The evolution of an American institution that reflects the unique tension between Judaism and Jewishness.

Scripture is replete with narratives that challenge a variety of philosophical concepts; including morality, divine benevolence, and human freedom. Free choice, a significant and much debated concept in medieval philosophy, continues to be of great interest to contemporary philosophers and others. However, scholarship in biblical studies has primarily focused on compositional history, philology, and literary analysis, not on the examination of the philosophy implied in biblical texts. In this book, Shira Weiss focuses on the Hebrew Bible's encounter with the philosophical notion of free choice, as interpreted by the fifteenth-century Spanish Jewish philosopher Joseph Albo in one of the most popular Hebrew works in the corpus of medieval Jewish philosophy: Albo's Examining narratives commonly interpreted as challenging human freedom--the Binding of Isaac, the Hardening of Pharaoh's Heart, the Book of Job, and God's Choice of Israel--Albo puts forward innovative arguments that preserve the concept of free choice in these texts. Despite the popularity of The Book of Principles, Albo has been commonly dismissed as an unoriginal thinker. As a result, argues Weiss, the major original contribution of his philosophy-his theory of free choice as explained in unique exegetical interpretations-has been overlooked. This book casts new light on Albo by demonstrating both the central importance of his views on free choice in his philosophy and the creative ways in which they are presented.

In 1917, a group of visionaries broke ground on an institution that would ultimately change the landscape of Jewish life in America. The idea of The Jewish Center was nothing less than revolutionary. The sermons and articles in this volume are intended to tell a small part of the story that has unfolded over the course of these past one hundred years. To grapple with the tensions of tradition and modernity; to integrate the values of our mesora with the very best of Western civilization; to use Torah and mitzvot as a guide to navigate the complexities of contemporary life: These were among the ambitions of the founders of the Jewish Center. The world has changed substantially in the past century, but their goals have not.In conjunction with the yearlong Centennial celebration of The Jewish Center, this volume presents in print for the first time a collection of sermons delivered by the rabbis of The Jewish Center over the course of its first century. They reveal a great deal about the culture, history, and faith of The Jewish Center. They reflect on historic events, the advances within Orthodox Judaism and life on New York's Upper West Side. The scholarly essays that follow in the second part of the volume provide yet another window into The Center's extraordinary past.

When Jews arrived in the mid-1700s, Baltimore was little more than a backwater port with an uncertain future. As the city grew so did its Jewish community, forming its first congregation in 1830 and hiring the first ordained rabbi in America in 1840. Today Baltimore is home to one of the nation's largest and most diverse Jewish communities, with approximately 100,000 Jews living in the metropolitan area. Through photographs and documents drawn primarily from the collection of the Jewish Museum of Maryland, The Jewish Community of Baltimore chronicles this fascinating history. More than 200 historic images portray the progress of Baltimore's Jews from a handful of immigrants starting new lives in a growing port city, to an established network of clergy, businesspeople, educators, philanthropists, and civic leaders. From the family-owned delis on Lombard Street and the grand department stores on Howard Street, to the majestic synagogues on Eutaw Place and the current epicenter of Jewish life on Park Heights Avenue, Jews have left an indelible mark on Baltimore.

Elucidates the Scriptural moral tradition by subjecting ethically challenging biblical texts to moral philosophical analysis.

A piercing portrait of the struggles and triumphs of one of America's renowned Jewish neighborhoods in the wake of unspeakable tragedy that highlights the hopes, fears, and tensions all Americans must confront on the road to healing. Squirrel Hill, Pittsburgh, is one of the oldest Jewish neighborhoods in the country, known for its tight-knit community and the profusion of multigenerational families. On October 27, 2018, a gunman killed eleven Jews who were worshipping at the Tree of Life synagogue in Squirrel Hill--the most deadly anti-Semitic attack in American history. Many neighborhoods would be understandably subsumed by despair and recrimination after such an event, but not this one. Mark Oppenheimer poignantly shifts the focus away from the criminal and his crime, and instead presents the historic, spirited community at the center of this heartbreak. He speaks with residents and nonresidents, Jews and gentiles, survivors and witnesses, teenagers and seniors, activists and historians. Together, these stories provide a kaleidoscopic and nuanced account of collective grief, love, support, and revival. But Oppenheimer also details the difficult dialogue and messy confrontations that Squirrel Hill had to face in the process of healing, and that are a necessary part of true growth and understanding in any community. He has reverently captured the vibrancy and caring that still characterize Squirrel Hill, and it is this phenomenal resilience that can provide inspiration to any place burdened with discrimination and hate.