New Books in Jewish Studies

• Susan Weingarten, "Ancient Jewish Food in its Geographical and Cultural Contexts: What’s Cooking in the Talmuds?" (Taylor & Francis, 2025

  Ancient Jewish Food in its Geographical and Cultural Contexts: What’s Cooking in the Talmuds? (Taylor & Francis, 2025) is the first in-depth study of food in talmudic literature in its geographical and cultural contexts. It demonstrates the sharing of foods and foodways between Jews and their non-Jewish neighbours in the Near East in Late Antiquity. Using both ancient written sources and archaeological evidence, this book sets the foods of the Mishnah and Palestinian Talmud in their Graeco-Roman context, and the foods of the Babylonian Talmud and the ge’onim in their Persian and Arab contexts. It explores practices of food preparation and their contribution to the ancient diet, as well as analysing the relationships between food, status and culture. The rabbinical authors of talmudic literature were more concerned with everyday food than were aristocratic Classical authors; by examining both talmudic sources and archaeological finds, this book paints a new picture of the diet, lifestyle and culture of ordinary people. Ancient Jewish Food in Its Geographical and Cultural Contexts will interest Food Historians as well as students and scholars of Jewish Studies, particularly the period of the Mishnah and Talmud, as well as those dealing with the wider social and cultural history of the Ancient Near East. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/jewish-studies

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• Yael Leibowitz, "Ezra-Nehemiah: Retrograde Revolution" (Maggid, 2025)

  Ezra-Nehemiah: Retrograde Revolution (Maggid, 2025) takes its readers on a literary tour of an era in which cohesiveness between Jews in Israel and the Diaspora is being tested, the parameters of Jewish identity are being re-assessed, political tact is being learned by necessity, and biblical literacy is at long last becoming the centerpiece of the Jewish community.  Tune in as we hear from Yael Leibowitz about her recent Maggid commentary on Ezra-Nehemiah! Yael Leibowitz is an Israeli educator and a Matan Kitvuni Fellow. She holds a Master’s degree in Judaic Studies from Columbia University and currently teaches at Matan Women’s Institute for Torah Learning and MIdreshet Lindenbaum College for Women. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/jewish-studies

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• Jack Wertheimer, "Jewish Giving: Philanthropy and the Shaping of American Jewish Life" (NYU Press, 2025)

  The American Jewish philanthropic enterprise is unparalleled in scope, dynamism, and the diversity of funders and the causes they support. Yet even as Jewish giving has been largely successful in responding with alacrity to emergencies, it has been subjected to severe criticism. What once was regarded as a point of pride has become the object of scorn and dismissal, with skepticism--if not harsh criticism--about its work rife both within and outside Jewish communal circles. Based on 320 interviews with professionals at Jewish not-for-profits across the United States, principals of foundations and their top staff personnel, and also tax filings of major foundations, Jewish Giving: Philanthropy and the Shaping of American Jewish Life (NYU Press, 2025) provides readers with fresh perspectives to evaluate the efforts of Jewish donors, large and small. The book traces the evolution of Jewish giving from the colonial era to the present, charting the changing profile of those who give to Jewish causes and what funders have aimed to achieve through their largesse. It makes the case that philanthropy serves as a prism through which broader themes in communal life are illuminated. As society or politics change, the priorities of charitable giving adjust in response. These changes in targeted funding can help to sharpen our understanding of demographic and social patterns. Devoting much attention to twenty-first century developments in contemporary Jewish giving, the book pays special attention to the changing landscape of donors who are remaking Jewish philanthropy, including women, Orthodox Jews, Sephardi givers, and young funders. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/jewish-studies

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• YIVO Archives and Library, "100 Objects from the Collections of the YIVO Institute for Jewish Research" (YIVO, 2025)

  Delve into Jewish history through 100 unique objects from the YIVO Archives and Library with 100 Objects from the Collections of the YIVO Institute for Jewish Research (2025). This gorgeously-illustrated coffee table book contains images and essays which represent modern Jewish history and culture through YIVO's one hundred years of collecting. The volume highlights a variety of manuscripts, photographs, ritual objects, and other ephemera. ּBook can be purchased here Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/jewish-studies

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• Dainy Bernstein, "Artifacts of Orthodox Jewish Childhoods" (Ben Yehuda Press, 2022)

  The culture of mainstream American childhood is vastly different than the culture of Orthodox Jewish childhood - which is itself a rich and varied landscape of texts, music, toys, and more, with nuanced shadings from one sect of Orthodox Judaism to the next. In Artifacts of Orthodox Jewish Childhoods: Personal and Critical Essays (Ben Yehuda Press, 2022), Dainy Bernstein has collected a treasury of essays examining the artifacts of Orthodox Jewish childhood and how they influence a child's developing view of the wider world - and their inner world. Interviewees: Dainy Bernstein holds a PhD in English and a Certificate in Medieval Studies from the CUNY Graduate Center and teaches college composition, medieval literature, and children's and Young Adult literature at Lehman College, CUNY. Goldie Gross earned a bachelor’s degree in art and business from Baruch College and earned a master’s degree in the history of art and archeology at the Institute of Fine Arts at New York University Yehudis Keller earned a BA in psychology and fine arts from Brooklyn College and is pursuing a doctorate in clinical psychology at Case Western Reserve University. Hannah Lebovits is an assistant professor of public affairs at the University of Texas-Arlington Miriam Moster is a doctoral student in sociology at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York Schneur Zalman Newfield is an Assistant Professor of Sociology at Borough of Manhattan Community College, City University of New York, and the author of Degrees of Separation: Identity Formation While Leaving Ultra-Orthodox Judaism (Temple University Press, 2020). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/jewish-studies

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