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Talmud: The Back StoryThursday, January 27, 2011 by Yehudah Mirsky | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Features
There is no getting away from the Babylonian Talmud. Love it, hate it, or both, this monumental work has been central to Jewish life for a millennium and more, managing time after time to find new readers and to summon new forms of reading.
Thursday, January 27, 2011 by John L. Allen, and Jr. | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Picks
In a forthcoming book, the legal scholar Joseph Weiler argues that, in the events surrounding the death of Jesus, Jews were acting out their biblically mandated part in a divine drama of obedience.Lies, Damned Lies, and Communal Statistics
Thursday, January 27, 2011 by Jenna Weissman Joselit | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Picks
How an anti-Semitic comment fueled the first great census of New York Jews and inspired a venerable tradition.The Resistance in Lebanon
Wednesday, January 26, 2011 by Elliott Abrams | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Picks
With Hizballah's power grab, the mantle of resistance moves to the March 14 movement that won Lebanon's elections. But will they resist, and will the U.S. back them?Al-Jazeera’s Show Trial
Wednesday, January 26, 2011 by Khaled Abu Toameh | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Picks
The "Palestine Papers" seem designed to deprive the West Bank leadership of what is left of its credibility; they may succeed.Learning from Reynolds Price
Wednesday, January 26, 2011 by Beth Kissileff | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Picks
Why can't American Jewish writers give as much serious and deep thought to their religion as the late novelist, a self-declared "outlaw Christian," gave to his?
The Seed of IsraelWednesday, January 26, 2011 by Aryeh Tepper | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Features
Until modern times, the boundaries of Jewish identity were cut and dried. If you were born to a Jewish mother, or if you were a convert according to Jewish religious law (halakhah), you were Jewish. If not, you weren't.
Wednesday, January 26, 2011 by Moshe Sokolow | Jewish Ideas Daily » Weekly Portions
"Should you purchase a Hebrew slave [eved ivri], he shall labor for six years and go free, gratis, in the seventh." This week's portion commences with a topic that is of poignant and almost eerie pertinence in this period of upheaval caused by economic straits, when many Jews have increasingly been compelled to depend on communal and philanthropic welfare. How does a Jew become a slave? And can another Jew become a slave master?A Dangerous Game
Wednesday, January 26, 2011 by Mudar Zahran | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Picks
As their citizens demand civil rights, leaders of Arab regimes distract them by igniting anti-Semitic rhetoric.
Is Israeli Democracy Finished?Tuesday, January 25, 2011 by Benjamin Kerstein | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Features
In a now somewhat notorious story published on January 11, Time magazine announced that Israeli politics was taking an ominous "rightward lurch," and concluded that the Middle East's only democracy is on the slippery slope toward something like . . . fascism.
