New York Politicians Have Fostered Chaos by Singling Out Orthodox Jews
Cracking down on synagogue attendance while turning a blind eye to protests.
October 9, 2020
King Solomon, the Lord of the Demons, and the Limits of Virtue Ethics
A bizarre talmudic tale teaches that no man is too wise for the commandments.
King Solomon is known for his wisdom, for his glorious and pacific reign over a united Israel, and also for the moral corruption of his old age. In one of its longest, and perhaps one of its most baffling, tales about a biblical figure, the Talmud describes how Solomon once succeeded in capturing Ashm’dai (Asmodeus), ruler of the demons. At the story’s end, Ashm’dai impersonates Solomon, sitting on his throne while the real king wanders the land as a beggar. The late Israeli rabbi Naḥum Eliezer Rabinovitch, in an essay translated into English by Elli Fischer, subjects this narrative to a meticulous allegorical reading, which he uses to explain the contradictions of the biblical monarch:
October 9, 2020
America’s Turkey Problem, and Israel’s
Friend or foe?
In a New History of the IDF, an Israeli Author Breaks New Ground in Lying about His Country
One of those Israelis who gets a warm welcome in certain London circles.
King Solomon, the Lord of the Demons, and the Limits of Virtue Ethics
A bizarre talmudic tale teaches that no man is too wise for the commandments.
Coronavirus, Karma, and the Evils of Cheap Theodicy—Secular or Otherwise
When the president became ill, liberal secularists saw the Hand of God.