Talmud and Halakhah

Moshe Kurtz explores several halakhic questions concerning the recitation of kaddish for the deceased, all of which point to a larger discussion about how one can confer merit on someone else.

Post-pandemic proposals to omit hazarat ha-shatz on a permanent basis have been soundly rejected by halakhic authorities. Is this due exclusively to halakhic considerations, or are additional factors at play? Yosie Levine contends that Ashkenazic rabbinic opposition to 19th-century attempts to eliminate hazarat ha-shatz may still be shaping halakhic discourse today.

The exhaustive Talmud commentary of Provencal scholar Menachem ben Shlomo Ha-Meiri was largely disregarded by Jewish scholars for centuries. Its revived popularity in the twentieth century presents a puzzle, then, for which multiple explanations have been offered. Michael Broyde considers the approaches advanced by his teacher Dr. Haym Soloveitchik and by others, before proposing his own explanation, focusing on Meiri's unique level of access to and use of Yerushalmi texts.

Yaakov Taubes examines three hypothetical “What if?” books and what they can teach us about history, science, and halakhah.

Howard Apfel reviews Sacred Training: A Halakhic Guidebook for Medical Students and Residents.

R. Shimshon Nadel explores the connection between the Hasmonean dynasty and the modern-day State of Israel.

In commemoration of the upcoming Sheloshim of Rav Moshe Kahn, Mindy Schwartz Zolty shares a Hesped of her teacher in which she discusses his derekh ha-limmud and his derekh as a melamed.

May one opt to participate in a potentially dangerous vaccine trial? This theoretical halakhic question has suddenly become all-too-urgent. Sharon Galper Grossman and Shamai Grossman explore.

Lawrence Kaplan responds to AJ Berkovitz’s article on the many conflicting interpretations of a passage in Midrash Tehillim, highlighting two different approaches advanced by Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik.

David Fried explores the humra of pat Yisrael during the aseret yemei teshuvah.