For many people, God is unknowable except as metaphor and symbol, unreachable except in action. For such people, the study of certain literary texts may be helpful. We shall read texts, starting with Ruth and Ecclesiastes and going into our own time. 

An important line of Jewish thought runs from R. Haim of Velozhin through R. Yisreal Salanter. It intercepts and is explicated by the works of Hermann Cohen, Franz Rosenzweig and Emmanuel Levinas. This course traces those paths. 

What are our obligations as Jews in matters of prayer and tikun olam? We will explore Biblical, rabbinic, mystical, and modern texts to help each of us to develop our own answer. 

Our tradition speaks of two different types of revelation. There is the event at Sinai, and we will discuss its theological implications for Judaism. Our beliefs about this event have been a topic of debate for centuries. In modern times, our understanding and beliefs about this event draw sharp lines among our Jewish communities. Secondly, there is the issue of ongoing revelation. How does Judaism feel about God’s continuing communication or lack thereof with the world S/He created? Jewish mysticism has a great deal to offer concerning the relationship between God and humankind and the true nature of the universe. There is both the black fire of the text and the white fire of its interpretation. We will survey specific issues such as the “hidden nature of God and Torah, the worlds of the sefirot, the feminine side of God, the demand of tikkun olam and devekut, and the issue of gilgul or the transmigration of souls.  

This course will explore Jewish reflection on prayer from the Medieval through the contemporary period. What is prayer, why pray, and how prayer works will be discussed through the lens of seminal Jewish thinkers like Maimonides, The Baal Shem Tov, Rabbi Soloveitchik, and Lawrence Hoffman.

The Jewish people have a love affair with he land of Israel. What is the basis for that relationship and in what sense is Israel Holy Land? As Jews, do we have an obligation to live there or just to dream about it? These and other questions will be raised as we look at the status of the land of Israel in the thought of important Jewish philosophers. 

Rav Albo, in Sefer HaIkarim, gives the three absolutely basic elements of Judaism as one G-d, revelation, reward and punishment. Wee shall examine the word "G-d" and the concepts of reward and punishment. We shall show how G-d becomes a word (following an exciting career as a "being"). We shall also show how the changing conception of "G-d" necessarily changes our conception of reward and punishment. Alternate theories will be welcomed and examined. Imaginative as well as analytical thought will find a home here. 

"Shall not the Judge of all the earth deal justly?" The problem of the existence of good and evil in a world created by a just G-d has been a center of Jewish debate from the Tanach to modernity. Our philosophers desire to maintain both the just nature of G-d and the theology that describes G-d as all-powerful. As Isaiah says, "Both the good and the evil come from G-d."

Rabbi Akiva taught, "All is foreseen and freedom of choice is given." Whatever the hidden nature of G-d’s revelation to His creation, human beings are still faced with moral decisions which need to be met on a daily basis. What are the core values which lie behind the decision making process in Judaism. How do we decide what is right and what is wrong and how we should act in a given situation?