Torah Personalities

The biblical figure of Esther is often interpreted by traditional and modern commentators as a heroine of active leadership. Naama Sadan offers a novel perspective, according to which Esther confronts national crisis in female-coded ways, triumphing and saving her people through internally-focused activism.

Bezalel Naor translates and contextualizes a poem by Pinchas Peli about the home of Rav Kook.

Sarah's conspicuous absence from the dramatic Akeidah narrative is the subject of both traditional and scholarly interpretation. Michael Wolff offers an approach through the lens of gender roles.

The masters of hasidut and psychoanalysis both arrived at a counterintuitive understanding of human nature, according to which narcissism is a reflection of self-hate rather than self-love. Admiel Kosman traces this idea as it appears in the works of Erich Fromm, the Rebbe of Warka, and Martin Buber, focusing on the commandment to love one's neighbor as a behaviorist correction.

Jared Rutner explores Rabbi Sacks’s economic views.

Tzvi Sinensky responds to Lawrence Kaplan and continues the discussion on Mendelssohn and Jewish law.

David Berger's reflection commemorating the passing of Yaakov Elman, ob"m.

How do Moses Mendelssohn and Revelation jibe? Judah Kerbel offers some perspective.

Aryeh Klapper with some new translation-stylings of Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik's Halakhic Man.

Meira Wolkenfeld's reflection commemorating the passing of Yaakov Elman, ob"m.