THEATER and THEOLOGY

Rabbi Dr. Joshua Berman is a professor of Tanakh at Bar-Ilan University.  A graduate of Princeton University and of Yeshivat Har Etzion, Rabbi Berman is the author of many books including, Created Equal: How the Bible Broke with Ancient Political Thought (Oxford, 2008), which was a National Jewish Book Award Finalist in Scholarship, and Ani Maamin: Biblical Criticism, Historical Truth and the Thirteen Principles of Faith (Maggid). Most recently he has published a commentary on the book of Lamentations for Cambridge University Press. His articles on biblical theology and contemporary society have appeared in the pages of Mosaic Magazine and The Wall Street Journal.  Rabbi Dr. Berman served as a member of the International Advisory Board for the Museum of the Bible in Washington, D.C.​

Rabbi Berman observes, "A lot of good people believe that If we say the Tanach isn’t 100% factual, then we’re saying it’s fake news. And a lot of good people maintain that if we don’t believe the Tanach is 100% factual, then we’re fake Jews. But our sources paint a much more nuanced picture."

Dr. Rabbi Zev Farber is a research fellow at the Kogod Center of the Shalom Hartman Institute in Jerusalem and the Senior Editor of thetorah.com at Project TABS. He received a PhD in Jewish Studies and Hebrew Bible from Emory University and an MA from Hebrew University in Jewish History. He also received ordination, Yoreh Yoreh, and advanced ordination, Yadin Yadin from YCT Rabbinical School.

Farber is the author of Images of Joshua in the Bible and their Reception (De Gruyter, 2016) and the editor of Halakhic Realities: Collected Studies on Brain Death (Maggid, 2015) and Halakhic Realities: Collected Studies on Organ Donation (Maggid, 2017). He coedited Archaeology and History of Eighth-Century Judah (with Jacob Wright, SBL 2018) and The Making of Moses (with Mark Leuchter, pub. in HUCA 90 2019).

Dr. Yehuda Gellman is Professor Emeritus, Department of Philosophy, Ben-Gurion University. He specializes in the philosophy of religion and is the author of the entry on mysticism in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Gellman was a fellow at the Harvard Center for the Study of World Religions and was the Alvin Plantinga Fellow at the Center for the Philosophy of Religion, Notre Dame University. He is a past senior fellow at the Hartman Institute, Jerusalem. Gellman edits a series in Philosophy of Religion and World Religions for Brill.

​

Gellman is the author of numerous books, including, Abraham! Abraham! Kierkegaard and the Hasidim on the Binding of Isaac (Ashgate Publishers, London), God's Kindness Has Overwhelmed Us, A Contemporary Doctrine of the Jews as God’s Chosen People (Academic Studies Press), and This Was from God, A Contemporary Theology of Torah and History (Academic Studies Press). 
 

​

​

​

Yael Leibowitz is currently a fellow of the Matan Women’s Institute for Torah Learning's kitvuni program, with a forthcoming book on Ezra-Nehemiah. She also teaches at Matan and is a frequent lecturer in North America and Europe. Yael has her Master’s degree in Judaic Studies from Columbia University. Prior to making Aliyah, Yael taught Tanakh at the Upper School of Ramaz, and then went on to join the Judaic Studies faculty at Yeshiva University’s Stern College for Women. She has taught at the Drisha Institute for Jewish Education and served as a resident scholar at the Jewish Center of Manhattan.

Leibowitz believes that the more we understand about the historical, cultural and religious realities of the world that produced the Bible, the more we can begin to appreciate the timeless truths embedded in its books. One of her areas of interest is in researching and expanding the acceptance of divergent stories as simultaneously valid interpretations of history. For more of Yael’s writing visit: yaelleibowitz.com

Dr. Tamar Ross is Professor Emerita of Jewish Philosophy at Bar Ilan University. She has scholarly expertise in the thought of Abraham Isaac Kook, the modern Musar movement and the ideology of Mitnaggedism, and Judaism and gender. She is the author of books and articles on Jewish ethics and theology, contemporary issues in traditional Jewish thought, philosophy of halakha, and Orthodox Jewish feminism.

As a Modern Orthodox Jewish feminist, Ross develops the idea of cumulative revelation, that is, that we learn more as history evolves and societies develop and mature. She argues against the concept of Yeridat ha-dorot, the idea that knowledge of Torah diminishes with time. She also argues against approaches of more liberal movements which address perceived flaws by challenging the divinity and religious validity of sacred texts and traditions, arguing that such an approach only undermined the foundations of faith. In her book, Expanding the Palace of Torah, Dr. Ross develops the metaphor, originally an idea of Abraham Isaac Kook, for an approach seeking to address contemporary concerns by expanding rather than undermining religious tradition.