Why is Jesus the source of fascination in modern Jewish thought? How has Christianity changed Jewish practice and how did Judaism shape the medieval imagination? We discovered the Jews who insisted on Jesus’ Jewish-ness, the movement to identify Jesus as an Aryan, and how an examination of the Virgin Mary can offer a glimpse into the links and catastrophic breaks between the Abrahamic faiths. Professors Susannah Heschel and Miri Rubin, two leading scholars in the field offered...

Why are words so important to so many Jews? Historian Fania Oz-Salzberger discusses Jews and Words, which she wrote together with her father, the celebrated Israeli novelist Amos Oz. They roam the gamut of Jewish history to explain the integral relationship of Jews and words. Their book traces a rich heritage of the spoken and written word from the Bible to today. Through a blend of storytelling, scholarship, conversation and argument it explores a “textline” that forms a l...

How was life for Jews in medieval England? Recent scholarship and a groundbreaking new translation of Hebrew poetry from Norwich shed light on a dark period of Anglo-Jewish history. Keiron Pim and Miri Rubin discuss the Jew Meir of Norwich and the writings of a monk, Thomas of Monmouth, the first Christian narrative to link Jews to child murder. Into the Light the Medieva...

In her latest book Miri Rubin illuminates life in European towns and cities for both the settled population and the newcomers who joined them between 1000 and 1500 AD. Some city-states enjoyed considerable autonomy and invited groups from afar, as well as professionals such as physicians, notaries and judges to settle and help produce good urban living. But this benign cycle began to break down after regular occurrences of the plague from 1350. She will be in conversation wit...

Dubbed ‘totally fascinating, tragic and unforgettable’ by Simon Sebag Montefiore, Licoricia of Winchester, a 13th century Jewish financier, was the most important Jewish woman in medieval England. In turn royal favourite, widow, potentate and prisoner, her extraordinary life took place against a backdrop of civil war, bad government and the ever-present and terrifying spectre of antisemitism. Author Rebecca Abrams is in conversation with renowned professor of m...