Jewish Quest

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Professor Jacob Wright explores the evolution of Shabbat. 

Professor Jacob L. Wright is Associate Professor of Hebrew Bible at Emory University’s Candler School of Theology and the Director of Graduate Studies in Emory’s Tam Institute of Jewish Studies. His doctorate is from Georg-August-Universität, Göttingen. He is the author of Rebuilding Identity: The Nehemiah Memoir and its Earliest Readers (which won a Templeton prize) and David, King of Israel, Caleb in Biblical Memory and Why The Bible Began 

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Rabbi Worch shares some of the Mei HaShiloach's insights on the giving of the Torah. 

Rabbi Worch comes from a European Hassidic family. He translated Esh Kodesh, the Piacezna Rebbe’s Torah commentary from the Warsaw Getto (1939-42), published as Sacred Fire, and published his own Kabbalist Haggadah, a handbook of the Passover Seder as well as a translation of the writings of the Mei HaShiloach's commentary on Torah. 

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Rabbi Danny Nevins discusses both the cultic and covenantal response to freedom.

Rabbi Danny Nevins is dedicated to exploring the sacred realm of Torah and its intersection with contemporary ethics, culture, and technology. Ordained at the Jewish Theological Seminary. Rabbi Nevins was named Head of School of Golda Och Academy in 2021, dedicating himself to support the faculty and students in the creation of an outstanding and warm Jewish learning environment. Previously, he worked at The Jewish Theological Seminary as the Pearl Resnick Dean of the Division of Religious Leadership. He writes responsa on topics of contemporary halakhah, essays, prayers, and Torah commentaries, many of which can be viewed on his website – rabbinevins.com.

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Rabbi Nelly Altenburger shares different explanations as to the meaning and purpose of the plagues. 

Rabbi Nelly Altenburger became the new spiritual leader of Congregation Adath Israel in Middletown in the summer of 2020. Rabbi Altenburger was born and raised in Brazil and received her Bachelor of Arts Degree in Hebrew Language and Literature from the University of Sao Paulo. She received a Master of Arts in Rabbinic Studies in 2004 from the Zeigler School of Rabbinic studies and was ordained in 2006. Previous to joining Adath Israel, she was the Rabbi and Religious School Director at Congregation B’nai Israel in Danbury, CT for fourteen years. 
 

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Professor Rabbi Shaul Magid explores the ethical problems of God hardening Pharaoh's heart. 

Professor Rabbi Shaul Magid is the Distinguished Fellow in Jewish Studies at Dartmouth College, and the former Jay and Jeannie Schottenstein Professor of Jewish Studies at Indiana University/Bloomington. He is also the rabbi of the Fire Island Synagogue in Seaview, NY. His M.A. is from Hebrew University, his Ph.D. from Brandeis, and his ordination from rabbis in Israel. He is the author of American Post-Judaism: Identity and Renewal in a Postethnic Society (Indiana University Press, 2013), Hasidism Incarnate: Hasidism, Christianity, and the Construction of Modern Judaism (Stanford University Press, 2014), Piety and Rebellion: Essays in Hasidism (Academic Studies press, 2019) and The Bible, the Talmud, and the New Testament: Elijah Zvi Soloveitchik's Commentary to the New Testament (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2019).

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Professor James Diamond discusses the philosophical and kabbalistic meaning of God's names and the most enigmatic three words of the entire Torah. 

Professor James A. Diamond is the Joseph and Wolf Lebovic Chair of Jewish Studies at the University of Waterloo and former director of the university’s Friedberg Genizah Project. He holds a Ph.D. in Religious Studies and Medieval Jewish Thought from the University of Toronto. He has recently been appointed as a fellow at the University of Hamburg,  Maimonides Center for Advanced Studies. He is the author of Maimonides and the Hermeneutics of Concealment, Converts, Heretics and Lepers: Maimonides and the Outsider and, Maimonides and the Shaping of the Jewish Canon and most recently with Menachem Kellner -  Reinventing Maimonides in Contemporary Jewish Thought, Littman Library of Jewish Civilization, (co-authored with Menachem Kellner). 

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Rabbi Dina Rosenberg discusses lying and deception in the Joseph story. 

Rabbi Rosenberg is the Senior Rabbi at CSI. She was ordained at The Jewish Theological Seminary in 2011 and previously served Conservative congregations in Mississippi, Brooklyn-New York, Maryland, and New Jersey. She has served as the secretary of the Interfaith Clergy Association in Freehold, New Jersey and currently serves on the Racial Justice Committee for the Rabbinical Assembly.

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Rabbi Nelly Altenburger reflects on the meaning of Joseph's tears. 

Rabbi Nelly Altenburger became the new spiritual leader of Congregation Adath Israel in Middletown in the summer of 2020. Rabbi Altenburger was born and raised in Brazil and received her Bachelor of Arts Degree in Hebrew Language and Literature from the University of Sao Paulo. She received a Master of Arts in Rabbinic Studies in 2004 from the Zeigler School of Rabbinic studies and was ordained in 2006. Previous to joining Adath Israel, she was the Rabbi and Religious School Director at Congregation B’nai Israel in Danbury, CT for fourteen years. 

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Rabbi Amanda Weiss discusses the importance of dreams in the Joseph story. 

Rabbi Amanda Weiss is assistant Rabbi at Temple Isaiah, Maryland. 

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Professor Alan Levenson asks why the brothers really hate Joseph. 

Alan T. Levenson holds the Schusterman/Josey Chair in Judaic History and is the Director of the Schusterman Center for Judaic and Israel Studies at the University of Oklahoma. Levenson has written extensively on the modern Jewish experience for both scholarly and popular audiences. His book, Between Philosemitism and Antisemitism: Defenses of Jews and Judaism in Germany, 1871-1932 was nominated for a National Jewish Book Award Prize (paperback edition 2013), and his textbook, Modern Jewish Thinkers, is widely used in classes on Jewish thought. He is also author of Joseph: Portraits Through the Ages (2016) and most recently Maurice Samuel: Life and Letters of a Secular Jewish Contrarian (2022).