Book Reviews by Israel Benporat
Tradition Online, 2022
Recent debates about President Biden's student debt forgiveness initiative, in which many invoked... more Recent debates about President Biden's student debt forgiveness initiative, in which many invoked parallels to Shemitta, highlight the continued centrality of the Bible in contemporary political and cultural discourse. The roots of this phenomenon trace back centuries in American history. Mark A. Noll's new volume, America's Book: The Rise and Decline of a Bible Civilization, 1794-1911, offers an authoritative synthesis of this story. An 848-page scholarly behemoth, America's Book is the long-awaited sequel to Noll's earlier work, In the Beginning Was the Word: The Bible in American Public Life, 1492-1783 (Oxford, 2015). While the latter spanned the colonial period to the American Revolution, America's Book continues through the late eighteenth century, from Thomas Paine's Age of Reason (1794-1795), to the tricentennial of the King James Bible translation in 1911. Noll argues that a Protestant "Bible Civilization" emerged in the early decades of the United States, fractured during the antebellum slavery crises and nascent religious diversity, and declined after the Civil War.
The Lehrhaus, 2021
In 1790, Isaac Pinto of Congregation Shearith Israel in New York, translator of the first English... more In 1790, Isaac Pinto of Congregation Shearith Israel in New York, translator of the first English siddur in America, wrote a letter to Rev. Ezra Stiles, president of Yale College. Evidently, Stiles's Hebraic acumen had impressed this Jew, who addressed his recipient with the delightful neologism "Rosh ha-Yeshiva ha-Yalensi"-head of the Yale Yeshiva (185)! This remarkable anecdote highlights the synergy between Judaism and Protestantism in early America. Brian Ogren's fascinating new study Kabbalah and the Founding of America argues that Jewish mysticism significantly influenced early American Protestant theology. While the notion of colonial Kabbalah seems strange and implausible, Ogren has unearthed a treasure
The Lehrhaus, 2019
2/5 between contemporary American society and the biblical past. In an era of increasing seculari... more 2/5 between contemporary American society and the biblical past. In an era of increasing secularism and biblical illiteracy, the Bible strikes the modern reader as an ancient, irrelevant text. However, this phenomenon belies the long and venerable American biblical tradition. The Bible was a deeply important text in American history, so significant that intellectual historian Perry Miller posited, "The Old Testament is truly so omnipresent…that historians have as much difficulty taking cognizance of it as of the air the people breathed." Yet the newly-edited anthology Proclaim Liberty Throughout the Land indeed takes cognizance of this omnipresence. Proclaim Liberty, produced under the auspices of Yeshiva University's Straus Center for Torah and Western Thought, offers a collection of primary sources to center the Hebrew Bible in the story of the United States.
Papers by Israel Benporat
Tradition, 2023
In 1722, a crowd gathered at Harvard to witness the conversion of
the mysterious “Rabbi” Judah Mo... more In 1722, a crowd gathered at Harvard to witness the conversion of
the mysterious “Rabbi” Judah Monis (1683-1764), who subsequently
taught Hebrew at the college for several decades. Monis’ purported
rabbinic persona captured the Christian imagination at an auspicious
moment in the history of Massachusetts, yet it also undermined the
full acceptance of his new religious identity.
Torah Musings, 2023
Click here to download PDF Every year, on the fourth Thursday of November, many Americans grace t... more Click here to download PDF Every year, on the fourth Thursday of November, many Americans grace their dinner tables with turkey and cranberry sauce in celebration of Thanksgiving. According to popular tradition, the holiday commemorates the first harvest of the Pilgrims following their arrival in Plymouth Colony. American Jews have long debated whether to participate in such festivities. This article offers a historical perspective on the approach of Rabbi Moshe Feinstein, widely considered America's greatest halachic decisor of the twentieth century. I argue that a deeper understanding of the holiday's history potentially carries halachic implications.
The Lehrhaus, 2023
Much ink has been spilled on the Jewish view of abortion. This essay explores an obscure set of s... more Much ink has been spilled on the Jewish view of abortion. This essay explores an obscure set of sources that have received little attention in the literature. My purpose in this article is not to take a halakhic or philosophical stance on the status of fetal life, but rather to shed light on some neglected rabbinic texts relevant to this issue. Tractate Sotah (the "wayward wife") elaborates on the miraculous biblical ritual (Numbers 5:11-31) for testing the fidelity of a suspected adulteress. The Sotah drinks bitter water mixed with dirt, and a priest erases into it a scroll containing God's name. In the rabbinic view, if she is guilty, she dies, but if she is innocent, she will be blessed with children. A dispute between Rashi and Tosafot regarding the case of a pregnant Sotah addresses the ethics of performing a ritual potentially fatal for a fetus.
The Lehrhaus, 2022
In Adam's fall we sinned all," read generations of schoolchildren learning the alphabet in coloni... more In Adam's fall we sinned all," read generations of schoolchildren learning the alphabet in colonial New England. The story of Adam and Eve has received considerable commentary over the past few millennia. The biblical account defies easy interpretation, contains manifold ambiguities, and raises serious theological questions. For both Jews and Christians, the primordial sin reflects deeper themes about the past, present, and future of humanity. Historically, misogyny has cast a long shadow over Jewish and Christian interpretations, which tend to emphasize Eve's erroneous behavior. Yet a close reading and comparative analysis of a midrash on Adam's role in the narrative sheds new light on the primordial sin. These novel interpretations shift the blame and reinterpret the narrative in unexpected ways that offer the modern reader surprisingly relevant moral teachings about sexuality.
The Lehrhaus, 2022
The "Judeo-Christian" Tradition at Yeshiva thelehrhaus.com/timely-thoughts/the-judeo-christian-tr... more The "Judeo-Christian" Tradition at Yeshiva thelehrhaus.com/timely-thoughts/the-judeo-christian-tradition-at-yeshiva/ I would like to begin this essay by acknowledging what an honor and privilege it is to participate in this symposium-both as an editor and a writer-with so many diverse and distinguished voices. I am not an expert in Jewish theology, but the following reflection stems from living and intensely studying the Jewish tradition, as well as my disciplinary background of early American history. It is both scholarly and deeply personal, and it is thus tentative. My hope is that these words will resonate with people who seek to advance the next generation of Torah u-Madda. In the early twentieth century, a curious phrase emerged, one that has recently drawn considerable favor from the right-wing Jewish community: "Judeo-Christian." In The Right Side of History (2019), conservative political pundit Ben Shapiro lauds Judeo-Christian values as founding principles of America and Western civilization. Similarly, books and projects sponsored by YU's Straus Center for Torah and Western Thought-some of which include my own contributions-cast the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament as a shared tradition of Judaism and Christianity. These efforts seek to highlight the commonalities between the two faiths to promote religious ideals in the public sphere. In this essay, I consider how such notions might fit into a Torah u-Madda framework. I argue that this trend reflects a significant departure from previous applications of the term and carries serious halakhic implications for Orthodox Jews. Nevertheless, I see value in carefully pursuing these avenues, and I propose a path forward that I consider faithful to the Jewish tradition.
Tradition Online, 2022
The oft-cited phrase "city on a hill" might evoke different associations for Jews and Christians.... more The oft-cited phrase "city on a hill" might evoke different associations for Jews and Christians. The motif appears in the short lay sermon, "A Modell of Christian Charity" (1630) by John Winthrop, the first governor of the Puritan Massachusetts Bay Colony. In our liturgy for Friday nights, we sing the words ve-nivnitah ir al tilah (Jeremiah 30:18), which ArtScroll renders, "As the City is built upon its hilltop." A more accurate translation of the phrase would read "mound" or "heap" in the sense of rebuilding over destruction (cf. Deuteronomy 13:17). Christians, on the other hand, hear in Winthrop's words an echo of the New Testament: "A city that is set on a hill cannot be hid" (Matthew 5:14). Despite its obscure origins, "Christian Charity" is considered canonical in early American literature. Before the Puritans' departure from England to the New World in April 1630, Winthrop provided a message of unity, love, and faith to the future colonists. Like many midrashim, Puritan exegesis typically "opens" with a Scriptural citation. While the verse is missing in the surviving manuscript, recent scholarship traces the sermon's themes back to Galatians 5:13 in the Geneva Bible.
Esther in America: The Scroll's Interpretation in and Impact on the United States (Straus Center for Torah and Western Thought), 2020
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Book Reviews by Israel Benporat
Papers by Israel Benporat
the mysterious “Rabbi” Judah Monis (1683-1764), who subsequently
taught Hebrew at the college for several decades. Monis’ purported
rabbinic persona captured the Christian imagination at an auspicious
moment in the history of Massachusetts, yet it also undermined the
full acceptance of his new religious identity.
the mysterious “Rabbi” Judah Monis (1683-1764), who subsequently
taught Hebrew at the college for several decades. Monis’ purported
rabbinic persona captured the Christian imagination at an auspicious
moment in the history of Massachusetts, yet it also undermined the
full acceptance of his new religious identity.