I have been investigating Wikipedia for more than three years, having talked to many Wikipedians about how the site’s mechanisms have created a self-sustaining system of left-wing and anti-Israel bias.

Something deep and tribal has touched more than a few Jews since Oct. 7. The massacre of that fateful day, followed by months of anti-Israel and antisemitic rage, has triggered among many Jews a sense of being under siege—a feeling that “it’s us against the world.”

We might call it a reconnection with our inner Jew.

What is going on in Gaza right now is not genocide, an easy, grievance-laden word to fall back on when facts are inconvenient. What is happening in Gaza is a war, and war can be hard for people to wrap their heads around, particularly young people who’ve never even vicariously experienced such a thing in their lifetimes.

The Science of Happiness had clearly piqued interest as indicated by the audience size, but I was still nervous. This was not my area of academic expertise and there was heightened sensitivity following the media attention over recent tragic events on campus. What were the students’ expectations? Talking about mental health seemed hazardous. Would I trigger adverse reactions simply by discussing these issues?

One of the unifying features of architectural styles before the twentieth century is the presence of ornament. We speak of architectural elements as ornamental inasmuch as they are shaped by aesthetic considerations rather than structural or functional ones… Since the Second World War, this has changed profoundly. For the first time in history, many high-status buildings have little or no ornament.

After the war, the Lithuanian yeshivas were located in free and independent states, where the Jews were equal citizens in many senses. There was no longer any reason for concern about going from Central Europe to Lithuania or Poland to study for a number of years in one of the famous yeshivas there. Indeed, in the late 1930s the reputation of these yeshivas spread throughout Europe, and religious authorities who knew the Lithuanian Torah world well encouraged young men from local Orthodox communities to go there to complete their studies.

Society gets a do-over. The rich and the poor are made equal again. The land rewilds. A new chapter begins. Perhaps the Torah isn’t actually asking us to create this utopia, but simply to imagine it.

To let it live within us.

To consider what it would be like if we let the land rest—

If we set each other, and ourselves, free.

And what were the people to do with all their free time during the seventh year? Less work meant more time for higher pursuits. Less involvement with earthiness allowed them to embrace heavenliness. If we are less busy with the material world, we can indulge in the spiritual.

For the children of Israel are servants to Me; they are My servants, whom I took out of the land of Egypt. I am the Lord, your God.

– Lev. 25:55

Bracha Goetz: We are not meant to be enslaved to other people… What we are meant to be is significantly bonded to God in awe and in love – with gratitude for our blessings.

Elliot Kukla (he/they) is a rabbi, author, and activist. Elliot has worked at the intersection of justice and spiritual care to those who are ill, dying and bereaved since 2007. They are currently on the faculty of SVARA, where they also direct the Collective Loss Adaptation Project (CLAP). Elliot joins Dan Libenson and Lex Rofeberg for a conversation about justice-based radical spiritual care, and what both the experience of chronic illness and the Jewish tradition offer our world as we contend with grief, loss, and the need for rest.

Sam Harris speaks with John Spencer about the reality of urban warfare and Israel’s conduct in the war in Gaza.

In this episode of “Top Story,” JNS editor-in-chief Jonathan Tobin is joined by Commentary magazine senior editor Seth Mandel to discuss the dangers inherent in woke ideologies like the diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) mantra that seems to have taken institutions of higher learning, journalism and so much else in America by storm.