2015-16 Events

"Kafka and the Law" Conference
April 4-5, 2016
University at Buffalo

The law is a theme that pervades the work of Franz Kafka as a whole, from his early writings, such as “The Judgment,” through The Trial, to later works such as The Castle and the neglected piece “The Animal in the Synagogue.”

Speaker: James McLachlan
Date: March 24, 2016
Time: 2pm
Location: 108 Baldy Hall

James McLachlan is a Professor of Philosophy at Western Carolina University. He earned a PhD from the Centre for the study of religion at the University of Toronto and did graduate work at Indiana University, Universite de Paris, and Pennsylvania State University.

November 19, 2015
University at Buffalo

One of the most revolutionary figures in the Jewish tradition is the philosopher and legal scholar, Moses Maimonides (1138-1204). Maimonides changed the ways Jews understand their religion through his major theological work, the Guide of the Perplexed and his legal code, the Mishneh Torah, so much so that everyone after Maimonides was influenced by him, even his critical opponents. As the eminent Maimonides scholar Isadore Twersky observed, “although religious rationalism did not begin with Maimonides, it came to be totally identified with him. Protagonists and antagonists would draw the lines of their positions in relation to Maimonides. To a great extent, subsequent Jewish intellectual history may be seen as a debate concerning the wisdom and effectiveness of the Maimonidean position.”

One would think that eight hundred years after his death, scholars would have completed the study of his writings, but scholars still actively debate Maimonides’ ideas and deliberate over the extent to which they support the Maimonidean project.

The last two years have witnessed many new books published on Maimonides’ thought by leading academic scholars in the United States, Canada and Israel. This conference seeks to bring these scholars together for the first time to discuss their works, allowing them to converse with each other over the lasting significance of Maimonides’ writings.

Speakers and Topics

• Moshe Halbertal - “Emotion and the Law: Maimonides’ Conception of Mourning”
• Kenneth Hart Green – “Why Maimonides Was Controversial”
• Lawrence Kaplan – “Love and Fear of God in the Writings of Maimonides According to Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik”
• James Diamond – “Nahmanides vs Maimonides on Memory and The Shaping of Jewish Identity”

Evening panel at Temple Beth Tzedek on the theme: “Why Read Maimonides Today”

All four professors will give brief presentations and answer questions from the audience.  Their books will be available for purchase, thanks to Talking Leaves Books. The authors will be signing their books as well.

Recent Books on Maimonides:

• James Diamond, Maimonides and the Shaping of the Jewish Canon. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2014.
• Moshe Halbertal, Maimonides: Life and Thought. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2013.
• Kenneth Hart Green, Leo Strauss and the Rediscovery of Maimonides and Leo Strauss on Maimonides: The Complete Writings, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2013.
• Lawrence Kaplan, Maimonides, Between Philosophy and Halakhah: Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik’s Lectures on the ‘Guide of the Perplexed’. Urim Publications, 2013.

About the Speakers

Moshe Halbertal is the Gruss Professor at NYU School of Law and a professor of Jewish thought and philosophy at Hebrew University. He received his Ph.D. from Hebrew University in 1989, and from 1988-92 he was a fellow at the Society of Fellows at Harvard University. Moshe Halbertal has also served as a visiting professor at Harvard Law School, and at the University of Pennsylvania Law School. He is the author of the books Idolatry (co-authored with Avishai Margalit), and People of the Book: Canon, Meaning, and Authority, both published by Harvard University Press, and of Concealment and Revelation published by Princeton University Press. He has also authored two books, Interpretative Revolutions in the Making, and Between Torah and Wisdom: R Menachem ha-Meiri and The Maimonidean Halakhists in Provence, both published in Hebrew by Magnes Press. His most recent books are By Way of Truth: Nachmanides and the Creation of Tradition, published by the Shalom Hartman Institute and Maimonides: Life and Thought published by Princeton University Press .

Lawrence J. Kaplan received his PhD from Harvard University and his rabbinical ordination from Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Theological Seminary. He has taught Rabbinics and Jewish Philosophy in the Department of Jewish Studies of McGill University since 1972. In the spring of 2004 he held a Harry Starr Fellowship at the Center for Jewish Studies of Harvard. He is probably best known for his scholarship on and translation of the works of “the Rav,” Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik. He translated from the Hebrew Rabbi Soloveitchik’s classic monograph Halakhic Man (Jewish Publication Society, 1983), as well as his essay “Kol Dodi Dofek.” His overview of the thought of Rabbi Soloveitchik appeared in the Cambridge Companion to Modern Jewish Philosophy.

Kenneth Hart Green teaches Jewish Studies in the Department for the Study of Religion and the Centre for Jewish Studies at the University of Toronto. He received his Ph.D. in the Department of Near Eastern and Judaic Studies at Brandeis University. He has published books and articles which explore the thought of Judah Halevi, Moses Maimonides, Benedict Spinoza, Moses Mendelssohn, Franz Rosenzweig, Leo Strauss, Gershom Scholem, and Emil Fackenheim. His most recent books are Leo Strauss, On Maimonides: The Complete Writings, and Leo Strauss and the Rediscovery of Maimonides. His next book is forthcoming with Cambridge University Press entitled Emil Fackenheim’s Search of Revelation: Divine Presence and Diabolical History. He is also presently working on a manuscript with the tentative title: What Moses Saw: Maimonidean Meditations, or On the Torah as a Speculative Teaching.

James A. Diamond holds the Joseph & Wolf Lebovic Chair of Jewish Studies at the University of Waterloo. He earned an LLB from Osgoode Hall Law School; an LLM in International Legal Studies at New York University School of Law and, while practicing civil litigation, an MA and PhD in Medieval Jewish Thought from University of Toronto. He was the international director of the Friedberg Genizah Project. His books, Maimonides and the Hermeneutics of Concealment, and Converts, Heretics, and Lepers: Maimonides and the Outsider, garnered Canadian Jewish book awards; the latter a Jordan Schnitzer Notable Selection. He has published widely on Jewish thought from the Bible to Maimonides to R. Kook. His most recent book is Maimonides and the Shaping of the Jewish Canon published by Cambridge University Press.

This conference has been organized by Prof. Alex Green, IJTH, and is sponsored by the Institute of Jewish Thought and Heritage, and the Humanities Institute, of the University at Buffalo. It is free and open to the public. We welcome you to attend.

April 30, 2015

Organized by Prof. Alex Green, Jewish Studies majors and minors and other interested UB students gathered in 708 Clemens Hall for dinner and conversation, and to learn about Jewish Studies courses and activities at UB.