Scholarship

What can the Talmud teach us about living through a pandemic? Avi Strausberg argues that it teaches us quite a bit about strengthening acts of kindness and solidarity in our communities.

This week's Parashah introduces us to the city of Shechem. Tamar Weissman examines the various appearances of this city throughout Tanakh, explaining that while it is a city of rupture, it is also one of covenant and fraternity.

Tzvi Sinensky reimagines the utilitarian case for Torah u-Madda. Far from seeing the study of Madda as a concession to the need to earn a livelihood, the new utilitarianism uses cutting-edge scholarship to solve some of the most pressing problems in our schools and communities.

Suzanne Last Stone reviews Chaim Saiman's Halakhah: The Rabbinic Idea of Law.

Dr. Tovah Lichtenstein responds to the details of the previously published Rav timeline.

Yaakov Jaffe explains how Biblical grammar and parables come together in Amos to teach us about women's Talmud Torah.

Two letters to the editor provide alternative perspectives on the question of what Jewish law wants American abortion law to be.

Alan Jotkowitz disagrees with Sharon Galper Grossman’s and Shamai Grossman’s halakhic argument that wealthy nations should provide booster shots to their own populations before contributing doses to poorer countries.

Two readers respond to Michael Broyde's recent article on time-bound commandments. Leah Sarna critiques Broyde's omission of female scholarship, and Avi Siegal argues that Broyde's unifying theory skews the data.

Yaakov Jaffe analyzes and compares the "Song of the Sea" and the "Rime of the Ancient Mariner."