Menachem Kellner’s recent review of books on Rambam’s philosophical works first emerging from within the right-wing and Haredi publishing houses raised a variety of issues concerning examining those works from outside the academic interpretations to which they have been subject. Yaakov Blau offers a “dispassionate critique” of Kellner and defends the methods and accomplishments of ArtScroll. 

In the modern State of Israel the complex relationship between religion and media is a two-way street. How well does the Hebrew press do its job when it covers Judaism? And how does the media influence religious leaders? In reviewing Yoel Cohen’s “Rabbis, Reporters and the Public in the Digital Holyland” Ari Goldman reminds us there’s another element to this relationship in the 21st century, namely the role of the public who, through social media, are very much partners in this relationship, which has gone from two-directional to triangular.

Johnny Solomon reviews Raphael Zarum’s approach to religion and science as expressed in his “Questioning Belief: Torah and Tradition in an Age of Doubt” (Maggid Books) by situating it within an arc of earlier works penned by his London-based predecessors: Rabbis Michael Friedländer, Isidore Epstein, and Jonathan Sacks. Through doing so, he explains what makes “Questioning Belief” unique, and why this book is a refreshing addition to the Jewish bookshelf. 

TRADITION’s recent Summer 2024 issue contained expanded book review coverage—what an array of fascinating topics, authors, and reviewers: How did Hazal read Talmudic women? What results when physicists and Haredim read Maimonides? Military ethics and morality, origins of Orthodoxy, and R. Aharon Lichtenstein’s teachings on halakhic values.