Scholarship

Sruli Fruchter examines the story not often told about Noah—the trauma inflicted by immense responsibility amidst immense destruction.

Can Halakhah really countenance euthanasia? Alan Jotkowitz responds to Leead Staller

It is customary to celebrate Tu Bi-Shevat by eating fruits and reciting the She-Hehiyanu blessing on them. This custom, however, has proved challenging in recent years as advances in technology have made it difficult to find new fruit—as defined by halakhah—to say the She-Hehiyanu

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.

In 1927, Rabbi Boruch Ber Leibowitz wrote a poem, an ode to Rabbi Hayyim Soloveitchik of Brisk. Nati Helfgot provides the background and a translation.

Eliyahu Freedman compares hospital chaplains to the Kohanim.

Joshua Shapiro explains how close readers of the Biblical text can find a unifying theory for reason behind the ten plagues.

Outside the Land of Israel, we add an extra day to several holidays. Michael Kurin wonders: why not on Hanukkah?

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.

Ari Lamm writes in tribute to the late Louis Feldman, examining his scholarship in light of personal experience.