Press play below to listen to the podcast, download it in the iTunes Store, or stream it via Stitcher.  When Jews celebrate the upcoming holiday of Purim, they’ll also study the Book of Esther, named for the young queen whose Jewish identity was unknown to her husband—Persia’s king—and his court. The Book of Esther […]

Press play below to listen to the podcast, download it in the iTunes Store, or stream it via Stitcher.  It is often thought that the Hebrew Bible focuses on the human capacity for good rather than on urging prosperity; that, in other words, trade and markets―areas where rational actors seek to maximize their self-interest―are […]

Press play below to listen to the podcast, download it in the iTunes Store, or stream it via Stitcher.  “We have arrived at a unique point in history,” a recent essay argues, “where many Americans love nothing more than themselves, and the only functioning organization that touches their lives is a corporation.” The author […]

Press play below to listen to the podcast, download it in the iTunes Store, or stream it via Stitcher.  Every week, on the seventh day—the Sabbath—observant Jews rest. They perform no labor and they dedicate the day to serving God. This idea, the Sabbath, has another application in the Hebrew Bible: God also commands […]

Press play below to listen to the podcast, download it in the iTunes Store, or stream it via Stitcher.  This week, Jews celebrate the holiday of Sukkot, during which it is traditional to read one of the most philosophically interesting books of the Hebrew Bible, Ecclesiastes. The narrator of the book, identified by Jewish […]

Press play below to listen to the podcast, download it in the iTunes Store, or stream it via Stitcher.  On June 24, 2021, in the middle of the night, part of a 12-story condominium building in the Miami suburb of Surfside, Florida, suddenly collapsed. Thus far, eighteen people are confirmed dead and 145 remain […]

Press play below to listen to the podcast, download it in the iTunes Store, or stream it via Stitcher.  There’s a distinction often made between two common approaches to the human longing for wisdom. The first approach, philosophy, is considered the unassisted search for wisdom and truth, one that requires boldness, curiosity, and perhaps […]

Press play below to listen to the podcast, download it in the iTunes Store, or stream it via Stitcher.  The hallmark of the American constitutional system was the idea that all men are created equal. Of course, the American regime did not live up to that ambition for centuries, but the ideal of equality […]

The Book of Ruth tells one of the Hebrew Bible’s most beautiful and beloved stories—chronicling how a childless widow from a foreign land rises to become the ancestress of Israel’s greatest king. But as Dr. Leon Kass and his coauthor (and granddaughter) Hannah Mandelbaum demonstrate in their new book, Reading Ruth: Birth, Redemption, and the […]

Press play below to listen to the podcast, download it in the iTunes Store, or stream it via Stitcher.  The idea of social justice marks a cleavage in the American Jewish consciousness. Its advocates believe that social justice represents the very best ethical impulses of Judaism, and that the pursuit of social justice is […]