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PODCAST

The College Commons Podcast

The College Commons Podcast, passionate perspectives from Judaism"s leading thinkers, is produced by Hebrew Union College, America"s first Jewish institution of higher learning.

religion & spirituality judaism

All Episodes

00:29:24

Dear Mr. Dickens: A Real-Life Heroine Fights...

The College Commons Podcast ·

2022/07/05

Author Nancy Churnin discusses the power of having a pen, paper, and something to say. Dear Mr. Dickens, 2021 National Jewish Book Award winner for children's picture book. In Eliza Davis's day, Charles Dickens was the most celebrated living writer in England. But some of his books reflected a prejudice that was all too common at the time: prejudice against Jewish people. Eliza was Jewish, and her heart hurt to see a Jewish character in Oliver Twist portrayed as ugly and selfish. She wanted to

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00:21:47

A Jewish Musician Walks into a Shanghai Nightclub…

The College Commons Podcast ·

2022/06/20

Author Weina Randel discusses The Last Rose of Shanghai: A love story transcending class, race, religion, and even war. National Jewish Book Award Finalist, The Last Rose of Shanghai In Japanese-occupied Shanghai, two people from different cultures are drawn together by fate and the freedom of music... Weina Dai Randel is the award-winning author of three novels, The Last Rose of Shanghai, The Moon in the Palace, and The Empress of Bright Moon, a historical duology about Wu Zetian, China’s only

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00:30:24

Our Imagined Jewish Story: A Jewish Odyssey in...

The College Commons Podcast ·

2022/06/07

Reverse-engineering his imagined past, Israeli author Yaniv Iczkovits follows his characters across the Pale of Settlement. The Slaughterman’s Daughter, finalist for the National Jewish Book Award. With her reputation as a vilde chaya (wild animal), Fanny Keismann isn’t like the other women in her shtetl in the Pale of Settlement—certainly not her obedient and anxiety-ridden sister, Mende, whose “philosopher” of a husband, Zvi-Meir, has run off to Minsk, abandoning her and their two children. As

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00:32:27

The Netanyahus: An Allegory of the Jewish Experience

The College Commons Podcast ·

2022/05/24

Pulitzer Prize-winning author Joshua Cohen reimagines a meeting between two giants of 20th century Judaism as debate about the Jewish destiny. 2021 National Jewish Book Award and 2022 Pulitzer Prize Winner, The Netanyahus: An Account of a Minor and Ultimately Even Negligible Episode in the History of a Very Famous Family Corbin College, not quite upstate New York, winter 1959–1960: Ruben Blum, a Jewish historian—but not an historian of the Jews—is co-opted onto a hiring committee to review

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00:17:02

Rebel Daughter: Fierce Enemies Falling in Love

The College Commons Podcast ·

2022/05/10

Author Lori Banov Kaufmann transports us to an unlikely love story set against the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 CE. National Jewish Book Award Winner, Rebel Daughter A young woman survives the unthinkable in this stunning and emotionally satisfying tale of family, love, and resilience, set against the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 CE. Lori grew up in Charleston, South Carolina. She received her undergraduate degree from Princeton and a masters from Harvard. She’d always wanted to write and

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00:23:35

A Play for the End of the World: Love Stories...

The College Commons Podcast ·

2022/04/26

Author Jai Chakrabarti muses on the power of art, friendship, and love to bridge the human experience. A Play for the End of the World, winner of the National Jewish Book Award for debut fiction. New York City, 1972. Jaryk Smith, a survivor of the Warsaw Ghetto, and Lucy Gardner, a southerner, newly arrived in the city, are in the first bloom of love when they receive word that Jaryk’s oldest friend has died under mysterious circumstances in a rural village in eastern India. Travelling there

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00:25:40

The Telling: Re-Reading the Passover Haggadah for...

The College Commons Podcast ·

2022/04/12

Author and philanthropist Mark Gerson uncovers surprising delights and insights from the deceptively familiar text. The Telling: How Judaism’s Essential Book Reveals the Meaning of Life, finalist for the 2021 National Jewish Book Award for Modern Jewish Thought and Experience. Mark Gerson is an entrepreneur and philanthropist, as well as the author of books on intellectual history and education. His articles and essays on subjects ranging from Frank Sinatra to the biblical Jonah have been

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00:24:16

Torah in the Time of Plague: Historical and...

The College Commons Podcast ·

2022/03/29

Guidance and provocations for finding meaning in ‘unprecedented’ times. Torah in a Time of Plague: Historical and Contemporary Jewish Reflections, winner of the 2021 National Jewish Book Award in Modern Jewish Thought and Experience. This collection of essays uses Torah – broadly understood to include any canonical Jewish text or tradition – to illuminate, explore, bemoan, or grapple with our current moment of plague. Rabbi Dr. Erin Leib Smokler is the Dean of Students and the Director of

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00:27:22

Rabbi Helen Plotkin: Learning Jewish/Being Jewish

The College Commons Podcast ·

2022/03/14

Studying Jewish tradition as an expression of the Jewish purpose. Rabbi Helen Plotkin is co-founder of the Beit Midrash at Swarthmore College, where she taught courses in Biblical Hebrew and classical Hebrew texts for 20 years. She is founder and director of Mekom Torah (pronounced McComb Toe-RAH), offering deep Jewish study opportunities for adults and teens that transcend the boundaries of the various Jewish movements. Mekom Torah is committed to a radically ancient vision of Judaism as a culture

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00:31:54

Roberta Kwall: Remix Judaism

The College Commons Podcast ·

2022/03/01

Major themes of Jewish life, reviewed, rethunk... remixed. Roberta Rosenthal Kwall is the Raymond P. Niro Professor at DePaul University College of Law. Professor Kwall earned her JD from the University of Pennsylvania and received her undergraduate degree in Religious Studies from Brown University. She also has a Master's Degree in Jewish Studies. Kwall is an internationally renowned scholar and lecturer and has published over 30 articles on a wide variety of topics including Jewish law and

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00:24:43

Paper Brigade with Editor Becca Kantor

The College Commons Podcast ·

2022/02/15

Dig into the Jewish literary landscape with the Jewish Book Council’s intriguing and rich annual literary journal. Becca Kantor is the editorial director of Jewish Book Council and its annual print literary journal, Paper Brigade. She received a BA in English from the University of Pennsylvania and an MA in creative writing from the University of East Anglia in Norwich, England. Becca was awarded a Fulbright fellowship to spend a year in Estonia writing and studying the country's Jewish

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00:37:01

Noam Zion: Sanctified Sex - the Jewish Debate on...

The College Commons Podcast ·

2022/02/01

Judaism's views on sex, sensuality, and intimacy within marriage. Noam is now emeritus at the Shalom Hartman Institute in Jerusalem where since 1978 he has been a senior research fellow and educator. He earned a graduate degree in general philosophy at Columbia University and the Hebrew University, while studying Bible and Rabbinics at JTSA and the Hartman Beit Midrash. His popular publications and worldwide lecturing have promoted Homemade Judaism - empowering families to create their own

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00:22:05

The Charlottesville Verdict: Taking Action in the...

The College Commons Podcast ·

2022/01/18

Civil litigation as a powerful tool against white supremacy. Amy Spitalnick is the Executive Director of Integrity First for America, the civil rights nonprofit that spearheaded the successful landmark lawsuit against the neo-Nazis, white supremacists, and hate groups responsible for the Charlottesville violence. Amy has extensive experience in government, politics, and advocacy, including as Communications Director and Senior Policy Advisor to the New York Attorney General and Communications

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00:31:01

Social Justice Torah Commentary

The College Commons Podcast ·

2022/01/04

Advancing social justice through Torah. Rabbi Barry H. Block serves Congregation B'nai Israel in Little Rock, Arkansas. A Houston native and graduate of Amherst College, Rabbi Block was ordained by Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion in New York in 1991, and he received his DD, honoris causa, in 2016. A member of the CCAR Board of Trustees, currently serving as vice president of organizational relationships, Block is the editor of The Mussar Torah Commentary (CCAR Press, 2020), a

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00:19:31

Rabbi Kari Tuling: Thinking about God in Jewish Terms

The College Commons Podcast ·

2021/12/21

Feminism, intertextuality and 3000 years of making sense of God. Rabbi Kari Tuling received rabbinic ordination in 2004 and earned her PhD in Jewish Thought in 2013, both from the Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion in Cincinnati. She has served congregations in Connecticut, Indiana, New York, and Ohio, and has taught Jewish Studies courses at the University of Cincinnati and the State University of New York, Plattsburgh. She currently serves as the rabbi of Congregation Kol Haverim

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00:37:03

Dr. Jonathan Sarna: Competing or Complementary?...

The College Commons Podcast ·

2021/12/07

Tension and compatibility in the long story of our Jewish and American identities. Dr. Jonathan D. Sarna is University Professor and Joseph H. & Belle R. Braun Professor of American Jewish History at Brandeis University, where he directs the Schusterman Center for Israel Studies. He also chairs the Academic Advisory and Editorial Board of the Jacob Rader Marcus Center of the American Jewish Archives in Cincinnati and serves as Chief Historian of the National Museum of American Jewish History in

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00:30:42

Rabbi Wayne Allen: Jewish Thinking About Good And Evil

The College Commons Podcast ·

2021/11/22

Controversy, confusion and confidence in God’s goodness, from antiquity to present. After being graduated from New York University with a B.A. in philosophy and Phi Beta Kappa, Rabbi Wayne Allen, Ph.D. attended the Jewish Theological Seminary of America where he earned a Masters degree in Rabbinics and went on to receive rabbinic ordination. He served as a congregational rabbi for 35 years, taking on postings in New York City, Los Angeles, and Toronto. The Jewish Theological Seminary conferred an

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00:29:14

Jewish Bible Translations: Personalities, Passions,...

The College Commons Podcast ·

2021/11/08

Understanding bible translations as a key to Jewish history. Leonard J. Greenspoon holds the Philip M. and Ethel Klutznick Chair in Jewish Civilization at Creighton University, where he is also Professor of Theology and of Classical & Near Eastern Studies. Greenspoon is the editor of the 32-volume (and counting) Studies in Jewish Civilization series. He has also written five other books, in addition to his most recent one on Jewish Bible translations. Additionally, he has served on translation

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00:30:15

Rabbi Zac Kamenetz: Psychedelic Judaism

The College Commons Podcast ·

2021/10/26

Psychedelics as a key to exploring Jewish mystical experiences. Rabbi Zac Kamenetz is a community leader and aspiring psychedelic-assisted therapist based in Berkeley,CA. He holds an MA in Biblical literature and languages from UC Berkeley and the Graduate Theological Union and received rabbinic ordination in 2012. A sought-after educator and qualified MBSR instructor, Zac’s work has been centered on seeking answers to life’s essential questions within the Jewish tradition and embodied spiritual

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00:21:51

Rabbi Sergio Bergman: World Union for Progressive...

The College Commons Podcast ·

2021/10/11

Leading diverse progressive Judaism around the globe. Born in Buenos Aires in 1962, Rabbi Bergman holds a Bachelor’s degree in Biochemistry and Pharmaceutics from the University of Buenos Aires, and three Master’s degrees: in Education from The Hebrew University, in Hebrew Letters from Hebrew Union College – Jewish Institute of Religion, Jerusalem, and in Jewish Studies from the Jewish Theological Seminary, Jerusalem. He was ordained at the Latin American Rabbinical Seminary of Buenos Aires in

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231 results

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