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Category Archives: The Jewish Journal
Who Counts? We all do.
I normally don’t review children’s books, but this one’s a keeper. Who Counts? combines simple, direct storytelling with superb artwork and morally uplifting themes. Its authors, a rabbi and a professor of Jewish Studies, retell three of Jesus’ parables from … Continue reading
Posted in Judaism, The Jewish Journal
Tagged Amy-Jill Levine, Bible, Children's Books, Lost Sheep, Margaux Meganck, Parables, Prodigal Son, Sandy Sasso, Who Counts?
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Immigration and the Image of God
My new blog post for The Jewish Journal: Surprisingly – or maybe not – many of our current debates were foreshadowed by ancient rabbinical disputes. One such foreshadowed debate was our national conundrum about immigration, legal and otherwise. In his … Continue reading
Keeping the Peace in Troubled Times
My latest blog post for The Jewish Journal: Angry disagreement now dominates our national discourse, with emphasis on the “angry.” We feel, with William Butler Yeats, that “Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold; mere anarchy is loosed upon the … Continue reading
Fighting Racism Starts in the Heart
My latest blog post for The Jewish Journal: When we think of relations between Jews and African-Americans, we naturally think of our proudest moments. And we should. Abraham Joshua Heschel marched side-by-side with Martin Luther King in 1965, helping America … Continue reading
Is Lone-Wolf Judaism a Thing?
My new blog post for The Jewish Journal: Howard Roark wasn’t Jewish, but his creator was. Roark was the protagonist of Ayn Rand‘s 1949 novel The Fountainhead. An architect who wouldn’t compromise his ideals or his integrity, he declared that … Continue reading
Chaos and Creation, from Genesis to Today
My new blog post for The Jewish Journal: You might not expect it, but the very first words of the Torah explain how social change works. The most familiar English rendering is “In the beginning, God created the heavens and … Continue reading
Do You Want to Believe?
My latest blog post for The Jewish Journal: After a bitterly divisive election season, there’s one question on everyone’s mind: “How can people possibly believe that?” What “that” is depends on who’s doing the talking. It means one thing to … Continue reading
Posted in Judaism, Philosophy, The Jewish Journal
Tagged Belief, Debate, Disagreement, Election, Jonathan Haidt, Politics, Psychology, Sociology of Belief, The Righteous Mind, WEIRD values
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Ben Franklin’s Jewish Values
My latest blog post for The Jewish Journal: American founder Benjamin Franklin (1706-1790) wasn’t Jewish, but he might as well have been. He shared many of Judaism’s key moral values. One of our most central values is moral seriousness: the … Continue reading
Twin Holidays of Creation
My latest blog post for The Jewish Journal: Rosh Hashanah celebrates the creation of the world. Yom Kippur is the Day of Atonement. They seem quite different. But what if they’re not so different after all? I’m not a rabbi … Continue reading
Posted in Judaism, The Jewish Journal
Tagged Exodus, Genesis, High Holidays, Kabbalah, Moral Choice, Nahum Sarna, Number Mysticism, Rosh Hashanah, Sefirot, Tikkun Olam, Yom Kippur
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The Thousand-Year View 