Latest Essays

Rebecca, informed by God of her sons’ destinies, thwarts her husband’s effort to bless Esau. The Torah thus portrays an assertive Rebecca in contrast to a weak and uninformed Isaac. Early Jewish interpreters took conflicting approaches to this unusual depiction of a patriarchal couple.

Abimelech, Michal, Sisera’s mother, and Jezebel all look through a window, but their experience is not the same.

The rabbis claim that a “subverted” or “apostate” city, which Deuteronomy 13:13-18 condemns to destruction, “never was and never will be” (t. San. 14:1). Yet the account in Judges 19-21 of the destruction or ḥerem of Gibeah, its inhabitants, animals, and property, suggests that such “internal ḥerem” was an Israelite practice, and that Gibeah is being presented as a subverted city.

At the well, the servant asks Rebecca who her father is, and she answers, “I am the daughter of Betuel the son of Milkah, whom she bore to Nahor” (Genesis 24:24). Why the unusual genealogical description?

Betuel, Rebecca’s father, mysteriously appears and disappears in the negotiations over Rebecca’s marriage.

A closer look at the thematic and verbal parallels between the accounts of the flood and the destruction of Sodom, as well as comparison with other ANE flood/destruction stories, helps us better understand the genre and function of the Sodom story.

Circumcision seemingly maims the body, yet ancient Jewish and rabbinic interpretation present it as actually perfecting the body.

God promised Abraham that Isaac would be his heir, yet God asked Abraham to offer Isaac as a sacrifice. What did Abraham believe that allowed him to reconcile this divine contradiction?

A new solution to why Canaan (not Ham) was cursed.

The ancient Near East had many versions of the flood story, such as Atrahasis, Ziusudra, Utnapishtim, etc., most of which predate the Torah’s account of Noah’s flood. But what is the earliest extant version of the releasing birds motif?

The Torah describes God’s fashioning the firmament (רקיע) on the second day of creation. This piece of the universe, however, doesn’t actually exist—a problem obfuscated in my yeshiva education.

My relationship with Torah began with the romance of mysticism but then gave way to skepticism and disillusionment. To my surprise, it was academic scholarship of the Torah that brought back the spark and helped foster a deeper, more mature relationship.

What is the gender of the God of creation? Of YHWH in general?

The connection between the Israelite festival of Sukkot in the temple and the Ugaritic new year festival and its dwellings of branches for the gods.  

Is there a genetic marker for kohanim, priests? Are Ashkenazi Jews descended from Khazars? Why is there such a close genetic connection between Samaritans and Jews, especially kohanim? A look at what genetic testing can tell us about Jews.

“God has not given you a mind to understand or eyes to see or ears to hear until this very day.”—Deuteronomy 29:3

Although incest taboos are found in the majority of cultures, medieval Jewish thinkers found this to be an insufficient explanation for the Torah’s prohibitions. 

The Torah reading on the afternoon of Yom Kippur consists of the list of forbidden sexual relations (Leviticus 18).  How do these laws connect to Yom Kippur? 

Two Roman conquests of Jerusalem (Pompey in 63 B.C.E. and Sosius in 37 B.C.E.) purportedly happened on “the day of the fast,” during which the Jews barely defended themselves. Is this a reference to Yom Kippur and why didn’t the Jews defend themselves?

Why is the Benjaminite city of Gibeah portrayed as another Sodom—and who is the anonymous Levite from Ephraim who arrives there with his concubine?

Moses and R. Judah HaNasi implore: “I would be most grateful if you would maintain the Torah after me.”

Do we really want God to remember all that we did?

Deuteronomy’s command to publicly read the Torah on Sukkot every seven years appears in stories about King Josiah, King Agrippa, and Ezra the Scribe. The latter’s innovative ceremony served as the model for what became synagogue Torah-reading.

Deuteronomy directs male landowners to bring the first fruits and recite a declaration. The Rabbis distinguish between the two parts of this commandment, including everyone in the bringing of the produce and excluding Levites, converts, and women only from the declarations. Eventually, even this exclusion largely falls by the wayside.

The anomalous and paradoxical nature of the twelfth curse – Deuteronomy 27:26.