Jewish Ideas to Change the World
Religion & Spirituality:Judaism
A virtual event presentation by Rabbi Dr. Yehuda Mirsky
The event was co-sponsored by Temple Emanuel
About the Event:
Liberalism is in crisis everywhere, and everywhere the crises bear similarities and real differences. We will look at what has been going on in Israel, to understand it on its terms, as a Jewish and Democratic state, and about liberalism’s vicissitudes around the world.
About the Speaker:
Yehudah Mirsky is a Professor of Near Eastern and Judaic Studies at Brandeis University and is on the faculty of the Schusterman Center for Israel Studies. He was, in the Spring Semesters of 2022 and 2023, a Visiting Professor at Harvard University. A native New Yorker, he lives in Jerusalem with his family and is both an active scholar and committed activist.
His scholarship and teaching focus on the intersections of politics and religion, the historical and theological underpinnings of liberalism and human rights, and, in recent years, on ecological ethics. He teaches courses in Jewish Thought (medieval and modern), history of Zionism and the State of Israel, and political and ethical thought.
He served in the US State Department’s human rights bureau during the Clinton Administration as a Public Affairs Officer and Special Advisor and has written on religion, politics, and culture for The New York Times, The Washington Post, New Republic, The Economist, Foreign Policy, New Lines and many other publications. He also was an aide to then-Senators Bob Kerrey and Al Gore and worked at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, the ACLU, and other NGOs. An ordained rabbi, he was the chaplain with the Red Cross after 9-11.
In Israel, he was in the early 2000s a Fellow at the Van Leer Institute and Jewish People Policy Institute and was among the founders of the grass-roots Yerushalmit Movement for a pluralist, livable Jerusalem. Currently, he is deeply involved in the protest movements against the current governing coalition's attempts to undo Israeli democracy, working with both the Jerusalem and Tel Aviv wings of the movement. He is also a longtime student of Arabic and Islam.
His Rav Kook: Mystic in a Time of Revolution (Yale, 2014) won the Jewish Book Council’s Choice Prize. It appeared in 2021 in a revised Hebrew edition as Rav Kook: Mabat Hadash (Kinneret) which was named by Ha-Aretz as one of the 50 best books of 2021. That year also saw the publication of his Towards the Mystical Experience of Modernity: The Making of Rav Kook, 1865-1904 (Academic Studies Press).
B.A. Yeshiva College, J.D. Yale Law School, Ph.D. Harvard University
★ Support this podcast ★Prophecy: What Does it Mean Anyway?
A Memoir That Explores The Stories of Survival, Tragedy and Hope
Shtisel’s Shas: A Talmudic Look at the Hit Israel T.V. Show
All Hands on Deck: The Gifts That Introverts and Extroverts Bring to Jewish Leadership and Why It Matters
Living on the Side of Life: An Interpretation of Jewish Living
Corona Exegesis: Political Cartoons, Jewish Holidays, and Israeli Society
The Battle of Definitions: What Is Antisemitism and Why Does Its Definition Matter?
Zionism and Its Critics
Is Peace Possible in Jerusalem?
Why Bad Stuff Happens: Two Dissident Theodicies
Cain and Abel’s Day In Court: What The World’s First Murder Can Teach Us About Dispensing Justice And Injustice – Rabbi Dan Ornstein
The Book of Proverbs: A Social Justice Commentary (BOOK LAUNCH) – Rabbi Dr. Shmuly Yanklowitz
Prozbul: Innovative Halachic Change or Gaming the System? – Rabbi Zvi Hirschfield
Third-Party Peacemakers in Judaism: Text, Theory, and Practice (Book Talk) – Rabbi Dr. Daniel Roth
King David: Man of War and Politics, Man of God, Man of Contradictions. Based on a close reading of the Books of Samuel – Rabbi Dr. Jeremy Rosen
Interview: Aaron Lipkin, Ofra
The Tragedy of Heruta: The Madonna who Became a Whore – Gila Fine
Power of the Image: Photographic Thoughts on Torah Values – Shira Hecht-Koller
Messianism, Zionism, and Religious Radicalism: Spiritualties in Israel – Rabbi Menachem Creditor
Shmitta: From Biblical Narratives to Contemporary Perspectives – Dr. Rabbi Avital Hochstein
Create your
podcast in
minutes
It is Free
Stories Of Hope With Tzipora Grodko
The Forgotten Exodus
For Heaven’s Sake
Kosher Money
Meaningful People