To Be a Jew Today, Noah Feldman
To Be a Jew Today, Noah Feldman
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To Be a Jew Today
A New Guide to God, Israel, and the Jewish People

Author: Noah Feldman

Narrator: Noah Feldman

Unabridged: 14 hr 17 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Recorded Books

Published: 03/05/2024


Synopsis

A leading public intellectual’s timely reckoning with how Jews can and should make sense of their tradition and each other.

What does it mean to be a Jew? At a time of worldwide crisis, venerable answers to this question have become unsettled. In To Be a Jew Today, the legal scholar and columnist Noah Feldman draws on a lifelong engagement with his religion to offer a wide-ranging interpretation of Judaism in its current varieties. How do Jews today understand their relationship to God, to Israel, and to each other—and live their lives accordingly?

Writing sympathetically but incisively about diverse outlooks, Feldman clarifies what’s at stake in the choice of how to be a Jew, and discusses the shared “theology of struggle” that Jews engage in as they wrestle with who God is, what God wants, or whether God exists. He shows how the founding of Israel has transformed Judaism itself over the last century—and explores the ongoing consequences of that transformation for all Jews, who find the meaning of their Jewishness and their views about Israel intertwined, no matter what those views are. And he examines the analogies between being Jewish and belonging to a large, messy family—a family that often makes its members crazy, but a family all the same. Written with learning, empathy and clarity, To Be a Jew Today is a critical resource for readers of all faiths.

About Noah Feldman

Noah Feldman is the Felix Frankfurter Professor of Law at Harvard University as well as a Senior Fellow of the Society of Fellows and a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. He is a contributing writer for Bloomberg View.Before joining the Harvard faculty, Feldman was Cecelia Goetz Professor of Law at New York University School of Law. He was named a Carnegie Scholar in 2005. In 2004, he was a visiting professor at Yale Law School and a fellow of the Whitney Humanities Center. In 2003, he served as senior constitutional advisor to the Coalition Provisional Authority in Iraq, and advised members of the Iraqi Governing Council on the drafting of the Transitional Administrative Law or interim constitution. He served as a law clerk to Justice David H. Souter of the U.S. Supreme Court (1998–1999). Selected as a Rhodes Scholar, he earned a D. Phil. in Islamic Thought from Oxford University and a J.D. from Yale Law School, serving as Book Reviews Editor of the Yale Law Journal. He received his A.B. summa cum laude in Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations from Harvard University in 1992, finishing first in his class.He is the author of several books, including Cool War: The Future of Global Competition; the award winning and acclaimed Scorpions: The Battles and Triumphs of FDR’s Great Justices; The Fall and Rise of the Islamic State; Divided By God: America's Church-State Problem and What We Should Do About It; and After Jihad: America and the Struggle for Islamic Democracy. With Kathleen Sullivan, he coauthored textbooks on constitutional and first amendment law. He has worked as a contributing writer for the New York Times Magazine.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Anna

This is a fascinating review of Jewish history and the various paths Judaism has taken. It discusses different ways at looking at being Jewish and different views of Israel. I felt myself fully engaged with it, even when I wasn't sure I agreed with a particular point. Definitely a good read for thos......more

Goodreads review by Bonita

Some really great insights and thought points - covers a variety of challenges in today's world, and how Judiasm is at the same time fluid and structured. A great read and one you will return to.......more

Goodreads review by Claudio

A superlative book. Important. To be a Jew is also to struggle with G*d together. If worthy, we may be able. These are elements that every Jew, everyone who thinks they are, can and should be a Jew, should simmer in. Written with grace, Feldman tries to bring if himself when as a political pundit an......more

Goodreads review by Charles

Exploration into the religion, nation, and community of the Jewish people, with all reasonable respect given to all identified strains in each of those perspectives. I don't know enough to say if anything was left out or mischaracterized, but Feldman is clear and consistent in his analysis of what i......more