Articles

Qian Julie Wang reflects on how both American culture and American Judaism often define identity through victimhood, turning suffering into a kind of currency that fuels competition and vengeance rather than justice or healing. Drawing on the Binding of Isaac, she contrasts readings of Isaac as helpless victim or empowered adult to show that we can choose to live from agency instead of powerlessness. In this season of teshuvah, she calls us to reclaim power and privilege not as tainted words but as sacred responsibilities, reminding us that each of us is both David and Goliath, oppressed and oppressor. Our task is to embrace the perspective that empowers us to care for one another and to build a world where suffering is not the measure of worth.

Jerusalem Day has come to be a celebration of violent Jewish nationalism under the guise of religious unity. Drawing on the heterodox thinking of Isaiah Berlin and Rav Shagar, Shaul Magid explores two competing visions of liberation—and two Jerusalems: one that dominates its non-Jewish inhabitants, and one that could embrace them as full participants. Through close readings of Rav Shagar’s sermons, Magid uncovers the theological and political fault lines at the heart of contemporary Zionism.

Today, it is our duty to reach back to the sources of our traditions to seek out who they were built for—a search for who we are today in line with the question of 'who have we been'?