At the JFN 2019 International Conference in San Francisco, Yossi Klein Halevi, a leading Israeli writer and analyst, and co-director of Shalom Hartman Institute’s Muslim Leadership Initiative, discussed the need of the Jewish people to find in its national movement a “third way” between the impulses toward tribalism/ethnocentrism or a multicultural paradigm that demands people shed their particular identities. Rabbi Noa Kushner, Founder of The Kitchen, an independent religious community in San Franciso, spoke to the possibility of another identity and group-building rubric, one centered on Jewish experience, mission and commitment. How do Jews in Israel and the Diaspora alike navigate the perplexity and complexity of these issues as the Jewish people navigate painful differences and seek a common story, a common purpose, and a common identity?

eJewish Philanthropy, May 25, 2016

According to cognitive scientist Lera Boroditzky, you and I don’t see the color “baby blue” in the same way. That’s not because we have different eyes, but because we have different tongues. Mother tongues, that is. You see, language shapes perception.

Sometimes we need to spawn many new organizations, and sometimes we need intelligent birth control.

eJewish Philanthropy, August 10, 2014