Name:

School: Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Theological Seminary (RIETS)

Hometown: Teaneck, NJ

Passion: Halakha and law

What is unique about semikha studies at RIETS?

RIETS is the only place where a rabbinical student can learn from first-rate talmidei chachamim [Torah scholars], poskim [deciders of Jewish law], rabbanim and mental health professionals all under one roof. Whether you’re in rabbanus [rabbinate] or Jewish education, a rabbi’s job entails many different responsibilities. You need training indifferent areas and exposure to many kinds of experts. RIETS offers a comprehensive and holistic approach to a rabbinical career.

RIETS also enabled me to continue learning seriously inits kollel while simultaneously gaining practical experience for the future. The school values the professional advancement of its students and provides generous scholarships toward master’s degrees at both YU’s Azrieli Graduate School of Jewish Education and Administration and the Bernard Revel Graduate Schoolof Jewish Studies.

In addition to finishing my studies at RIETS, I’m about to complete a master’s degree in medieval Jewish history at Revel, which I couldn’t have done without support from RIETS. I decided to study Jewish history because I wanted to broaden my knowledge base—I think it’s important for rabbinic figures to have expertise and interest in many areas. I’m also interested in exploring the field of legal academia in the future, and a lot of what I studied in Revel, such as History of Halakha with Rabbi Ephraim Kanarfogel, is a strong foundation for that—the development of law, legal history and legal theory over time.

You’ll be attending Harvard Law School in the fall. Are there similarities between your passion for Gemara and your fascination with law? How does the study of one enrich the other?

The requirement to understand concepts clearly and have information at your fingertips is important in law school and the intellectual rigor you develop through years of learning willdefinitely help you with that. A lot of the critical analysis you put into learning is also related to the approach people take in law school—how do you master knowledge and distill legal principles from a practical application of the law?

Still, my interests in Gemara and law are divergent. Halakha and Gemara are, first and foremost, the word of God. That can’t be understated. What’s so amazing is that you can really establish a unique, personal relationship with Torah because your ability to grasp it is totally up to you. You can get information from teachers, but to be successful at learning requires effort and motivation of your own. Once you’re able to achieve that, the relationship you have with it is singular and unique. I also like the study of halakha because it’s its own system with its own principles and concepts. I guess secular law is likethataswell. It’s the application of the principles to context and situations that really interests me.

Has there been a particular rabbi at RIETS that has made an impression on you?

My most memorable experience here has been the four years I spent learning in Rav Michael Rosensweig’s shiur [lecture]. The rigor and intellectual demand that it requires is unparalleled by any of my academic pursuits to date. The shiur’s thoroughness, meticulousness and depth have profoundly impacted not only my learning, but my outlook on life. And to learn from Rav Rosensweig, a person whose wisdom is outdone only by his character, has been a tremendous privilege.

However, part of the shiur’s greatness is that it expands well beyond the classroom. The hours I’ve spent in the beis medrash [study hall] every day preparing, and perhaps more significantly reviewing shiur, making sure that I’ve fully grasped the concepts and opinions, is an experience like no other. Being able to devote my full attention and energy to the pursuit of something so valuable and important is empowering and invigorating. The friends I’ve made “in battle” late at night as we together tried to process and clarify everything we heard that day are so unique. I feel the friendships we’ve created and centered on Torah learning and values willlastwell beyond my years at RIETS.

What extracurricular activities were you involved with during your time on campus?

I was very involved in high school programming during the year and spent six summers as a madrich [advisor] on the NCSY Summer Kollel in Israel. I started there as a camper and eventually worked my way up to being head counselor, which is an experience that’s helped me in many aspects of life. I learned how to work on a team and as an individual. I also learned that if you’re committed to an idea or a program, you’re willing to work any job at any level because you realize how essential each part of the working whole is. No job is beneath you. There’s also something really wonderful about enabling like-minded high school students to connect with each other and create a social network of guys whose relationships are built not only on having fun, but on values they identify with, through learning. Being part of that electric environment, where people are spending their free time getting excited about learning, is great.

At RIETS, I was also the editor of the Beis Yitzchak, its annual Torah journal, and I helped with programming for the Shavuos Yarchei Kallah. That program was really incredible because it was started and fully executed by another RIETS student, Rabbi Shay Schachter, and more than 850 people attended—it wasn’t a small endeavor. The fact that students here can take their idealism and execute a program like that, which has gotten really positive feedback, is unbelievable.

Written by Perel Skier

Courtesy of YU News Blog

Name:

School: Bernard Revel Graduate School of Jewish Studies

Hometown: Southfield, Michigan

Passion: Jewish philosophy

At Revel, you earned both a master’s and doctoral degree. What fascinates you about Judaic studies?

An Orthodox upbringing and education had given me a firm religious foundation, but I sought to explore and substantiate my convictions and observance through the study of philosophy. Medieval Jewish philosophers discussed many important theological and philosophical concepts that are still debated today. I feel that my self-understanding as a Jew has been enhanced through my studies and my beliefs and practice have become far more meaningful.

Why Revel?

I valued the opportunity to learn from serious academics that shared my religious commitments, served as mentors and influenced my intellectual development. I’ve gained a lot from informal conversations that I had with my professors as I developed my theological perspective. The candor and sophistication with which they discussed ideas with me impacted me greatly. Dr. David Shatz, Dr. Arthur Hyman and Dr. Zev Harvey, a Hebrew University professor who taught a summer course at Revel and later became an adviser for my dissertation, are all paradigmatic religious scholars that I emulate.

What does your doctoral work focus on?

I studied the philosophical interpretation of free choice in the exegetical part of Joseph Albo’s work Sefer ha-Iqqarim, or The Book of Principles. There’s a general scholarly consensus that even though Albo was influential and popular, he wasn’t very innovative as a philosopher, and there’s been a recent trend in Jewish philosophy which argues that there may have been more philosophical depth to his work than he’s given credit for.

I furthered that argument by exploring Albo’s notion of free choice, which is a theme that he repeatedly discusses in his interpretation of challenging biblical narratives. In a number of these instances, Albo interprets such narratives that have been traditionally understood as denying free choice as affirming free choice instead, perhaps in an effort to encourage his generation to assert their own free will and maintain their religious identities despite the persecutions of late 15th-century Spain, which would eventually lead to the expulsion of the Jews.

While earning your degrees at Revel, you also taught courses in Jewish Philosophy and Bible at YU’s Stern College for Women and served as assistant principal at the Frisch School as well. What do you like about teaching?

It’s a funny story, because this was not what I expected to do back in college. I graduated from Stern with a degree in economics, worked at a hedge fund and planned to go into finance. I thought I’d eventually move into venture capital. I loved Judaic studies and had actually transferred to Stern from University of Pennsylvania for them, but not as a career move—just so I could study Jewish topics for my own enrichment.

After my time at the hedge fund, the enormous time and travel commitments of the investment banking and consulting world didn’t appeal to me, so I thought I would explore opportunities in hinukh [education] to see if I found that fulfilling. And I have. I began teaching at Frisch and a few years later I was teaching at Stern as well.

At Stern, a sampling of the courses I’ve taught includes Philosophical Issues of Tanakh, where we take challenging biblical narratives and interpret them philosophically; more modern topics like the Philosophy of the Rav, where we discuss many of Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik’s works, their influences, both Christian and Jewish, and their impact on our own understanding of religion in contemporary times; and a class called Dogma, where we investigate whether there are obligatory beliefs in Judaism and the delineation of such beliefs throughout Jewish history. In my classes, we analyze the great ideas of philosophy. Topics include free choice, divine command morality, reason and Revelation, and theodicy.

I like to explore my students’ questions and help them think about their religious experience in much greater depth. I often begin my classes with very general and relevant philosophical questions to elicit initial feedback. For example—if God is all-knowing, how can man have free choice? Does God dictate morality, or is there an independent standard of ethics? How can a good God allow evil? Are Jews obligated only in halakhic practice or in beliefs as well? We then analyze primary sources from medieval Jewish philosophers and secondary sources from contemporary scholars which help students develop a more sophisticated understanding and, hopefully, more meaningful convictions.

What’s next?

I presented a paper at the Annual Conference of the Association for Judaic Studies in December based on one of the chapters of my dissertation and a university press in attendance expressed an interest in my work. I’ve since submitted my manuscript for publication. This summer, I’ll be participating in an academic workshop for recent PhDs and a conference on the philosophy of Scripture at the Shalem Center’s Institute for Advanced Studies in Jerusalem.

Written by Perel Skier

Courtesy of YU News Blog

The Shabbaton began with Friday night meals at the homes of Revel students and alumni. These provided opportunities to talk casually with peers and professors usually encountered in academic settings and were enjoyed by all. At the meal he attended, Professor Rynhold talked about the Jewish community in London, where he was raised, the process of moving to New York, and the differences between Jewish life in Europe and  the tri-state area. Professor Cohen shared his thoughts about how the young Jewish community of Washington Heights has blossomed since the days he lived there in the early 90’s as a graduate student and then as a YU faculty member.

The Shabbaton continued with an oneg at Mt. Sinai Jewish Center open to the community, where Professors Cohen and Rynhold shared personal reflections on their careers in Jewish Academia. Professor Rynhold described how he became interested in Jewish philosophy in yeshiva in Israel—after which he went on to study general and Jewish philosophy at Cambridge University, and to specialize in the philosophy of Rav Soloveitchik. Professor Cohen described his own educational trajectory from Gush through Revel, his studies with Nehama Leibowitz, and his teaching experiences at YU over the last 25 years. It was wonderful to get a sense of the journeys these professors underwent to get to their posts today. Everyone at the oneg gained insight into the aspirations, dedication and hard work that led the speakers to where they are now—as well as the false turns, and uncertainties that challenged them along the way.

Professor Rynhold delivered the drasha on Shabbat morning to the entire Mt. Sinai Jewish Center congregation on how one might address the perceived conflict between science and religion. Thirty-five Shabbaton participants convened afterward for a lively communal Shabbat meal in the lower level of Morgenstern Hall. After lunch, there was a Revel student panel, in which students from the different majors shared their varied Revel experiences. It was fascinating to discover the wide spectrum of students that find their home at Revel, from the Bible student who had graduated from Michigan University with a psychology degree, to the modern Jewish history student that in his free time gives tours at the Cloister Museum, and the semikha student who finally found a place to explore his religious questions at Revel.

After a few hours of shabbat relaxation, the Shabbaton reconvened at Mt. Sinai for Mincha, after which Professor Cohen delivered a shiur on the book of Ruth during Seudah Shelishit. The turnout was staggering, and while source sheets could not satisfy the large amount of people, the entire audience appreciated how Professor Cohen drew out the spiritual message of the book of Ruth from a literary analysis of its narrative structure.

“The Shabbaton was a lot of fun,” remarked Revel Master’s student Anne Guetta. “I enjoyed talking to people who are interested in academic Jewish studies and getting to know my professors and fellow Revel students better. The growing student community at Revel is wonderful!”

This article was written by Elianna Mitnick (Revel 2013)

The panel opened with the keynote by Rachel Furst, PhD candidate in Jewish History at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and currently Visiting Scholar at the Tikvah Center for Law and Jewish Civilization at NYU Law School. In her remarks, she introduced the aims of the Graduate Workshop, a group of approximately a dozen young scholars that she co-founded in 2009 with Pinchas Roth (a Revel MA graduate in medieval Jewish history, who went on to earn his PhD from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem), who also attended the symposium. Their goal was to discover “narratives of the medieval world and its various social and material realities that can be gleaned from close readings of halakhic sources by applying to them methodologies from a range of disciplines—law, literature, sociology, psychology, communications, and gender studies, among others.” The lectures delivered at this symposium, Furst explained, are “the products of meetings, collaborative readings, and ongoing research among the group over the past four years.”

Ethan Zadoff, PhD candidate in History at the CUNY Graduate Center and Adjunct Professor at Hunter College, delivered his paper on Child Marriage Law in Medieval Ashkenaz in Comparative Perspective. He aimed to show what can be learned about medieval halakhic discussions from a comparison with contemporaneous (Christian) canon law.  Zadoff’s case study concerning child marriage in both halakhic and canon law includes the consideration of the “changing dynamic of the medieval family, the relationship between children and parents, and notions of the individual within the context of the family.” Zadoff discussed the following question raised among hakmei ashkenaz (the scholars of the Rhineland yeshivot in the eleventh century): in a case where a father arranges a marriage between his minor son and an adult woman, would the couple require a religious divorce (get) if they decide to terminate their marriage?  This matter was debated between the scholars of Mainz and Worms, a question, Zadoff argued, that depended on underlying conceptions of a father’s authority over his minor son.  The status of child marriage was also debated among canon lawyers of the time, a debate that likewise reflects differing views of family, parent-child relationships, and the agency of the marital partners.  A medieval work known as 74 Titles reflects the Frankish and Carolingian traditions in asserting that marriage is contingent on the consent of the bride’s protective kin. Ivo of Chartres (c. 1040-1115) disagreed, stating that consent of the marital partners is of paramount importance. Thus, Zadoff demonstrated that both medieval Jewish and canon law reflect changing dynamics of the family, conceptions of betrothal, and the authority of parents over minor children.

Jesse Abelman, PhD candidate in medieval Jewish history at Revel, and a faculty member at the Drisha Institute Yesodot program, presented his talk on “Anger, Violence and the Law: Reading Emotion in Medieval Legal Texts.” He compared the ways in which the emotion of anger is given legal weight in medieval halakhic responsa and in the feuding traditions of the eleventh through thirteenth centuries in general (i.e., Christian) European society. He began by citing Stephen D. White’s influential article “The Politics of Anger” to observe that in medieval times the expression of anger was used to justify aristocratic feuding.  Abelman argued that Jewish halakhic authorities, on the other hand, cited anger as a legal consideration in order to prevent violence, rather than to condone it. Abelman pointed to the halakhic literature regarding a case of mesirah (the prohibition of informing against a fellow Jew to the Gentile authorities) motivated by anger over a real or perceived affront. Citing the writings of the great Ashkenazic halakhist R. Meir of Rothenberg (c. 1215-1293) and his student  R. Hayyim Or Zaru’a (c. 1250-1310), Abelman showed that some halakhic scholars considered such a case to be analogous to the biblical goel ha-dam (blood avenged), who is not punished if he retaliates “in hot anger” against one who killed his kinsman (Deut. 19:6). Among the considerations raised in the halakhic literature was that if mesirah were not permitted under these circumstances, then violence may result instead, as the affronted party might take matters into its own hands rather than seeking legal redress in the Gentile courts.

Sara Tova Brody, MA in Gender Studies at Bar Ilan University and currently a Fellow at Yeshivat Hadar in NY, delivered the third of the evening’s presentations: “Staying Home: Social Standing of Widows in Medieval Spanish Responsa.” Brody introduced the audience to the notion of “feminist geography” and showed how it can illuminate halakhic discussions when we consider “issues such as the boundaries of the home and the divisions between private and public spaces” as defined in halakhic literature. Brody turned her attention to the specific case of “the widow’s lodging,” i.e., a widow’s right to dwell in the husband’s home and claim support from his estate before collecting her ketubah money. Discussing at length a responsum (teshuvah) by R. Solomon ibn Adret (Rashba; Barcelona, 1235-1310), Brody showed that this question is inextricably tied up with a woman’s status inside her own home as well as the way women were viewed by their societies. In other words, while the questions posed to the medieval halakhists in this sort of case relate explicitly to money and estates, the place and status of women at the time emerge quite clearly as key factors.

Following the three presentations, Rachel Furst offered responses to each speaker, and then took questions from the audience—ranging from halakhic to sociological to methodological. A number of attendees remarked that the evening was particularly stimulating. As one Revel alum commented: “The presentations and dialogues were really thought-provoking. These young visiting scholars clearly have a lot to offer and it’s great that Revel organized this symposium. Please do it again!”

Click here to see a photo essay of the event.

This article was written by Steven and Rivka Skaist (Revel 2014)

Wednesday, May 29
4 – 6 p.m.

Yeshiva University
Wilf Campus
Belfer Hall, Room 1214
2495 Amsterdam Avenue
New York, NY 10033

Click here for Flyer

Keynote speaker Dr. Yael Zerubavel of Rutgers University
Speaking on the topic, “Israel, Cultural Memory, and the Transformations of a National Tradition.”

Sunday, May 12, 2013
Registration 9:00 am, Keynote speaker 9:30 am
Belfer Hall Room 1214, Yeshiva University

Click here for flyer

For more information about the conference please contact Israel.studies@yu.edu.

For further information about the Center for Israel Studies, visit yu.edu/ci

• Friday night home hospitality meals

• Friday night Oneg at Mt. Sinai Jewish Center, 135 Bennett Avenue
(entrance on 187th Street) featuring Professors Cohen and Rynhold
on “Personal Reflections on Careers in Jewish Academia” (10:15 p.m.)

• Shaharit on Shabbat at Mt. Sinai Jewish Center featuring a drasha
by Professor Rynhold on “The Religion Science Conflict Revisited”

• Communal Shabbat lunch on Yeshiva University’s Wilf Campus,
followed by a Revel student panel (12:15 p.m.)

• Community Seudah Shelishit at Mt. Sinai Jewish Center, featuring
a presentation by Professor Cohen on “Between America and Israel:
The Latest Exchanges in Jewish Studies Scholarship”

Cost is $10. Reservations are required by Monday, April 15.
To RSVP, or if you are interested in hosting a Friday night home hospitality meal,
please contact Revel Student Liaison Elianna Mitnick at Elianna119@gmail.com

Click here for flyer.

The medieval era holds particular interest for Daniel, since “it was a formative period in Jewish history in which various strategies were put forward in the interpretive endeavors revolving around the dual axes of the Bible and rabbinic literature. For a people that has an ongoing meaningful relationship with those texts, the period was trendsetting and has loomed large ever since.”  Daniel explains that as a student deeply involved in understanding medieval texts in a traditional context he wanted to move into the world that those texts inhabited and inquire after the human factor. He was perhaps most animated by the question “What was the medieval Jew really like?”

When asked about the professors Daniel has most enjoyed, he emphatically rattles off the long list of teachers to whom he feels indebted:

Professors Berger, Kanarfogel, and Tsadik are tasked with introducing neophytes like me to the sprawling world of medieval Jewish history (and in Berger’s case: quality jokes) in a short span of time, but they do it extremely well. Professors Dauber and Carlebach teach students to read closely and carefully. Professor Kaplan’s gift, in my opinion, is in enabling her students to contextualize any given subject matter and to formulate tough questions about it from a variety of perspectives. Her pedagogy is inspiring. Any private attention from Professor Olson is to be cherished, and I really enjoyed a guided readings session with him. His breadth of knowledge and patience with my ignorance were astounding. Professor Steiner’s courses challenged me the most through his insistence upon participation and quality work in areas in which I had no previous expertise. I could not but emerge from his courses a changed person.

Daniel would like to follow in their footsteps, transmitting his knowledge and skills to the broader community. He is currently planning on a career in academia, which will enable him to engage in research and teach Jewish history on a university level.

As a dedicated doctoral student, Daniel doesn’t have a lot of free time. “But,” he adds, “when I pretend that I have free time, I cherish my family. Occasionally I play my acoustic guitar while my fifteen-month-old daughter bangs out some Old McDonald on her electric.”

 This article was written by Rivka Skaist, Revel 2014.

Key Note: Introducing New Academic Approaches to Halakhic Texts

Rachel Furst, Co-founder of the Graduate Workshop, PhD candidate in Jewish History at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem; Visiting Scholar, Tikvah Center for Law and Jewish Civilization at NYU Law School

Child Marriage and Marriage Law in Medieval Ashkenaz in Comparative Perspective

Ethan Zadoff, PhD candidate in History at the CUNY Graduate Center; Adjunct Professor, Hunter College

Anger, Violence and the Law: Reading Emotion in Medieval Legal Texts

Jesse Abelman, PhD candidate in medieval Jewish history at Revel; teaches in the Yesodot program at Drisha Institute.

Staying Home: Social Standing of Widows in Medieval Spanish Responsa

Sara Tova Brody, MA in Gender Studies at Bar Ilan University; Fellow at Yeshivat Hadar in NY.

Response and Questions moderated by Rachel Furst

See Flyer here

Tuesday, April 16, 2013 (Yom ha-Atzmaut)

7:00-8:00 p.m.

Belfer Hall, Room 1214

2495 Amsterdam Avenue

New York, NY  10033

Parking Available

There will be a dinner before the program at 6:30p.m. in BH1214. There is no charge for dinner. However, space is limited, and so reservations must be made in advance.

For reservations and further information, please contact: shalpern@yu.edu

Professor Teller joined Revel students, faculty and alumni for dinner, during which he spoke informally about his academic trajectory. He described how his life experiences as an outsider—as a Jew at Oxford, an Englishman in Israel, and an Israeli-trained scholar in America—contributed to his intellectual career and scholarship. Anecdotally, he emphasized the role that close examination of non-Jewish sources has played in his understanding of Polish Jewry. Through a careful reading of numerous economic and legal archival documents in Polish and other languages (to which he gained unique access by actually working in various cities in Poland), Professor Teller discovered that Polish Jewry was in fact well integrated with non-Jewish society, playing a large role in royal commerce and heavily utilizing the Polish court system. This informal presentation was followed by a lively discussion of historical methodology prompted by questions from Revel students and alumni.

Professor Teller subsequently delivered a lecture entitled “Print, Power, and Prestige: The Polish-Lithuanian Rabbinate and the Book in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries.” This lecture presented an ironic pairing of historical developments: whereas the real political power of Polish-Lithuanian rabbis declined during this era, the prestige of the rabbinate actually rose, with the community showing them greater ceremonial respect. In this context, Professor Teller explained the role played by the printing press in Polish-Lithuanian Jewish society. While the conventional wisdom regards the availability of print to have served to democratize and disseminate knowledge, Professor Teller argued that, in fact, book printing in early-modern Poland and Lithuania was targeted at an already educated, affluent, and often rabbinic, elite. In other words, book printing is not an independent factor of historical change, but rather works in tandem with other social and intellectual processes, in this case giving more knowledge and prestige to those who already possessed them for other reasons. As proof for his claim, Professor Teller cited the formatting of the books printed during this era, which were difficult to read and included no illustrations. Sometimes, in fact, works originally intended for a popular audience were reformatted by printers in a way that made them suitable primarily for scholars. As an example, Professor Teller cited the case of the Shulhan Arukh, the four-part code of Jewish law penned by the sixteenth-century Safed Rabbi Joseph Karo. This work was originally composed as a brief exposition of Jewish law and was accordingly first published in a pocket-size version accessible to anyone who could read Hebrew. That format was eventually abandoned, however, as publishers in the seventeenth century increasingly printed the Shulhan Arukh within an extensive apparatus of complex scholarly commentaries in large tomes suited primarily for study by advanced rabbinic scholars.

Co-sponsored by the Yeshiva College Jewish Studies Colloquium, Professor Teller’s lecture drew a large crowd of YC and Stern College students and faculty, who joined the Revel audience that had attended the dinner and remained for the lecture. Among the participants in the program that evening were YU Vice Provost Lawrence Schiffman, Revel Dean David Berger, and Associate Dean Mordechai Cohen, as well as Revel Jewish History Professors Elisheva Carlebach and Debra Kaplan. It was, in fact, Professor Kaplan who had invited Professor Teller, and she introduced him and his work at both his dinner presentation and lecture. Professor Kaplan is teaching a Revel course this semester on Print Culture in the Jewish World, and her students found this special program to be a lively and illuminating supplement to their usual weekly preparations and lectures.

This article was written by Tali Arbit (Revel MA student in Jewish history)