The Kotzk Podcast

By Rabbi Gavin Michal

Join Rabbi Gavin Michal for a look at some of the lesser-known events, books, and people in Jewish history. New episodes weekly based on articles from the Kotzk Blog, www.kotzkblog.com. This podcast w... more

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How many episodes does The Kotzk Podcast have?

The podcast currently has 48 episodes available.

The Kotzk Podcast episodes:

February 23, 2025 Kotzk Podcast 047: Moshe haGoleh of Kiev: a critical devotee of Avraham Ibn Ezra
Kotzk Podcast 047: Moshe haGoleh of Kiev: a critical devotee of Avraham Ibn Ezra (Kotzk Blog 502)
This episode ꟷ based extensively on the research by Professor Eric Lawee[1] ꟷ examines a little-known and somewhat neglected exegete and commentator, R. Moshe ben Yakov (1448-1520) who compiled a supper-commentary (i.e., a commentary on a commentary) based on R. Avraham Ibn Ezra (1089-1164) who had preceded him by almost four centuries. Moshe ben Yakov is also known as Moshe haGoleh (the ‘exile’) miKiev.[2]
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1h 8min
February 23, 2025 Kotzk Podcast 046: Were some early Spanish Kabbalists defending a Maimonidean position?
Kotzk Podcast 046: Were some early Spanish Kabbalists defending a Maimonidean position? (Kotzk Blog 501)
This episode ꟷ based extensively on the research by Professor Tzahi Weiss[1] ꟷ examines an interesting and unusual approach to understanding how thirteenth-century Kabbalah suddenly emerged in Provence (southern France) and Catalonia (northeastern Spain). With this emergence, there was now a rapid interest in, and wide reception of, the notion of Sefirot (Divine emanations). Although the term ‘Sefirot’ was used in the earlier mystical work of the Bahir, it suddenly took on a specific meaning in thirteenth-century Spanish Zoharic Kabbalah.
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1h 19min
February 23, 2025 Kotzk Podcast 045: Mining Chassidic stories for kernels of historicity
Kotzk Podcast 045: Mining Chassidic stories for kernels of historicity (Kotzk Blog 500)

This episode ꟷ based extensively on the research by Professor Glynn Dynner[1] ꟷ examines a possible methodology to extract aspects of historical truths from the often exaggerated and venerating style of Chassidic storytelling.
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1h 3min
January 27, 2025 Kotzk Podcast 044: The debate over the authenticity of the portrait of R. Shneur Zalman of Liadi
This episode examines various versions of the provenance of the iconic picture of the Alter Rebbe, the first Rebbe of Chabad. It offers a critical analysis as well as a possible defence of the authenticity of the portrait. Ultimately, though, the question is left open-ended (Kotzk Blog 499)
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1h 37min
January 19, 2025 Kotzk Podcast 043: Did the Babylonian Talmud create the authoritative rabbi and the passive Jew?
Did the Babylonian Talmud create the authoritative rabbi and the passive Jew? (Kotzk Blog 498)
This episode – based extensively on the research by Rabbi Dr Amir Mashiach[1] − explores the emergence of the rabbinic class after the failed Jewish revolts against the Romans during the first two centuries CE. Up to that point, the rabbis did not feature in leadership positions. On assuming power immediately after the failed military campaigns and revolts, the rabbis (and the Babylonian rabbis particularly) began to intensely promote passivity as the hallmark of the Torah Jew. Too many Jews had been killed during the wars and the rabbis saw passivity as the only way forward for Jewish survival into the future
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1h 17min
January 19, 2025 Kotzk Podcast 042: Language as incubators of theological ideas
Language as incubators of theological ideas (Kotzk Blog
497)
This Episode – based extensively on the research by Professor Edward Ullendorff (1920 -2011) – examines languages as distinct incubators of theological ideas. In other words, we are going to see to what extent “different languages reflect different realities” (Ullendorff 1966:273) which, in turn, reflect different theologies; and how translations, in this case from the Hebrew of the Torah into English, can project different meanings from those of the original language. I then take this a step further and propose that sometimes the reflected theologies can impose themselves back onto the original source language, creating a double distortion.
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1h 8min
December 13, 2024 Kotzk Podcast 041: Kabbalah: To print or not to print the ‘lost’ mystical tradition
Kabbalah: To print or not to print the ‘lost’ mystical tradition (Kotzk Blog 496)

This article ꟷ based extensively on the research by Avraham Oriah Kelman[1] ꟷ examines the little-known crisis in Kabbalistic transmission that became evident between the thirteenth and sixteenth centuries.
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1h 11min
December 01, 2024 Kotzk Podcast 040: Inverted hierarchies: Humans making G-d more moral
Inverted hierarchies: Humans making G-d more moral (Kotzk Blog 494)
This article ꟷ based extensively on the research by Professor Dov Weiss[1] ꟷ examines how late Palestinian Midrashim, particularly the Tanchuma Yelamedeinu (fourth to ninth centuries CE), depict humans challenging G-d over morally problematic issues expressed in the Torah. In these cases, biblical figures are audaciously portrayed as both teaching and counselling G-d, as it were, convincing Him to adopt a more moral and ethical approach. The Midrashic work, Tanchuma Yelamedeinu exhibits about fifty examples of humans making G-d ‘more moral.’
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1h 10min
November 15, 2024 Kotzk Podcast 039: Carrying on Shabbat: From Jeremiah to the Mishna
Carrying on Shabbat: From Jeremiah to the Mishna (Kotzk blog 493)
This episode ꟷ based extensively on the research by Professor Alex P. Jassen[1] ꟷ examines how four pre-Mishnaic texts show evidence of the origin and expansion of the prohibition against carrying on Shabbat. The specific textual prohibition against carrying on Shabbat first begins with Yirmiyahu’s (Jeremiah’s) prohibition against carrying a ‘load’ (מַשָּׂא֙, massa), for trade and commercial purposes, and only in Jerusalem. It then underwent a process of expansion during Second Temple times as it passed through the four texts of Nechemiah (Nehemiah), the Book of Jubilees, the Dead Sea Scrolls and finally became the Mishna’s general Halachic prohibition, as we know it today, against carrying ‘anything’ to or from ‘any’ domain. We shall trace and map this textual progression. Our focus is on the textual trail, as the oral tradition (which we briefly discuss at the conclusion) is not possible to track in the same way.

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58min
November 04, 2024 Kotzk Podcast 038: Are Halachic rulings (Piskei Halacha) open to critical analysis or do they represent Divine Will?
Are Halachic rulings (Piskei Halacha) open to critical analysis or do they represent Divine Will? (Kotzk Blog
492)
This episod – based extensively on the research by Professor Adiel Schremer[1] − takes an in-depth and forthright look at the sometimes mysterious process of Halachic decision-making as practised by the Posek (Halachic judge or decisor). The Torah teaches that if any matter of law shall arise in the future that is too difficult for people to determine by themselves, then they must approach the “judge who shall be in those days” (Deut. 17:8-11) for adjudication:
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1h 27min

FAQs about The Kotzk Podcast:

How many episodes does The Kotzk Podcast have?

The podcast currently has 48 episodes available.

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The Kotzk Podcast

FAQs about The Kotzk Podcast:

How many episodes does The Kotzk Podcast have?

The Kotzk Podcast episodes:

FAQs about The Kotzk Podcast:

How many episodes does The Kotzk Podcast have?

More shows like The Kotzk Podcast

Seforimchatter

JUDAISM DEMYSTIFIED | A Guide for Today's Perplexed: Confronting the Challenges of This Generation