There are three different ways to become a saint, each indicating something different about the individual involved. If the purpose of reading saints’ lives is to be inspired to live well and become a better person, some of these paths are more applicable to a modern context (at least in America) than others. First, there…
Asceticism and hermitism have fascinated me for a long time, (which might surprise those who know me as a convivial, gregarious person who loves an audience). Judaism’s focus on community are largely incompatible with such practices, so I’m not sure where the interest comes from, but I think it’s a combination of feeling daunted by…
Over the course of a lifetime we come to “know” many things that we haven’t personally studied, about history, science, art, and a plethora of subjects. At best, however, our knowledge is usually informed by the most popular (and hopefully most accurate?) view of the subject at the time that we happened to study or…
I am a lawyer by training. In the U.S., this implies a certain belief in (or at least acceptance of) the value of precedent: that evaluations of disputes (and even of the meaning of the text of laws) should take into consideration how previous courts have interpreted those same texts, or held in related disputes.…
For many years, Google’s unofficial mantra was, reportedly, “Don’t be evil.” This sounds simple, and is a great aspiration, but is a) too low a bar (note the double negative, it’s not “be good”), and b) presumes that a bunch of computer scientists and business leaders are also fairly sophisticated philosophers who have a robust…
Who are our forefathers? Why do we care? At one level, all identity/lineage, whether family, religious, or national is in pursuit of the same validation, that we know/have a place in the world, that we are part of a bigger story that runs deeper than the shallow activities that fill much of our days. We…
I started out thinking I’d be an econ major in undergrad. The positivity (v. normativity) of “rational actor” analysis appealed to me, and it felt like a way to employ my talents for quantitative thinking for something more than simple math problems. I took Microeconomics with Prof. Robert H. Frank at Cornell, and his “economic…
I’m coming to appreciate the importance of humility. I consider myself a pretty smart/knowledgeable guy about a lot of different topics; prioritizing breadth of education and learning has been a central element of my self-identity for a long time. As a new parent, though, I’ve been thinking a lot about how much I don’t know…
My grandfather passed away last week, at the age of 92. He had a strong Jewish education (Yeshiva Flatbush), led our family’s Passover seders when we visited, and appreciated the pulls of identity. He married an Irish Catholic before she converted to Judaism, and celebrated both the Irish and Jewish sides of his children’s heritage.…
If you’re like me, there are books that you enjoy having on your shelf because other people may think you’re smart/deep for having read them, and others that you don’t read in public (or hide the titles if you do) because they don’t fit with the image you try to project. Reformation by Diarmaid MacCulloch…
Jacob K. Lehman 