Mechon Hadar Online Learning

Ever wanted to know the answer to some deep and challenging questions in halakhah (Jewish law)? Join R. Avi Killip interviewing R. Ethan Tucker with questions sent in by Yeshivat Hadar alumni and others on all sorts of details of Jewish law. This is a joint project between the Center for Jewish Law and Values and Jewish Public Media.

God dreams of living among a people who will be faithful—who will serve only God, who will construct a society in which justice and decency prevail. But God’s dreams are thwarted at every turn: Israel repeatedly descends into idolatry and allows the powerful to take advantage of the weak. Reading the prophets, one frequently wonders whether the covenant between God and Israel will finally come to an ignominious end. Yet it never does. Time and again, just when it seems that Israel’s relationship with God has been irreparably breached, new hope emerges. The message of these texts is clear: Despite the depth of God’s anguish, God will not abandon the people. To understand why is to learn something fundamental—and potentially transformative—about the God Jews worship.

In this class, we will examine two Talmudic stories concerning the period of the Omer (which ends with Shavuot) as a way of exploring deeper questions of ethics, role modeling and education. We will also encounter two classic stories that are read differently when seen in light of each other.

Ever wanted to know the answer to some deep and challenging questions in halakhah (Jewish law)? Join R. Avi Killip interviewing R. Ethan Tucker with questions sent in by Yeshivat Hadar alumni and others on all sorts of details of Jewish law. This is a joint project between the Center for Jewish Law and Values and Jewish Public Media.

Counting the Omer. Over the course of Jewish history, a time of breathless anticipation becomes simultaneously a period of profound grief. To understand why is to discover Judaism’s deepest yearnings as well as its greatest disappointments.

We often talk about how important a moment k'riyat yam suf, the splitting of the Reed Sea, was for us as a people, but we don't normally think about what it was like for God.

Ever wanted to know the answer to some deep and challenging questions in halakhah (Jewish law)? Join R. Avi Killip interviewing R. Ethan Tucker with questions sent in by Yeshivat Hadar alumni and others on all sorts of details of Jewish law. This is a joint project between the Center for Jewish Law and Values and Jewish Public Media.

When Leviticus lays out its vision for how Israel is to live a life of holiness, it includes the following charge: “You shall not insult (tekallel) the deaf, or place a stumbling block before the blind, but you shall fear the Lord your God; I am the Lord” (Leviticus 19:14). What exactly are these prohibitions designed to do? Is there a particular value the Torah is trying to instil in us? Are the "deaf" and "blind" here representative of more inclusive categories? The varying interpretations need to be assessed carefully, and with an eye to a crucial moral and religious imperative: learning to listen to the voices of those so often rendered voiceless.

Ever wanted to know the answer to some deep and challenging questions in halakhah (Jewish law)? Join R. Avi Killip interviewing R. Ethan Tucker with questions sent in by Yeshivat Hadar alumni and others on all sorts of details of Jewish law. This is a joint project between the Center for Jewish Law and Values and Jewish Public Media.

Living with Unresolved, and Unresolvable, Disagreements. What do I do if I find myself in disagreement with those that decide the law? What if I think I'm right while my friends are wrong? Using two passages from the Torah Temimah (Rabbi Baruch Ha-Levi Epstein's commentary on the Torah), this class explores those questions. Recorded live at the Alumni Conference 2015.

The Meaning of the Metzora. Modern readers often find the laws concerning Israelites affected by tzara’at, a scaly skin disease (usually—though erroneously—rendered as leprosy), deeply disturbing. For thousands of years, people afflicted with diseases of the skin have suffered from stigma and social exclusion. So far from lightening the burden of stigma that the ailing are frequently made to bear, in this instance the Torah seems only to intensify it. And yet if we read both the text and the history of its interpretation closely, a(n at least) somewhat more complex picture emerges.

Do we have an obligation to fit in? Is it okay to have a different practice than our community? Can we show this in communal settings or should we keep it to ourselves? Ethan Tucker investigates these questions through the lens of Hazal and responsa. Recorded at the Alumni Conference 2015.

Ever wanted to know the answer to some deep and challenging questions in halakhah (Jewish law)? Join R. Avi Killip interviewing R. Ethan Tucker with questions sent in by Yeshivat Hadar alumni and others on all sorts of details of Jewish law. This is a joint project between the Center for Jewish Law and Values and Jewish Public Media.

No sooner are Aaron's sons ordained than two of them die at the terrifying hand of God. The story is terse, laconic—and profoundly disturbing. But it raises fascinating and crucially important questions—about mourning and devastation, about (often misguided) attempts to console, and about the ways leadership roles can (legitimately?) limit public expressions of grief and sorrow.

Most of our visual midrashim about the splitting of the sea in the Exodus happens during the daytime. But actually, according to the Torah, it happened at night. Night is a dangerous time. What does it mean that our Seders and our redemption happened at night?