Scholarship

Chesky Kopel looks at the various tellings and retellings of the controversial deal that Rudolph Kastner made with Nazi leadership in Budapest and argues that they represent a modern-day Midrashic presentation of the history.

At the height of the cholera epidemic in 1831, Hatam Sofer delivered a timely sermon on a perplexing midrash to Parshat Ki Tavo. The take-home, suggests Elli Fischer, is all-too familiar in the COVID era.

Responding to Tamar Ross’s article from two weeks ago, Steven Gotlib argues for a more traditional understanding of Divine Revelation.

Elliot Salinger with an erudite and accessible article on Rambam's philosophy of "knowing."

Lazarre Simckes analyses Joseph’s dreams through the lens of trauma psychology.

Joshua Stadlan carefully explores the “blemishes” that invalidate a kohein for service in the Mishkan to argue that they were not an original part of God’s plan.

With only two verses about him in the Book of Judges, not much is known about Tola ben Puah. Ami Hordes takes clues from his story's text and context to paint a fuller picture of who the judge was and why he was important.

"Who Knows" seems to have become a recurring question for so many of us. Erica Brown shares personal and biblical reflections on the meaning of this phrase for the age of coronavirus.

Many synagogue goers found the abbreviated High Holiday services we recently concluded quite appealing. Need we eventually go back to the way it was before coronavirus? Not really, argues Moshe Kurtz, surveying the substantial halakhic support for shortening the services every year.

With masterful translation, Tzvi Novick offers a glimpse of Israeli culture to our English readers.