Tradition Podcast

TRADITION ’s Summer 2023 issue, recently made fully open access, contained a fascinating offering penned by Michael A. Shmidman, our distinguished editor emeritus, titled “ Isadore Twersky’s Unique Contribution to the Study of The Guide of the Perplexed . ” It is a presentation and analysis of five integral and interlocking components of Rabbi Professor Isadore (Yitzhak) Twersky’s understanding of...

As we continue to wrestle with the state of anxiety for what comes next at this troubling and traumatic time in Israel and around the Jewish world, we take strength from demonstrations of inspiring resilience and unity in our nation. We hope you’ve been following the content recently published on TraditionOnline.org responding to current events. In our upcoming Winter issue we hope to deliver some...

“The entire world is a very narrow bridge.” The world, all of life, is a “narrow bridge,” on either side of which is a gaping, terrifying abyss. Someone who does not live this experience cannot understand it. One needs to traverse the bridge, and it is clear from an objective perspective that he is capable of doing so. This is why “the main thing is not to fear at all.” Your greatest enemy is not...

During this time of worldwide Jewish unity, TRADITION is pleased to deliver an episode of our podcast co-produced with our friends at Matan: The Sadie Rennert Women’s Institute of Torah Study in Jerusalem. Our recently released Fall 2023 issue features an essay by Dr. Yosefa Fogel Wruble titled “ Psalm 139: When God’s Presence Both Overwhelms and Eludes ” which explores two exegetical prisms for P...

TRADITION and the Rabbinical Council of America brought together authors from our recent issue on “The Yom Kippur War After 50 Years” as they discuss insights from their contributions to our pages and the sudden, tragic timeliness of that issue for events unfolding in Israel. Dr. Shlomo Fischer, Rabbi Jeffrey Saks, Rabbi Dr. Tzvi Sinensky and moderator Mrs. Mali Brofsky. TRADITION has made the con...

TRADITION ’s Fall 2022 issue featured a lengthy essay by Todd Berman exploring a 6-decade-old critique launched by R. Eliezer Berkovits on Dr. Abraham J. Heschel’s “Theology of Divine Pathos.” In brief, the debate centered on Heschel’s contention that a prophet reacts to God’s emotions , that the navi is guided by God’s own feelings . For Berkovits, Heschel errs by aligning himself with the wrong...

On April 23, 2023, TRADITION and the Rabbinical Council of America convened our first  TRADITION Today Summit , hosted at Congregation Rinat Yisrael in Teaneck, NJ, exploring “Material Success and Its Challenges.” Among the papers presented at the event was a fascinating item co-authored by Avital Chizik-Goldschmidt and Chaim Saiman, “Material Success and the Rise of ‘Modern, Orthodoxy’” – in whic...

Three decades following the passing of the Rav zt”l his legacy endures and his teachings still inspire – but how do we communicate his Torah to a generation “which did not know Yosef” (R. Yosef Dov Halevi Soloveitchik, that is)? This is a question that is explored from a few different angles in TRADITION’s recent expanded issue on the thought of the Rav.  Readers of the special issue will discover...

Our editor, Jeffrey Saks, offers this audio version of his Editor’s Note introducing TRADITION’s special issue on the thought of Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik zt”l. In Saks’ essay, “We Read the Rav to Know We Are Not Alone in Loneliness” ( open access here ), he shares his own personal encounter with the Rav’s writings at a pivotal moment in his own religious development, and discusses the importan...

Here we are, days before the arrival of Passover. If we are not drowning in cleaning products, chances are we’re doing the equally important work—perhaps more important work—of reflecting on the Exodus story in advance of Seder night. A highlight of this week’s observances is the recounting of the biblical Ten Plagues. In an interesting new book, Dr. Jeremy Brown considers the Eleventh Plague, a k...

Avivah Gottlieb Zornberg is an internationally recognized teacher and lecturer around the English-speaking world and, each week, in multiple settings in Jerusalem, where her unique style of integrating keen readings of the weekly Torah portion with the commentaries of midrash, classical meforshim, Hasidic interpretation, and more, are supplemented by the insights she draws from philosophy, psychoa...

Recording of Rabbi Chaim Brovender and Mrs. Mali Brofsky in conversation to mark the 120th birthday of Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik zt”l. Hosted by TRADITION and WebYeshiva.org (12 Adar/March 5, 2023). The post The Rav’s Students Across Generations appeared first on Tradition Online .

Dr. Tovah Lichtenstein and R. Jeffrey Saks in conversation to mark the 120th birthday of Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik zt”l. Hosted by TRADITION and WebYeshiva.org (12 Adar/March 5, 2023). The post The Rav’s Enduring Legacy appeared first on Tradition Online .

Prof. Marc B. Shapiro’s recent essay “From the Pages of TRADITION : R. Esriel Hildesheimer on Torah Study for Women” (TRADITION, Summer 2022), was the subject of our most recent podcast. Shapiro joined Jeffrey Saks to discuss Hildesheimer’s legacy and that of 19th-century German Orthodoxy; the history of women’s Torah study; trends in Jewish education; and the intersections of Jewish history and t...

In the 1970s Moral Philosophy turned its attention to an ancient topic – but coined a new name to organize our thinking about it. That field, now known as “Moral Luck” constitutes a set of fascinating and important philosophical debates. Do we judge people by their intentions, for good or for ill, or by the results of those intentions? This has serious implications for both ethics and jurisprudenc...

TRADITION’s Summer 2022 issue featured an article by Yakov Nagen, “Sharing Torah with the World: The Jewish People’s Responsibility to Non-Jews.” The essay was part of a cluster of content related to topics in Jewish Universalism .  Nagen’s contribution is a learned treatment of issues related to the challenge of being a “light unto the nations” in which he argues that teaching Torah to non-Jews i...

As our readers and listeners likely know, since the launch of the TraditionOnline website in the summer of 2019 we have published a weekly feature called “The BEST.” In that column we have asked a wide variety of writers to consider what things “out there” in the big wide world make them think and feel. What elements in general culture potentially inspire us to live better? We have sought to share...

With Rosh Hashana around the corner, and the end of the Shemitta year upon us, TRADITION’s editor Jeffrey Saks sat down chat with Shlomo Brody about his recent essay “The Curious Case of Prozbul’s Disappearance and Resurgence” (open access at https://traditiononline.org/the-curious-case-of-prozbuls-disappearance-and-resurgence ). Brody’s essay offers a fascinating tour of an episode in the history...

This is an Audio Editor’s Note from TRADITION’s newly released Summer 2022 issue—Rabbi Jeffrey Saks reads his essay “It Takes a Cosmic Village” which introduces a special section on Jewish Universalism. In this column our editor muses on a cluster of essays recently published in our pages, situating them at the intersection of Jewish Universalism and Particularism; or, in Rabbi Soloveitchik’s term...

The late and lamented Rabbi Jonathan Sacks was a frequent critic of the emergence of a post-truth culture and also a life-long opponent of moral relativism. Yet, in his book, “The Dignity of Difference: How to Avoid the Clash of Civilizations,” he was an ardent proponent of a form of religious pluralism. When first published over 20 years ago his position was both attacked and misunderstood—giving...

In this episode of the TRADITION/Or Chadash series, Shlomo Zuckier discusses the presence of Hasidism in contemporary Modern Orthodox life. Alon Meltzer queries Zuckier about his contribution to TRADITION’s “Rabbi Lamm Memorial Volume,” which analyzed R. Lamm’s approach to Hasidut and how it formulated a key element in his manifesto of Torah u-Madda. Exploring the idea of academia and secular lear...

In this episode of the TRADITION/Or Chadash series our editor Rabbi Jeffrey Saks has the tables (and microphone) turned on him and becomes the subject of the interview.  Jacquie Seemann Charak of Or Chadash in Sydney, Australia, questions Saks about his recent essay in the Rabbi Norman Lamm memorial volume, “The Extremes Are More Consistent But Absurd,” which explored R. Lamm’s writings on religio...

RCA – Rabbinical Council of America and its TRADITION Journal present a special conversation from the frontlines of Jewish life in Ukraine with Rabbi Mordechai Bald, Chief Rabbi of Lviv, in conversation with RCA President Rabbi Binyamin Blau, and TRADITION editor Rabbi Jeffrey Saks. Help support the Lviv Jewish community’s emergency fund: https://lauderfoundation.com/ukraine The post Dispatch from...

In the period preceding World War I a surprising number of young Jewish women in Habsburg Galicia left their traditional Orthodox homes for life in the Catholic Church (mostly in the Felician Sisters’ Convent in Krakow). Although the Jewish community tended to portray this phenomenon as kidnapping, and some families involved government authorities in their attempts to recover their daughters, the...

In TRADITION ’s Fall 2021 issue, we published an essay penned by Rabbi Shubert Spero – a longtime contributor to our pages. In fact, this essay, his 26th in TRADITION , arrived 60 years after his first appearance in the journal and coincided with his 98th birthday. We took the opportunity to spend an afternoon chatting with Rabbi Spero in his Jerusalem apartment about this essay, “ The Problematic...