JEWISH IDEAS AND THE HEBREW BIBLE
In this core class, students will engage in a careful and intensive study of the major themes throughout the Hebrew Bible—God’s relationship to humanity, the meaning of particularism, building a covenantal relationship, free will and redemption, freedom and law, justice and exile.
Readings will draw primarily from the Hebrew Bible, while also integrating classical and medieval sources, including the Talmud and Maimonides, as well as works by modern Jewish thinkers and writers like Joseph B. Soloveitchik, Abraham Joshua Heschel, and Mordecai Kaplan. In all, this course aims to give students a sweeping account of Tanakh and the major ideas that animate Jewish theology, tradition, and practice.
Students will be expected to be active participants, not passive observers, in a serious inquiry into the great ideas and profound debates that have captured the Jewish and Western imagination throughout the generations: What is justice? What does it mean for God to be one or for a people to be “chosen”? What is holiness and what role does it play in our lives?
Together, we will examine what some of the brightest minds of Jewish history—past and present—thought about these questions and interrogate our own assumptions and beliefs about these issues. What is at stake for us in these questions, and where will they lead us in the future?
The aim of these discussions is not to inculcate students in any particular sect or practice, but to deepen each student’s awareness of the rich intellectual currents, internal conflicts, and enduring promises offered by the Jewish tradition. These ideas shape our own identities, notions of justice and the good, and our vision for the kind of future we want for ourselves, our country, and the broader Jewish community.
This series is part of Tikvah’s Kress Project on the Hebrew Bible. We are grateful to Camille and Sandy Kress (Austin, Texas) for their generous support.
