Jewish Thought and History

Rebecca Cypess considers the life and work of the Italian Jewish Renaissance composer Salamone Rossi, his rabbinic supporter Leon Modena, and the controversies over 17th century polyphonic music in the synagogue.

What do Paul, Purim costumes, and Purim torah all have in common? Yehuda Fogel delves into the meaning of hiddenness and its role in revelation on Purim.

Tamar Ron Marvin argues for the importance of recognizing a Jewish idea of Aliyat Ha-Dorot.

Udi Dvorkin offers a plea to take Rav Shagar at his full value, which means reading him in the original Hebrew.

Did Rav Soloveitchik buy into Nietzsche’s critique of religion? Alex Ozar reviews Daniel Rynhold and Michael Harris’s book, which surprisingly argues that the answer to this question is yes.

Aton Holzer offers a novel re-reading of the Seder, arguing that it reflects and recreates four types of liberty that can be found in the Exodus narrative, as well as a fifth form of freedom.

David Fried reviews Diana Lobel's Moses and Abraham Maimonides: Encountering the Divine, which argues that the categorization of Moses Maimonides as an Aristotelian philosopher and his son Abraham as a Sufi mystic is an oversimplification.

Warren Zev Harvey reflects on the pain and fear of Israel’s current moment, finding unexpected hope in R. Joseph Kaspi’s anti-deterministic theory of history. The essay was originally published in Hebrew and translated by the author.

Tzvi Sinensky on The Slonimer's contemporary popularity

Steven Gotlib review Miri Freud-Kandel’s new book on the relevance of Louis Jacobs to contemporary Orthodox theology.