The Jewish Lives Podcast

Get ready for Passover with Jewish Lives. Rabbi Elliot Cosgrove of Park Avenue Synagogue and Professor Daniel Matt, author of Becoming Elijah: Prophet of Transformation, explore the life and legacy of the prophet Elijah, one of the most popular figures in Jewish folklore. This episode comes from the Park Avenue Synagogue Podcast.  

Henrietta Szold (1860–1945) is renowned as the founder of Hadassah, the Women’s Zionist Organization of America, which quickly became one of the most successful of all Zionist groups.Join us with award-winning author Francine Klagsbrun, author of the new biography Henrietta Szold: Hadassah and the Zionist Dream, as we explore the life of an extraordinary woman whose impact resonates to this day. 

On January 5, 1895, Captain Alfred Dreyfus’s cries of innocence were drowned out by a mob shouting “Death to Judas!”As global antisemitism rises, join us with Yale scholar Maurice Samuels, author of the new Jewish Lives biography Alfred Dreyfus: The Man at the Center of the Affair, as we explore a story that is more important than ever.

Baruch (Benedictus) Spinoza (1632–1677) was a radical free thinker who led a life guided by strong moral principles despite his disbelief in an all-seeing God.Join us with award-winning writer Ian Buruma, author of the new Jewish Lives biography Spinoza: Freedom’s Messiah, as we explore the life and legacy of the enlightenment thinker whose belief in freedom of thought and speech resonates in our own time.

Born in the Land of Israel around the year 50 C.E., Rabbi Akiva was the greatest rabbi of his time and one of the most important influences on Judaism as we know it today.Join us with Professor Barry W. Holtz, author of Rabbi Akiva: Sage of the Talmud, as we explore the life and teachings of one of the most beloved heroes of Jewish history.

Amos Oz (1939–2018) was one of Israel’s most prolific and prominent writers, as well as a regular contender for the Nobel Prize for Literature. He was the author of dozens of novels, essay collections, and novellas written between 1965 and shortly before his death.Join us with celebrated scholar Robert Alter, author of the new Jewish Lives biography Amos Oz: Writer, Activist, Icon, as we explore the life and work of the legendary writer.

Born Julius Marx in 1890, the brilliant comic actor who would later be known as Groucho, was celebrated for his slapstick portrayals, ingenious wordplay, and double entendre.Join us with Lee Siegel, author of Groucho Marx: The Comedy of Existence, as we explore the life of the beloved American iconoclast through the lens of his work on stage, screen, and television.

The feminist writer and activist Betty Friedan (1921–2006), pathbreaking author of The Feminine Mystique, was powerful and polarizing.Join us with Rachel Shteir, author of the new Jewish Lives biography Betty Friedan: Magnificent Disrupter, as we explore the life of the author and activist acclaimed as the mother of second-wave feminism.

Gershom Scholem (1897–1982) was one of the most influential figures in the field of Jewish Studies.Join us with historian David Biale, author of the Jewish Lives biography Gershom Scholem: Master of the Kabbalah, as we examine the life of the thinker who pioneered the study of Jewish mysticism and profoundly influenced the Zionist movement.

Both thoroughly German and unabashedly Jewish, Walther Rathenau (1867–1922) served in the exalted position of foreign minister in the early days of the Weimar Republic.His achievement was unprecedented—no Jew in Germany had ever attained such high political rank. But Rathenau’s success was marked by tragedy: within months he was assassinated by right-wing extremists seeking to destroy the newly formed Republic.Join us with esteemed historian Shulamit Volkov as we illuminate the complex social and psychological milieu of German Jewry in the period before Hitler’s rise to power.

Tradition has it that King Solomon knew everything there was to know—the mysteries of nature, of love, of God himself—but what do we know about him?Join us with esteemed biblical scholar Steven Weitzman as we reexamine Solomon's story and its surprising influence in shaping Western culture in Solomon: The Lure of Wisdom. We also explore what Solomon's life, wisdom, and writings have come to mean for Jews, Christians, and Muslims over the past two thousand years. 

Elie Wiesel is the author of the seminal Holocaust memoir Night and recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize.Join us with Joseph Berger, author of the new Jewish Lives biography Elie Wiesel: Confronting the Silence, as we explore how a teenage survivor from a Hasidic family became the eloquent embodiment of Holocaust remembrance and of forceful opposition to indifference. 

Mel Brooks, born Melvin Kaminsky in Brooklyn in 1926, is one of the great comic voices of the twentieth centuryJoin us with Jeremy Dauber, author of the new Jewish Lives biography Mel Brooks: Disobedient Jew, as we explore how Brooks’s American Jewish humor went from being solely for niche audiences to an essential part of the American mainstream, paving the way for generations of Jewish (and other) comedians to come. 

Born Jerome Wilson Rabinowitz, Jerome Robbins (1918–1998) was a master choreographer, dancer, and stage director, most famous for his stage productions of West Side Story, Peter Pan, and Fiddler on the Roof.Join us with Wendy Lesser, author of the Jewish Lives biography Jerome Robbins: A Life in Dance, as we explore Robbins’s life through his major dances in ballet, Broadway, and film.Music in this episode: Claude Debussy - Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun

The Warner Brothers—Harry, Albert, Sam, and Jack—arrived in America as unschooled Jewish immigrants, yet they founded a movie studio that became the smartest, toughest, and most radical in all of Hollywood.Join us with celebrated film critic David Thomson, author of Warner Bros.: The Making of an American Movie Studio, as we explore how four immigrant brothers transformed themselves into the moguls and masters of American fantasy.

Born Lev Davidovich Bronstein in southern Ukraine, Leon Trotsky (1879-1940) was a revolutionary figure who led an upheaval that helped define the contours of twentieth-century politics.Join us with Joshua Rubenstein, author of the Jewish Lives biography Leon Trotsky: A Revolutionary’s Life, as we uncover the brilliant and brilliantly flawed man who was both a world-class intellectual and a man capable of the most narrow-minded ideological dogmatism.

Most famous for All My Sons, Death of a Salesman, and The Crucible, Arthur Miller (1915–2005) was a playwright who almost single-handedly propelled twentieth-century American theater into a new level of cultural sophistication.Join us with distinguished theater critic John Lahr, author of the new Jewish Lives biography Arthur Miller: American Witness, as we explore the fault lines of Miller’s life—his family, the Great Depression, the rise of fascism, Elia Kazan and the House Committee on Un-American Activities, Marilyn Monroe, and the rise and fall of Miller’s role as a public intellectual.

Said to be the inspiration for Ian Fleming’s iconic James Bond character, Sidney Reilly (c. 1873–1925) is one of the most colorful and best–known spies of the 20th century.Join us with historian Benny Morris, author of the new Jewish Lives biography Sidney Reilly: Master Spy, as we sift through the reality and the myth of Reilly’s life and uncover a fascinating portrait of one of the most intriguing figures from the golden age of spies. 

The Book of Ruth offers a vibrant portrait of a foreigner who became the founding mother of the Davidic dynasty.Join us with Ilana Pardes, author of the new Jewish Lives biography Ruth: A Migrant’s Tale, as we explore the ever-changing perspectives on Ruth’s foreignness beginning in the Hebrew bible and rabbinic literature through Zionism and the modern world. 

Alfred Stieglitz (1864–1946) was an enormously influential photographer and champion of other artists.Join us with Phyllis Rose, acclaimed critic, biographer, and author of Alfred Stieglitz: Taking Pictures, Making Painters, as we explore Stieglitz’s role as a revolutionary force in the history of American art.