Regardless of how well or poorly Jews have integrated into their host societies, in each generation, they have fasted over the two destructions of Jerusalem and the Temple in 586 BCE and 70 CE. And have prayed to be able to return. But there remains a division between those Jews who see the return as a miraculous manifestation of Messianism…
General Topics
Jewish Torquemadas
Of all the Roman emperors, I would say that Constantine more than any other, was responsible indirectly for the two thousand years of Christian oppression of the Jews. If you are interested in the facts, I heartily recommend Constantine’s Sword: The Church and the Jews, by James Carrol. But I want to focus just on one serendipitous item. Constantine was an…
Fast of Tammuz
We have just had the Fast of the Seventeenth of Tammuz. It commemorates the Roman siege of Jerusalem and the moment at which the Romans destroyed the walls and a prelude to the destruction of the Second Temple. Whereas the Fast of the Ninth of Av (in three weeks) the actual destruction of the two Temples, is the most important fast after Yom Kipur, the Fast of…
Blasphemy and Brian
In 1997 “The Life of Brian” by Monty Python comedians was a tremendous hit in Britain and a scandal. The cast was composed of Eric Idle (a contemporary of mine at Cambridge); John Cleese, Terry Jones, Michael Palin, Terry Gilliam, and Graham Chapman, names that dominated British comedy for several decades. It is my favorite comedy of all time. Even better…
Charter Schools and Isidore of Seville
I have always been a fan of Charter Schools ( naturally there are poor ones too). And I was always shocked that American Teachers’ Unions opposed them on principle and have consistently tried to block them. Even Barack Obama who campaigned for them because they helped the poorest and most disadvantaged children get far better results than public schools, capitulated…
Talmud on a Desert Island
One of the longest-running radio program series on the BBC is Desert Island Discs. It began in the year of my birth 1942 and is still running Desert Island Discs – Wikipedia. A very wide range of people is asked to imagine that they are shipwrecked on a Desert Island and have to choose and talk about their eight favorite pieces of music…