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Jewish Wars, Then and NowMonday, January 11, 2010 | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Features
A masterwork of historical writing, The Jewish Wars by Yosef ben Matityahu, better known by his Roman name of Flavius Josephus (37–ca. 100 C.E.) is a massive and indispensable chronicle of Jewish fortunes from the Hasmonean Revolt in the second century B.C.E. through the destruction of the Temple and the fall of Masada in 73 C.E. It is also the autobiography of an extraordinary and extraordinarily conflicted man. Military leader, historian, biblical interpreter, negotiator, diplomat, neither martyr nor traitor but something in-between, Josephus traversed a route from battlefield commander in the war against Rome to Roman citizen and favored beneficiary of imperial...
Monday, January 11, 2010 by Itamar Eichner | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Picks
Over 7,000 members of Bnai Menashe, ethnic Indians claiming descent from one of the ten Lost Tribes, are formally converting to Judaism and moving to Israel. Their story has been told by Hillel Halkin in his book, Across the Sabbath River.Never Lost, Case Closed
Monday, January 11, 2010 by Cnaan Liphshiz | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Picks
An isolated crypto-Jewish community in northern Portugal has somehow retained its genetic identity for centuries.Radicalization 101
Monday, January 11, 2010 by Douglas Murray | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Picks
Outside Waziristan, the U.K.'s universities offer the most conducive environment an Islamic extremist could wish to inhabit.My God, Elohai
Monday, January 11, 2010 by Kobi Oz | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Picks
Discovering tapes of his Tunisian grandfather's self-performed songs of religious devotion, an Israeli singer and band leader enters into a haunting musical dialogue with tradition.A Breakthrough Discovery
Friday, January 8, 2010 | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Picks
The deciphering of the oldest Hebrew inscription ever discovered—from the tenth century B.C.E.—also supplies the earliest written evidence of the ancient Kingdom of Israel.Still Redundant After all these Years
Friday, January 8, 2010 by Gary Rosenblatt | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Picks
Exactly six decades ago, a report on Jewish organizational life in the U.S. found "duplication, excessive competition, . . . and actual conflict." All still there today—but is this an altogether bad thing?One and the Same?
Friday, January 8, 2010 by Yael Mishali | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Picks
Ultra-Orthodoxy and radical secularism are not so much polar opposites as two sides of the same coin; the good news is that both are doomed to extinction.In Poland, the Once Unthinkable Thrives
Friday, January 8, 2010 by Konstanty Gebert | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Picks
A Jewish intellectual and former Solidarity activist marvels at a small but miraculously renewed community.
Art is a CameraFriday, January 8, 2010 | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Features
Ever since the Second Commandment, with its prohibition of "images," Judaism has been an un-, or even anti-visual culture. Or so we are told. While there is some truth to this notion, it is a very limited truth. The realities—historical, philosophical, above all aesthetic—are much more complicated and much more interesting. After all, the Bible itself tells us that at Sinai the people "saw the voices." Scholars have demonstrated the rich visual culture at work in Jewish history, as well as the role of the visual imagination in theology and mysticism—and in the daily experience of those for whom Judaism is...
