You can pick and choose which programs to attend when you register.
Voices from the Margins: Petitions from the Poor in the Cairo Geniza with Danielle Kranjec
Tuesday, December 6 • 7PM
The documents recovered from the Cairo Geniza represent every corner of medieval Jewish society, including the voices of the impoverished and the ill. How does hearing from voices not usually transmitted in our textual tradition illuminate our understanding of Jewish peoplehood, and the values that have sustained our communities?
Danielle is the associate Vice President of Hillel International’s Center for Jewish and Israel Education/Meyerhoff Center.
Why the Prophet Jeremiah Hated Religion (and Maybe We Should Too) with Rabbi Shai Held
Tuesday, January 10, 2023 • 7PM
In this day and age, we tend to assume that it is ideological atheists who most hate religion. But, according to the prophet Yirmiyahu, it is God who actively detests religion—or at least religion of the self-serving, hypocritical kind. In this session, we will engage in an extremely close reading of Jeremiah Chapter 7 and try to understand Jeremiah’s approach to God, religion, and ethics. We’ll pay special attention to the age-old controversy over what the prophet means when he says that God never commanded sacrifice, and we’ll talk openly about how Jeremiah’s critique might speak to us, challenge us, and unsettle us.
Rabbi Shai Held–theologian, scholar, and educator–is President, Dean, and Chair in Jewish Thought at Machon Hadar in New York. Shai has a PhD in religion from Harvard; his main academic interests are in modern Jewish and Christian thought and in the history of Zionism.
