Inscriptions of Israel/Palestine: Presentation
It’s been quite a year and for many completely prosaic reasons I have not kept up this blog as I should have. This is not to say that I have not been busy (even if, at time, languishing under the...
View ArticleThe Rabbinic Citation Network
Some months ago I wrote about my work with Michael Sperling analyzing and graphing the rabbinic citation network in the Babylonian Talmud (see here). Our full academic paper on this remains...
View ArticleThe Rabbinic Network, in italiano
My recent piece in Tablet on my work with Michael Sperling on the rabbinic network was just picked up by an Italian website. It also contains a short interview with me about the project.
View ArticleGreat Jewish Books, Yet Again
Did someone mention teaching? It seems like ages since I’ve been inside an undergraduate classroom. Yet here we go again, and although my first class is still a couple of weeks away, I am already...
View ArticleSo You’re Going to College…
I originally published this in 2015, but am re-upping it as the new college year begins. Over the years, I have offered scores of first-year students advice. I have encouraged them to clarify their...
View ArticleSacred Time: A First Stab
I have not posted very much over the period of COVID. This was due in part due to the predictable psychological effects of living under COVID (maybe a mild case of “languishing,” as the press has...
View ArticleReading Recommendation Letters
As longtime readers of this blog know, I have been thinking for a long time about issues of evaluation: How do we know if we, as individuals and collectives, are doing a good job? Within the academy,...
View ArticleRace, Religion, and Ethnicity in the Study of Antiquity
This semester I am teaching a substantially revamped course on “Race, Religion, and Ethnicity in the Study of Antiquity.” One of my new goals for this course is to explore the ethical implications of...
View ArticleThe Second Degree
Many years ago I created a profile on LinkedIn, not because I had any vision of what I wanted to do on it, but because that is what people did. I soon discovered, as I suspected, that LinkedIn does...
View ArticleNew Essay: The Meaning and Function of Torah
In what seems like a lifetime ago (2017), I went to a wonderful conference sponsored by the Enoch Seminar on the meaning and function of “Torah.” I reported on that conference, and my own paper,...
View ArticleIsrael, South Africa, and Divestment
This was originally published on my Substack. To receive future posts as they come out, right to your mailbox, please consider subscribing. The narrative is sometimes implicit, but often explicit, […]
View ArticleOur Purpose: The Desire for Meaning is our Strength and Weakness
This originally appeared in my Substack. Do humans have a unique purpose?The Bible wrestles with this question. In the first creation account (Genesis 1:1-2:4), God first states the intention to […]
View ArticleWhat Should I Take?
This originally appeared on my Substack.Over the years, I have offered scores of first-year college students advice. I have encouraged them to clarify their goals; to create long term plans; […]
View ArticleAntisemitism: A History
A course that I’m teaching in Fall, 2024, to undergraduates at Brown University:Antisemitism is sometimes called the “longest hatred,” and today it is on the rise. This class examines both […]
View ArticleThe Talmud
In addition to teaching my course on antisemitism this fall, I’ll also be teaching a course on the Talmud (in English). The description is below, and the full downloadable syllabus, […]
View ArticleAgainst Divestment at Brown University
In April, 2024, as at a few (mostly highly-selective) universities, student protesters encamped at Brown University. The encampments were set up on our main green, and while peaceful, they violated […]
View ArticleCan ChatGPT Read Ancient Texts?
This was originally published on my Substack, available here. For many years, I have been directing a project to make available the inscriptions that date from around 520 BCE – […]
View ArticleWhat is “Late Antiquity”?
This was originally published in my Substack, available here. I sometimes call myself a scholar of “Late Antiquity.” But what does that mean?There is nothing obvious or natural about how […]
View ArticleWhat Really Happened on Hanukkah?
Hanukkah is the only Jewish holiday not mentioned in the Jewish Bible. About four hundred years after the events that gave rise to the holiday, the rabbis were still uneasily […]
View ArticleAI and Ancient Inscriptions
Strange image generated by DALL-E for this postFirst published on my Substack. In an earlier post, I discussed a very simple and quick experiment that I did on a photograph of […]
View Article