In the opening section, we would explore the place of Zion/Israel in the Jewish moral and political imagination—from the biblical age to the age of exile to the early days of the modern Zionist movement. We would re-capture fascinating figures—like Ezra the Scribe, the Maccabees, Yohanan Ben Zakkai, Yehuda Halevi, and the central (but often forgotten) early Zionist figures, ending with selections from the great Zionist novel Daniel Deronda by George Eliot.