Article Archives

Seder’s End

The four cups have been drunk, the story has been told, and all have cried "Next Year in Jerusalem." Now comes the final act, one that, the late hour notwithstanding, it would be a pity to miss. The closing pages of the Haggadah, a mix of sacred hymns and humorous songs, highlight the entire narrative's arresting mix of playfulness and pedagogy, the fine line it walks between the memory of slavery and persecution and the celebration of survival and destiny. The hymns, most of them seemingly unconnected to the Seder itself, widen its angle of vision as we venture out to...

Haggadah

It is hard to think of another classic Jewish text reprinted, rewritten, and re-imagined as often, or as divergently, as the Haggadah. The Passover Seder is the most ubiquitous Jewish observance—fully three-quarters of American Jews participate in a Seder of some kind, as do 80–95 percent of Israelis. The abundance of Haggadot, in other words, reflects the ubiquity of the observance. Of course, the Haggadah has long been a mirror of Jewish history. Once its text had stabilized by the dawn of the Middle Ages, it became the object of lavish and continuing attention on the part of commentators, illuminators, illustrators,...

Thoroughly Modern Matzah

When Jews the world over sit down next week to mark the birth of Jewish history, matzah will figure prominently at the table. Matzah baking is an exacting task; according to traditional law, the entire process, from first kneading to exit from the oven, must be accomplished in 18 minutes flat, with not a speck of leaven in sight. For thousands of years, these specifications and others were laboriously met by hand. Yet this most ancient food has a modern history, too. The first matzah machine was invented in 1838 in France. With rabbinic approval, the technology moved steadily eastward.  The...

Crisis?

What comes to mind when you think about great moments of crisis in U.S. foreign policy? The Berlin blockade, the Cuban missile crisis, Iran's seizure of American hostages? Or, perhaps, Israel's decision to build residential housing in northeast Jerusalem? Whether current tensions with Washington do constitute a crisis, and whether yesterday's crisis talks between President Barack Obama and Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu lead to a reduction or intensification of those tensions, will become apparent soon enough. But whatever the outcome, it is a fact that strains between Washington and Jerusalem have been part of the "special relationship" ever since President Harry...

AIPAC

Against a background of sharp disagreement between Washington and Jerusalem, the annual policy conference of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee winds down today. On Monday, the 7,500 delegates—Jews, Christians, African Americans, as well as European and Canadian activists—heard Secretary of State Hillary Clinton declare that the United States would tell Israel the "truth" when "difficult but necessary choices" had to be made. Today, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu is scheduled to meet President Barack Obama. Delegates from all 50 states planned to spend Tuesday on Capitol Hill speaking with their respective Senators and Members of Congress. But what is AIPAC, and what...

Milton Steinberg

A different sort of book launch took place yesterday at New York's Park Avenue Synagogue, a flagship of the Conservative movement. Being celebrated was the release of a long-lost novel left unfinished at the time of the author's death 60 years ago. The author was Milton Steinberg, who once served as the synagogue's rabbi and was among the most influential American Jews of the 20th century.   Steinberg's early thought was molded by three teachers. At City College, the philosopher Morris Raphael Cohen imbued in him a commitment to philosophical rationalism. Rabbi Jacob Kohn taught him that the life of the...

Feast Your Eyes

Early next week, an extraordinary private collection will go on display at New York's Yeshiva University Museum, before heading off in the fall to the Israel Museum in Jerusalem. The Braginsky Collection of illuminated manuscripts, ketubot, megillot, and printed volumes is not only visually ravishing but deeply instructive.  The exhibit's many items created in Central Europe in the 15th-19th centuries demonstrate a vibrant visual culture in communities seldom thought of as hotbeds of cultural openness and artistic energy.  They are complemented by beautiful objects produced by Sephardic communities from Amsterdam to India, and from Livorno, Italy, a major center of Jewish...

Creed or People?

Is Jewishness a matter of belief, or of belonging? The question, which agitates many Jews and non-Jews in today's multicultural world, is in fact very old—and it has been illuminated by recent scholarship into the relationships among Judaism, Christianity, and the religions and rulers of the later Roman Empire.  The traditional image of Judaism as Christianity's parent has long given way to an image of two competing interpretations of ancient Israelite religion and its spiritual legacies. After the destruction of the Temple in 70 C.E., these two emergent religious communities, in all their permutations, would develop in the shadow of imperial Rome. How...

Mubarak

While attention in Israel and elsewhere is focused on the sudden deterioration in relations with the Obama administration, Iran's seemingly unstoppable push for nuclear weapons, and the possible outbreak of a third intifada, few have commented on the implications of the continued hospitalization in Germany of 81-year-old Hosni Mubarak, president of Egypt. On March 4, Mubarak placed Prime Minister Ahmed Nazif in charge of Egypt's affairs and entered a Heidelberg hospital to have his gall bladder removed. German doctors said they are satisfied with his recovery. Nevertheless, rumors that Mubarak had died sent share prices temporarily falling on Cairo's stock market....

East Jerusalem

During Vice President Joseph Biden's visit to Israel last week, a routine bureaucratic approval of additional dwellings for ultra-Orthodox Jews was leaked to the media, thereby setting off a crisis in relations between the two countries. The neighborhood in question, Ramat Shlomo, is said to stand in Arab East Jerusalem. But what and where is East Jerusalem?    The term is an artificial construct, and a misnomer. Jerusalem is a city built on hills, embedded on a mountain ridge; Samaria lies to the north, Judea to the south.  The city has no grid system—no Fifth Avenue to divide the east and west sides....