Latest Essays

Dathan and Abiram’s civic rebellion against Moses and Aaron was independent of the Levites’ challenge to their religious demotion in relation to the Aaronides. The composite narrative underscores, more emphatically than either story could do alone, the principle that divinely-appointed leaders are to be accepted by the nation of Israel.

Reflections on teaching biblical criticism in the classroom; a talk given at the Edah conference (2005).

The Critical and Traditional Approaches

Four Answers to One Question

The works of medieval exegetes such as Maimonides, Rashbam and Ibn Ezra demonstrate that Judaism has a long-standing tradition of studying the Torah critically.

Inaugurating TheTorah.com

The poems in the Torah are stylistically, theologically, and linguistically different from the prose narratives surrounding them. They include traces of earlier dialects of Hebrew, Ancient Near Eastern mythical motifs, and resemble an 8^th century B.C.E. poetic fragment from Kuntillet Ajrud—all of which suggest that they are ancient remnants of earlier Israelite literature.