I enjoyed the collection overall. The quality of the essays varied (though none were bad) and there were definitely some excellent points raised worth pondering. I do wish the editors had opted to organize the essays thematically rather than alphabetically by the authors' last names. The conclusion does a nice job of tying things together, but it would have been nice to have a larger conceptual framework within which to understand each essay while reading. #BHBReads

This past #Shabbos, I finished reading "Strauss, Spinoza, and Sinai", a collection of essays that seek to answer whether Leo Strauss' critique of Spinoza (namely, that an Orthodox worldview is just as valid as a secular one since both are ultimately based on different but equally unprovable axiomatic assumptions) is a sufficient grounding for Orthodox belief. #BHBReads

There are few Orthodox rabbis who have a deep knowledge of biblical criticism and ancient Near East culture, but Joshua Berman is certainly one of them. In "Created Equal", he shows how the book of Deuteronomy was a notable break from the caste-based societies of Israel's neighbors and how it planted the seeds for an egalitarian society. While it is more of an academic than religious work, I personally found it very religiously inspiring when I first read it a few years ago. #BHBReads

In addition to being a great biography, the book is also an excellent window into Jewish life in Germany pre-WWII. Rabbi Weinberg is an absolutely fascinating figure and Shapiro tells his story with an impressive knowledge of his life and zeal for the subject matter. It is one of the few nonfiction books I can say I literally couldn't put down when I first read it. If this sounds at all intriguing to you, you owe it to yourself to read this book!
@mazeldon #BHBReads

"Between the Yeshiva World and Modern Orthodoxy" by Marc Shapiro is possibly the best Jewish book written in English I've ever read. It is a biography of Rabbi Yechiel Yaakov Weinberg, also known as the S'ridei Eish (Survivors of the Fire), who was a Holocaust survivor and one of the premier poskim (decisors of Jewish law) worldwide after World War II. @mazeldon #BHBReads

Another book I read somewhat recently was "Radical Then, Radical Now" (also published as "A Letter in the Scroll") by Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks zt"l. Rabbi Sacks has a real talent for expressing traditional Judaism in such a way that makes it seem not only relevant to the modern world, but indispensable to it. That talent is on full display in this work, delivered in Rabbi Sacks' excellent prose. Reading it made me feel proud to be a Jew. #BHBReads

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The past few days I've posted about the Jewish books I've been reading and quite enjoyed it. I think I'll continue to post about books as I read them and post about books I've read in the past as well. I'll tag these posts with #BHBreads in case anyone wants to follow them (or filter them 😅​).