November 18, 2021

The BEST: Adam Gopnik’s Essays

The New Yorker’s Adam Gopnik is an erudite polymath, and his elegant essays are a source of astute acumen, offering valuable insight and a model of superb writing. Yitzchak Blau’s offers a reader’s guide in this week’s “The BEST.”
November 16, 2021

The Sexual Abuse of Dina

What was life like for little Dina in the household of Jacob? What exactly was she seeking when she embarked on her excursion? What actually happened to Dina that day? After Dina was saved, what happened to her? Dan Jacobson considers these questions in offering a new understanding of the Dina story which sheds light not only on the Biblical text but also on the experience of sexual abuse victims through the ages. 
November 14, 2021

PODCAST: Rabbi Lamm and the Spirit of the Rabbinate

The TRADITION Podcast explores Rabbi Norman Lamm’s energetic rabbinic leadership and his message and challenge to his rabbinic colleagues and students. Guests R. Menachem Penner and R. Benjamin Samuels chat with our editor R. Jeffrey Saks about their contributions to the recent “Rabbi Lamm Memorial Volume.”
November 11, 2021

The BEST: Survival in Auschwitz

In which “Squid Game” reminds our editor, Jeffrey Saks, of a more worthy exploration of how shockingly easily humanity can become degraded – Primo Levi’s remarkable work of incredible moral power, “Survival in Auschwitz,” in this week’s “The BEST.”