Shades of White: A Fresh Look at Lavan’s Relationship With Yaakov
Yitzchak Etshalom comments on the relationship between Lavan and Yaakov.
Adam’s Absence: Rereading the Primordial Sin
Yisroel Ben-Porat analyzes a Midrash offering non-misogynistic takes on the original sin.
Also the Diseases
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.
Re-reading Bereishit: A Review of David Fohrman’s New Book
Tammy Jacobowitz reviews David Forman's latest book, a companion to Sefer Bereishit, and finds engaging, instructive literary analysis that pulls new insights from familiar stories.
When Shabbat first provided a Taste of the World to Come
Our modern Shabbat experience has been called "a taste of the world to come." But was this the case for the first Shabbat in the desert? Ezra Zuckerman Sivan considers the question.
In God We Trust or Do We? The Fears of Isaac and Jacob
Meshulam Gotlieb analyzes a midrash on Jacob's ladder dream to understand Jacob's lifelong fear, how he became so fearful and how it affected his life.
Priests and Prejudice: Disability in Parashat Emor
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.
Aleinu and Genesis: Against the Twin Idolatries of Universalism & Ethnonationalism
Does the Torah support a universalist or ethnonationalist political orientation? In this timely essay, Ezra Zuckerman Sivan explores the meaning behind key stories in Genesis through the framework of the Aleinu prayer.
Avraham’s Test of Loyalty
Mark Glass puts the Akeidah in conversation with the surrounding narratives of the book of Genesis.
In the Shadow of God: The Mishkan’s “Constructive” Theology
Ranana Dine compares Christian and Jewish views on the value of having a beautiful Temple.
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