, author of City of Dreams: The 400-Year Epic History of Immigrant New York

The Jewish Metropolis: New York City from the 17th to the 21st Century covers the entire sweep of the history of the largest Jewish community of all time. It provides an introduction to many facets of that history, including: 

• The ways in which waves of immigration shaped New York’s Jewish community
• Jewish cultural production in English, Yiddish, Ladino, and German
• New York’s contribution to the development of American Judaism
• Jewish interaction with other ethnic and religious groups
• And Jewish participation in the politics and culture of the city as a whole

When Maimonides’ Mishneh Torah (Code of Jewish Law) reached Lunel, France, a group of scholars composed twenty-four objections to his positions. Surprisingly, Maimonides’ rejoinder opened with an unusual rhymed prose epistle with effusive praise for his correspondents and artistic and complex language. In this book, Charles Sheer offers the first annotated translation of the entire epistle: he uncovers the biblical and midrashic passages modified by Maimonides that became the language of his Iggeret, and explicates its ideas in the context of Maimonides’ other works and compositions of the late Middle Ages.  He illustrates how Maimonides, in a most personal fashion, shared with these scholars his ideological struggle between his love for Torah study and “hokhmah” (philosophy, wisdom).  This Grand Epistle reveals much about this towering figure and provides a moving portrait of him during his last decade.

“Academically detailed yet esoterically fun.” —Kirkus

Few written works examine the tradition of prayers in government. This new angle will appeal to students and lovers of American history, Congress, American Jewish history, and religion. It’s a welcome, important addition to our understanding of Congress and Jewish contribution to America.

A Winner of the Association for the Study of the Middle East and Africa 2023 Bernard Lewis Prize

Landes, a medievalist and historian of apocalyptic movements, takes us through the first years of the third millennium (2000-2003), documenting how a radical inability of Westerners to understand the medieval mentality that drove Global Jihad prompted a series of disastrous misinterpretations and misguided reactions that have shaped our so-far unhappy century. These misinterpretations in 2000, 2001, 2002, and 2005, contributed fundamentally to the ever-worsening moral and empirical disorientations of our information elites (journalists, academics, pundits). So while journalists reported Palestinian war propaganda as news (lethal journalism), they were also reporting Jihadi war propaganda as news (own-goal war journalism). These radical disorientations have created our current dilemma of pervasive information distrust, deep splits within the voting public in most democracies, the politicization of science, and the inability of Western elites to defend their civilization, and instead, to stand down before an invasion.

In Shoah through Muslim Eyes, the author discusses her journey with Judaism as a Muslim.

Her book is based on the struggle of anti-Semitism within Muslim communities and her interviews with survivors. Rejecting polemical myths about the Holocaust and Jews, Afridi offers a new way of creating understanding of two communities through the acceptance and enormity of the Shoah. Her journey is both personal and academic in which the reader can find nuances of her belief in Islam, principles of justice, and the loneliness of such a journey. The chapters discuss the Holocaust and how it is unprecedented, interviews with survivors, antisemitism and Islamophobia, and Islam and memory. Afridi includes Muslim-Arab narratives that enhance the reach of the Holocaust into Muslim lands under the Vichy and Nazi government.

One of the most basic questions for any legal system is that of methodology: how one interprets, analyzes, weighs, and applies a mass of often competing legal rules, precedents, practices, customs, and traditions to reach final determinations and practical guidance about the correct legal-prescribed course of action in any given situation. Questions of legal methodology raise not only practical concerns, but theoretical and philosophical ones as well. We expect law to be more than the arbitrary result of a given decision maker’s personal preferences, and so we demand that legal methodologies be principled as well as practical. These issues are especially acute in religious legal systems, where the stakes are raised by concerns for respecting not just human, but divine law. Despite this, the major scholars and codifiers of halakhah, or Jewish law, have only rarely explicated their own methods for reaching principled legal decisions. This book explains the major jurisprudential factors driving the halakhic jurisprudence of Rabbi Yehiel Mikhel Epstein, twentieth-century author of the Arukh Hashulchan—the most comprehensive, seminal, and original modern restatement of Jewish law since Maimonides. Reasoning inductively from a broad review of hundreds of rulings from the Orach Chaim section of the Arukh Hashulchan, the book teases out and explicates ten core halakhic principles that animate Rabbi Epstein’s halakhic decision-making. Along the way, it compares the Arukh Hashulchan methodology to that of the Mishna Berura. This book will help any reader understand important methodological issues in both Jewish and general jurisprudence.

Israel and the Nations: The Bible, The Rabbis, and Jewish-Gentile Relations explores the Jewish theology and law (Halakhah) relating to non-Jews. It analyzes biblical, talmudic, medieval, and contemporary Jewish writings about gentiles and their religions.

The Bible challenges the Jewish people to be “a blessing for all the families of the earth.” Yet throughout history, Jewish experience with gentiles was complex. In the biblical and talmudic eras most gentiles were assumed to be idolators. In the Middle Ages most rabbis considered their Christian neighbors idolators, and Christian enmity sharpened the otherness Jews felt toward their Christian hosts. Muslims were monotheists, but Jewish-Muslim relations were sometimes positive and at other times difficult. With the advent secular tolerance in modernity, Jews found themselves in a new relationship with their gentile neighbors. How should Jews relate to gentiles today, and what are the bounds of Jewish tolerance and religious pluralism?

The book will interest both Jewish laypersons familiar with Jewish tradition as well as scholars of theology and interfaith relations

“Academically detailed yet esoterically fun.” —Kirkus

When Maimonides’ Mishneh Torah (Code of Jewish Law) reached Lunel, France, a group of scholars composed twenty-four objections to his positions. Surprisingly, Maimonides’ rejoinder opened with an unusual rhymed prose epistle with effusive praise for his correspondents and artistic and complex language. In this book, Charles Sheer offers the first annotated translation of the entire epistle: he uncovers the biblical and midrashic passages modified by Maimonides that became the language of his Iggeret, and explicates its ideas in the context of Maimonides’ other works and compositions of the late Middle Ages.  He illustrates how Maimonides, in a most personal fashion, shared with these scholars his ideological struggle between his love for Torah study and “hokhmah” (philosophy, wisdom).  This Grand Epistle reveals much about this towering figure and provides a moving portrait of him during his last decade.