48 | Tammuz 5779 | July 2019
48 - The Dark Hours // Anat Kutner Though sleep and sex are hardly the stuff of history, a surprising amount can be gleaned from rabbinic responsa dealing with medieval Jewish sleeping habits. With candlelight...
כותב
The Book of Exodus: A Biography
What can Princeton University’s Lives of Great Religious Books series possibly add to the reams already written on the enormous religious and political influence of the book of Exodus, particularly Michael Walzer’s classic Exodus and...
Shmuel Zanwil Kahane’s Map of Holy Sites
The Rock of Destruction Location: Jerusalem Hills Near Eshtaol and Zor’a, atop a barren, stony hill along the road to Jerusalem, a lone rock juts out. Here, according to a legend recorded in the early...
Curator or Creator
Nowhere to Go In 1950, Jerusalem gained a new pilgrimage site: the Lion’s Cave, located in the Muslim graveyard of the city’s Mamilla neighborhood. The man responsible for this innovation was the director of Israel’s...
Shmuel Zanwil Kahane and the Legend of the Holy Ashes
The Curator's Vision Shmuel Zanwil Kahane, director of Israel's Ministry of Religious Affairs from 1949 to 1979, possessed a keen sense of history. Enormous changes had overtaken the Jewish people, demanding a narrative beyond the...
The Price of Dissent
Amsterdam, Holland’s greatest city, epitomizes liberalism and freedom. The famous coffee shops of the De Wallen neighborhood, the red-light district, the free-flowing alcohol at the many breweries, and the general “anything goes” atmosphere attract millions...
Messianic Mania
When I had attained the age of 20, I began to study the Zohar and the Lurianic writings. [According to the Talmud] whoever wants to purify himself receives the aid of Heaven; and thus He...
Divinely Plagued
Seldom can any individual distill the defining events of his sojourn in this world into a single sentence. Yet sometimes a few words from a familiar, seminal text can evoke just such a sense of...
47 | Nisan 5779 | April 2019
47 - Song of the Lonely Poet // Yemima Hovav Cowed by his reputation as Jewish national poet, Hayim Nahman Bialik’s personal life was much less tempestuous than some might have preferred. Was it lack...
41 | Shevat 5778 | January 2018
41 In the Service of the Czar // Irena Vladimirsky The St. Petersburg police chief, a Russian diplomat, and a comedian all sit down together at the Seder... It sounds like a joke, but Peter the...
42 | Nisan 5778 | March 2018
42 Lights, Camera, Zionism! // Zahi Cohen What made Hollywood’s favorite screenwriter work for the Zionist underground? Was it Ben Hecht’s warm heart, his stormy personality, his shocking discovery of Nazi atrocities – or all...
