A Jewish democracy activist joins us to talk about the oppression of the Uighurs in western China, and whether the Jewish experience has any survival strategies to offer.
On Passover, Jews are commanded to retell the story of the Exodus, but the book they use to do it seems just as focused on food and drink as it is on the story itself. Why?
Lenient rulings in response to new situations are not necessary if unfortunate accommodations, they are instead a testament to the strength and durability of Judaism.
What the headline-making rabbinic showdown over online seders reveals about Jewish law and its limits.
It’s not that they were exceptionally sophisticated or tolerant, as one popular recent article would have it—it’s that they lived surrounded by people who raised pigs.
The most widely read, beloved, and perplexing book of the Jewish tradition.
A desire to see wicked nations punished is bound up in the belief in a just and providential God.
Not willfulness, but freedom for excellence.
A communal, and often political, ritual that was commonplace for a few decades.
Egypt and Bergen-Belsen.
“Soldiers in Hawaii had fresh pineapple for dessert. Kashrut was a secondary concern.”
An acclaimed food writer and culinary historian knew that to understand Jewish food was to understand Judaism itself.
The book read today would be unrecognizable to the ancient Jews who first devised the home ritual of the seder.