Three Weeks and Tisha be-Av

Yom Kippur marks the end of an 11 week period when thematic haftarot about the destruction of the Temple, consolation following its loss, and repentance replace haftarot connected to the weekly Torah reading. What can this grouping teach us about the nature of forgiveness and reconciliation? Hannah Abrams explains.

Ayelet Wenger offers a creative, intertextual reading of the story of Rabbi Akiva and the Wolf on the Temple Mount.

Erica Brown considers the little-discussed prohibition on planting during the Nine Days and what it teaches about the nature of mourning and joy.

Max Hollander analyzes the Talmudic narrative of Pardes and the four rabbis who entered it.

  Aton M. Holzer The fifteenth of Av – among the most minor of minor festivals on the Jewish calendar – is marked in the diaspora...

Zvi Grumet suggests that when read in sequence, the kinot of R. Elazar Ha-Kalir—often seen as the ones most difficult to understand—offer a powerful theological narrative from despair to hope.

In his latest for the Lehrhaus, Dan Ornstein creatively imagines the story of the Talmudic sage Rabbi Yohanan through his teachings on the Book of Job. The short story is followed by a reflection on the methodology and power of "contemporary midrash."

Yosef Lindell examines why Shomron Kol Titein is a fitting conclusion to the daytime kinnot on Tisha Be-Av.

In advance of Tisha Be-Av, Tzvi Novick annotates and interprets the kinnah of a’adeh ad hug shamayim by the master poet R. Eleazar ha-Kalir, unlocking its complex acrostic to determine who its speaker is meant to be.

David Polsky explores the similarities and differences between Hamas and the Jewish Zealots at the time of the destruction of the Second Temple.