Terry Eagleton interviewed by JTS’s Arnie Eisen
| 2:11 PM Sep 11, 2009
Pairing a pugnacious British intellectual with an American Jewish religious leader for a public conversation on faith must be a lot of people’s idea of fun, because it’s happened in Manhattan two years in a row. The first time around was a bit more raucous: 2,000 people turned out to see Christopher Hitchens and Conservative ...
By rejecting Maimonides’ God, ‘New Yorker’ writer says
| 1:00 PM Aug 25, 2009
One of the difficulties of being an atheist is that the task of explaining just what it is one doesn’t believe in requires, to some degree, an idea of what God might be like, if one did believe in a Supreme Being. In this week’s New Yorker, James Wood examines the question of whether the ...
Strange places for atheists, the plight of prisoners, and baseball takes a stand
| 5:00 PM Jul 7, 2009
•A game show in Turkey called Penitents Compete pits religious leaders from the world’s major faiths against each other in the battle for the soul of a nonbeliever. The atheists are examined by a panel of theologians to prove their sincerity—presumably based on how well they know their Hitchens. [CNN]
•One atheist who has yet to ...
Shedding tears is no way to write a novel
| 10:34 AM Aug 2, 2007
It’s been a rough few weeks. I am struggling to begin this novel, and so instead of writing, I am reading, and what I am reading about is writing, and so I find myself wanting to kick Robert Frost’s ass. I want his head on a stick. Two roads diverge in a wood, and I—I ...
Feeling betrayed by God, a father refuses to sacrifice his son
| 10:44 AM Jul 19, 2007
There’s an argument that Abraham should have refused to sacrifice Isaac, or so a friend tells me; he has recently decided to become a rabbi and is playing over various interpretations he’s heard and elaborated on. This one he admits he only half believes: Just as Abraham pled with God to spare the handful of ...
A writer endeavors to learn exactly how ordinary people arrive at their systems of belief and disbelief
| 10:47 AM Aug 10, 2006
As someone obsessed with the joke of being human—that is, the combination of being conscious and mortal—I find myself seeking but never finding answers to my grand theological and philosophical questions. As part of this search, I decided to talk to others to see how they approach these conundrums. Lee Greenfeld is an underground rock ...
Though only a tiny fraction of what it was in the 18th century, Barbados’s Jewish community—and its 1750 synagogue—still stand proud
In early 20th-century Poland, poet Shmuel Nadler took off his yarmulke and took up with the Communists
Judith Shulevitz’s new book considers the Sabbath throughout the ages and in her own life
After a painstaking survey, Tablet Magazine awards title for nation's tastiest triangular treat
Making Palestinian chicken and Moroccan challah for a Shabbat dinner with Alice Waters
The national infatuation with pork has reached Jewish cuisine, prohibitions notwithstanding
Passover is about freedom, so let’s not encourage our kids to be slaves to their allergies
My children are becoming German citizens, and I’m going nuts
Little people, big questions
Playing the defiant Vashti in a day school Purim play awakened my inner feminist
On Valentine’s Day, reflecting on the limits and boundlessness of a father’s love
Plus-size retail queen Deb Malkin insists that fashion isn’t only for the skinny
Amid financial shortfalls and a Conservative crisis, the Jewish Theological Seminary will shutter its cantorial school
As Chabad opens preschools across the country, secular parents try to reconcile the movement with the classroom
The recession has hit the rabbinate, too. How are the newly ordained—and laid-off veterans—handling the rabbi glut?
How to reconcile religious prohibitions on autopsies with the need to determine a cause of death
From the archives: The neverending fetishistic fascination with Jews and intelligence
Immunization fears lead to another outbreak among New York’s ultra-Orthodox
For an Orthodox preteen, Tonya Harding was a hero—and a Purim inspiration
A crossword puzzle celebrating Judaism’s denominations
The Coney Island attraction who made wrestling history
