Jewish Quest

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Dr Ely Levine discusses the significance of the Red Heifer and the symbolic meaning behind the serpent of bronze. 

Dr. Ely Levine holds a PhD in biblical studies and archaeology from Harvard University. He has taught at Villanova University, the University of Pennsylvania, and Luther College. He has participated in archaeological excavations in Italy and Israel, and is a member of the staff of the Tell es-Safi/Gath Excavation Project. Currently, Dr. Levine is Scholar-in-Residence and Ritual Coordinator at Har Zion Temple in Penn Valley, Pennsylvania.

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Professor Naomi Graetz discusses the connection between Samuel and Korach and the parsha’s pertinence for today. 

Naomi Graetz taught English at Ben Gurion University of the Negev for 35 years. She is the author of Unlocking the Garden: A Feminist Jewish Look at the Bible, Midrash and God; The Rabbi’s Wife Plays at Murder ; S/He Created Them: Feminist Retellings of Biblical Stories (Professional Press, 1993; second edition Gorgias Press, 2003), Silence is Deadly: Judaism Confronts Wifebeating and Forty Years of Being a Feminist Jew. Since Covid began, she has been teaching Bible and Modern Midrash from a feminist perspective on zoom. She began her weekly blog for TOI in June 2022. Her book on Wifebeating has been translated into Hebrew and is forthcoming with Carmel Press in 2025

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Professor Jacob Wright discusses the origins of the spy story.

Professor Jacob Wright is 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, and Caleb in Biblical Memory.

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Rabbi Adam Zagoria-Moffat discusses radical models of leadership. 

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Audio of Session held on Tuesday 21st May 2024 with Simon Eder. 

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Rabbi Nelly Altenburger shares how we might read some deeply troubling lines of the parsha. 

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 John Collins discusses the meaning of ''Love your neighbour as yourself!''
and how the Golden Rule emerged. 
 
Professor John Collins is Holmes Professor of Old Testament Criticism and Interpretation at Yale University. He received his Ph. D. from Harvard (1972) and holds honorary degrees from the University College Dublin and the University of Zurich. Collins' most recent books are The Invention of Judaism. Torah and Jewish Identity from Deuteronomy to Paul (University of California, 2017), and What Are Biblical Values? (Yale, 2019). He serves as general editor of the Anchor Yale Bible and Anchor Yale Bible Reference Library and has received the Burkitt medal for biblical scholarship from the British Academy.
 

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Professor Elsie Stern shares how Acharei Mot acts as the bridge between the two sections of Vayikra. 

Elsie Stern is Professor of Bible at the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College. She received her BA from Yale University and her M.A. and PhD from the University of Chicago. Stern is the author of From Rebuke to Consolation: Exegesis and Theology in the Liturgical Anthology of the Ninth of Av Season. She is also General editor of a new torah commentary for the Central Conference of American Rabbis. 

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In a special podcast for Pesach, Professor Berel Dov Lerner discusses the central theme of covenant on Seder night and reflects on Israel’s enslavement and redemption in Egypt as a meditation upon temporality and human agency. 

Berel Dov Lerner was born in Washington D.C. and is a member of Kibbutz Sheluhot in Israel’s Beit Shean Valley. He received a BA in social and behavioral sciences from Johns Hopkins University, an MA in philosophy from the University of Chicago, and a PhD in philosophy from Tel Aviv University. He also studied Judaism at Yeshivat HaKibbutz HaDati.  Berel is currently an associate professor of philosophy at the Western Galilee College in Akko and also teaches at the Interdisciplinary Center Herzliya. He is the author of many articles in philosophy and Jewish studies and of the book Rules, Magic, and Instrumental Reason (Routledge 2002). His latest book is Human-Divine Interactions in Hebrew Scriptures Covenants and Cross-Purposes (Routledge 2024). 

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Geoffrey Stern asks how Metsorah is connected to evil speech and he discusses the importance of tsar'at in the Torah. 

Geoffrey Stern is founder of the podcast, Madlik, a disruptive Torah podcast, which is published on a weekly basis in an effort to insure that the spirit of Judaism continues to grow and flourish. He is a serial entrepreneur in the audio chip and self playing media playback product space.