Scholarship

Judah Kerbel explores how differing approaches to listening to music during Sefirat ha-Omer balance the appropriate role for subjectivity in halakhic decision-making.

Joshua Berman, a leading Tanakh scholar, has written a compelling book that addresses head-on many of the challenges posed by biblical criticism. Michael Harris explains.

In Part II of his series on trop, William Gewirtz explains the principle of recursion and how it helps us interpret texts.

What motivated the first Ashkenazic Chief Rabbi of Israel, Rav Herzog, to work tirelessly on the seemingly quixotic project of running the modern State of Israel on the basis of Halakhah? Reviewing Alexandar Kaye's new book on the subject, Rabbi Shalom Carmy explains.

Tzvi Sinensky explores the Talmudic version of the Roman myth of Narcissus

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

Michael Bernstein examines how the individual experience is ironically incorporated into holidays that are all about the community.

Ilan Fuchs reviews Naomi Seidman’s book Sarah Schenirer and the Bais Yaakov Movement.

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.

David Curwin explores the evidence that Jacob may have made a fatal mistake in not conquering Canaan upon returning.