History
The Dead Sea Scrolls, Alive in Times SquareTuesday, November 8, 2011 by Alex Joffe | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Features
In the basement of a converted theater on West 44th Street, tucked between the legendary Sardi's restaurant and a bowling alley, a block from Times Square and across the street from the musical Memphis, is Discovery Times Square.
To Be Young, Gifted, and a British JewMonday, November 7, 2011 by Elliot Jager | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Features
One way to think of British Jewry is to focus on its slow and steady decline: 270,000 souls, demographically graying; synagogue affiliation on a downward spiral; out-marriage running at between 30-50 percent.
Eating Your ValuesFriday, November 4, 2011 | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Features
The many Jewish laws regarding food—how it gets from the ground and into our mouths in a kosher manner—are central to Jewish life. But what ethical framework underlies the system of kashrut? Maimonides' justifications for kashrut range from avoiding cruelty to animals and eschewing the idolatrous practices of antiquity to considerations of health.
British Philo-Semitism, Once and FutureThursday, November 3, 2011 by Alex Joffe | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Features
Anyone who has even a passing familiarity with public discourse about Jews in today's United Kingdom can be forgiven for viewing the term "British philo-Semitism" as an oxymoron.
Creating the Master RaceFriday, October 28, 2011 by Alex Joffe | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Features
The Museum of Jewish Heritage in Lower Manhattan's peaceful Battery Park is an unlikely place to explore some of the 20th century's most horrific evils. Deadly Medicine, an exhibit on Nazi racial science, is a sobering examination of the intertwined history of science and evil.
The Yiddish Silver ScreenThursday, October 27, 2011 by Nahma Sandrow | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Features
Nobody is sure exactly how many movies were ever made in Yiddish. James Hoberman's exhaustive study Bridge of Light (2010) lists some hundred such films, made in the 20th century primarily in America, Germany, Austria, Romania, Poland, and Russia.
Portrait of the Artist as a Self-Hating JewTuesday, October 25, 2011 by Dan Kagan-Kans | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Features
The French author Irène Némirovsky lived through one world war and died at Hitler's hands in the second. Born to a wealthy Jewish family in Kiev at the turn of the last century, she came of age just in time to flee revolutionary Russia for Paris.
In Egypt, with LiberalsWednesday, October 19, 2011 by Michael J. Totten | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Features
American relations with the Arab world have been strained for decades; Israel's relations with the Arab world barely exist. But the Arab world itself is not all of a piece. The outright enemies of Israel and the West—preeminently, Syria and Iran—are political totalitarians.
The Genesis of Modern ScienceTuesday, October 18, 2011 by David Curzon | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Features
Copernicus, Galileo, Kepler, Descartes, Newton, and the other founders of modern science were all believers in the truths of the opening chapter in the Hebrew Bible.
Political ContrailTuesday, October 11, 2011 by Elliot Jager | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Features
This month marks the 30th anniversary of an emotionally fraught and bitterly waged political confrontation between the Reagan administration and the organized Jewish community.
Editors' Picks
Pop! Goes the Patriarchy Yoel Finkelman, H-Net. A new study offers a strong focus on the faults inherent in Orthodox masculinity without adequate discussion of its strengths.
War Diary Matti Friedman, Times of Israel. "Arab Legion reported to be trying to smoke out the Haganah who had entered underground channels . . ." Excerpts from a British clergyman's 1948 journal.
The Holocaust and Atrocity Prevention Nina Shea, National Review. Obama excoriated the Bush administration for failing to speak up about the Armenian genocide, yet he has also remained silent. But official recognition often comes at a high cost.
From Esperanza to Shprintze Philologos, Forward. "In English my name means hope," says the heroine of Sandra Cisneros's House on Mango Street. What does it mean in Yiddish?
Hail to the Chief? Dianna Cahn, JTA. Now that modern-day Judaism is losing ground as a uniform community in Britain, many are asking whether the chief rabbi can—or should—continue to try to unite Jewry under a single umbrella.
Blurring the Line Raymond Ibrahim, Middle East Forum. How does the media whitewash Muslim persecution of Christians? One way is to evoke "sectarian strife," a phrase that conjures images of two equally matched adversaries fighting.
There's a Key in My Challah! Jeffrey Saks, Torah Musings. Does the post-Passover tradition known as "shliss challah" derive from symbolic readings of the season's texts—or, rather, is it a Christian symbol of Jesus rising in the dough?
Bon Voyage? Benjamin Ivry, Forward. Flaubert and other nineteenth-century French travelers in Palestine groused about wild dogs, the hygiene of the locals, the blight of tourism, and the taste of Dead Sea water.
Genetic Threads Josh Fischman, Chronicle of Higher Education. The story of Jewish origins, once the province of historians and scholars of religion, is now being told by DNA—and it decisively refutes the counter-narratives promulgated by Shlomo Sand.
Haredim in the Holocaust Meir Wikler, Haaretz. While Yad Vashem downplays the experiences of the religious in the Shoah, Haredim have authored their own books and are building their own museums to teach their children and to memorialize the slain.