Edah’s Fourth Biennial International Conference
THE CHALLENGES. THE OPPORTUNITIES.
Diversity, Change, Meaning, Justice
Sunday, February 20, 2005
9:00 – 9:50 AM TEXT STUDY:
Room 433 Isaac Encounters Ishmael: A Jewish Perspective on Islam
Rabbi Chaim Seidler-Feller
Room 425 "The Gates of Weeping are Not Closed": Berachot 5b
Dr. Gerald Cromer
Room 423 Brother or Other: Orthodox Attitudes Towards Non-Observant Jews
Dr. Adam Ferziger
Room 428 Benefiting From Comparative Study of Religious Ritual: T’vilah and Baptism
Marcie Lenk
Room 424 Re-reading Esav in the Talmud: Religious Dialogue with the Non-Jewish World
Rabbi Francis Nataf
Room 533 Independent-Minded Students: Talmudic Models for the Seder Night
Ilana Fodiman Silverman
Room 525 The Role and Power of Kavannah and Lishmah in Talmudic Texts
Rabbi Jay Miller
Room
523 Constructing a Halachic Ethos:
Obligation vs Right in Perek Elu Metziot
Rabbi David
Bigman
Room
528 Coping with Challenges: A
Response to Human Suffering
Rabbi Avi Weiss
10:00 – 11:15 AM Plenary # 1 – Lowenstein Auditorium
Who are We? Where Are We? Where Are We Headed?
Dr. Sam Heilman
Dr. Jacob Ukeles
Rabbi Saul J. Berman
11:30 – 12:45 PM SESSION I:
(11:30 – 12:45 PM Lunch #1 in Dining Room or Session Rooms)
Room 433 Madonna and Kabbalah: What Can We Learn From the Headlines?
Rabbi Dr. Alan Brill
Room 425 Confronting Intermarriage in Communities and Families
Dr. Sylvia Barack Fishman
Rabbi Shmuel Herzfeld
Room 623 Has the Mix of Religion and Politics Corrupted the Vision of Religious Zionism?
Rabbi Dr. Daniel Tropper
Moshe Tur-Paz
Room 428 Military Ethics in Fighting Terror
Dr. Asa Kasher
Room 424 Seeing the Spiritual in Material Objects
Tobi Kahn
Mierle Ukeles
Room 624 The Perception of Antagonism: Media Coverage of the Orthodox Community
Gary Rosenblatt
Ami Eden
Room 533 Working and Learning with Priests and Imams
Rabbi Dr. B. Barry Levy
Rabbi Dr. Michael Chernick
Room
525 Changing Gender Roles in Society
and Their Impact on the Modern Orthodox Family
Dr. Gila Leiter
Naomi Mark
Room 523 Modern Orthodox Political Values and our Prayers for the Government
Rabbi Benjamin Samuels
Rabbi Aryeh Spero
Room 527 Shifts in the Modern Orthodox/Charedi Divide
Rabbi Francis Nataf
Dr. Steve Bayme
Room 427 Women in Community Leadership Roles
Rabbi Dr. Aryeh Frimer
Room 528 Are Day Schools Preparing Our Children for the Real World?
Rabbi Charles Sheer
Rabbi Jeffrey Kobrin
Room 524 Toward a Halachic Theory of Truth Telling in Speech and Sexuality
Rabbi Dr. Yitz Greenberg
Room 633 The Ethics of Prioritizing Rescue: Jewish Leadership During the Holocaust
Dr. Efraim Zuroff
Room 625 Of Wigs and Restaurants: Re-Encountering Avoda Zara in the 21st Century
Rabbi Dr. Jeffrey Woolf
Room 423 Modern Orthodoxy – The 4th Century Version
Rabbi Dr. Yaakov Elman
Room 628 Rabbinic Authority vs. Personal Autonomy: Asking A She’elah vs Deciding for Yourself
Rabbi Dov Linzer
Rabbi Robert
Klapper
1:00 – 2:15 PM SESSION II
(1:00 – 2:15 Lunch #2 in Dining Room or Session Rooms)
Room 433 Modern Biblical Scholarship and Orthodoxy
Rabbi Menachem Leibtag
Eric Grossman
Room 427 Creating Bridges Across the Jewish Divide
Rabbi David Kalb
Room
425 A New Orthodox
Rabbinate: Theory and Practice
Dr. Adam Ferziger
Rabbi Dov Linzer
Room 423 Honoring Parents: Kaddish and Memory
Sam Freedman
Ari Goldman
Room
428 Can
Dr. Daniel Statman
Rabbi Dr. Jeffrey Woolf
Room 424 The “Other” As Amalek in Orthodox Life
Dr. Gerald Cromer
Dr. Steven Bayme
Room
533 Pre-Nuptial Agreements as
Solution to the Agunah Problem in the
Rabbi Michael Broyde
Rachel Levmore
Room 525 Religious Dimensions of the Israeli- Palestinian Conflict
Dr. Shmuel Sandler
Rabbi Dr. Marc Gopin
Room 523 Halacha and Emotions in Organ Donation
Nechama Glogower
Blu Greenberg
Robert Berman
Room 528 Whither Who Goest? Modern Orthodoxy and Conversion
Dr. Sylvia Barack Fishman
Rabbi Yair Silverman
Room 524 The Price of Science Without Moral Constraints: German & US Medicine Before DNA & Now
Dr. Robert Pollack
Room 633 "Silly but
Dangerous": The Slippery Slope of Rabbinic Responses/Responsa to Feminism
Dr.
Room 625 Rav Soloveitchik and Non-Orthodox Denominations
Rabbi Seth Farber
Room 627 Orthodox Shuls Serving the non-Orthodox: Should They, Can They?
Rabbi Barry Gelman
Fran Lunzer Kritz
Room 623 The Use and Abuse of the Holocaust in North American and Israeli Culture
Dr. Efraim Zuroff
Dr. Gilbert Kahn
Room 527 Accent Wars in Synagogues and Schools: Linguistic and Halachic Aspects of Pronouncing Loshon Kodesh
Dr. Lewis Glinert
Room 628 From Prayer to Avodah: To Improve Tefillah in Modern Orthodox Synagogues
Rabbi Nathaniel Helfgot
Ilana Fodiman
Silverman
Room 624 Kevod HaBeriyot as A Factor In Halachic Decision Making
Rabbi Ezra Labaton: In the Writings of Hacham Ovadia Yosef
Rabbi Dr. Daniel Sperber: With Regard to Women
2:30 – 3:45 PM SESSION III
Room 433 The Performance of Mitzvot in a World Emptied of Religious Meaning
Rabbi Dr. Tsvi Blanchard
Dr. Daniel Statman
Room 425 Does Israeli Orthodoxy Share in Democratic Values?
Dr. Shmuel Sandler
Dr. Amnon Shapira
Room 423 The Modern Orthodox in Haredi Garb: Are We All Headed to the Same Intellectual Haberdasher?
Rabbi Dr. B Barry Levy
Rabbi Dr. Alan Brill
Room 428 Conversion as a Personal and as a National Issue
Rabbi Dr. Seth Farber
Rabbi Robert Klapper
Lowenstein Addressing Sexual Abuse in the Orthodox Community
Rabbi Mark Dratch
Dr. Brian Leggiere
Room 424 Orthodox Responses to the Rise of Reform: What Can we Learn?
Dr. Jay Berkovitz
Rabbi Adam Mintz
Room 533 Torah and Economic Justice: Revitalizing a Lost Connection
Rabbi Micha Odenheimer
Dr. Moses Pava
Room 525 Substance Abuse in Yeshiva High Schools
Rabbi Jack Beiler
Rabbi Scot Berman
Room 523 Our Obligations To Ourselves and the World
Linda Levi Tarlow
Dr. Rick Hodes
Room 528 Leaders for Klal Yisrael in a Post Denominational Era
Rabbi Dr. Naftali Rothenberg
Rabbi Nathaniel Helfgot
Room 524 Judaism, Idolatry and our Gentile Neighbors
Dr. Asa Kasher
Rabbi Dr. Eugene Korn
Room
633 When Our Children Choose A Different Path: A Workshop
Chana
Sperber
Room 427 Is Government Funding for Day Schools a Boon or a Threat to Jewish Survival?
Cooki Levy
Yossi Prager
Room 625 Understanding “Honor”: Kevod Ha Tzibbur and Kevod HaBeriyot Revisited
Rabbi Dr. Aryeh Frimer
Room 623 Halachic Challenges for Orthodox Lawyers
Rabbi Michael Broyde
Rabbi Stephen Friedman
Room 527 A New Look at Yirat Shamayim
Dr. Jacob Joshua Ross
Room 628 The Legal Thought of Rabbi Hershel Schachter
Rabbi Alan J.
Yuter
Room
624 Tolerance & Unity: The
Challenge of Tribalism
Rabbi Binny Freedman
4:00 – 5:00 PM SESSION IV TEXTS AND TOPICS
Room 433 “Tikkun Olam” – A Biblical Theme or A Mitzvah?
Rabbi Menachem Leibtag
Room 425 The Biblical Tendency to Limit and Mitigate War
Dr. Amnon Shapira (Note: This session will be in Hebrew)
Room
427 God Post-9/11: Theology, Politics
and the
Rabbi Eliyahu Stern
Room 423 What Happened to Modern Orthodoxy When it went to the Army?
Moshe Tur-Paz
Room 428 Law of Love: The Ethical and Moral Basis of Halacha
Rabbi Dr. Daniel Sperber
Room 424 Rejection or Reconstruction: Reb Nachman and the Haskala
Rabbi David Bigman
Room 533 Can Peace be Made Without Religious Leaders?
Rabbi Dr. Marc Gopin
Room 525 Maoist Rebels and Ethiopian tribes: A Jewish Journey to the Heart of Globalization
Rabbi Micha Odenheimer
Room 523 Jewish
Attitudes to Divorce: A Thoughtful Interpretation of the Sources
Rachel Levmore
Room 528 Holiness Even in Heresy: The “Other” in the Thought of Rav Kook
Rabbi Bob Carroll
Room 524 The Limits of Halachic Diversity in Issues of Personal Status
Rabbi Rod Glogower
Room 633 Amalek-Absolute or Relative Evil:
"The Descendants of Haman Studied Torah
in Bnei Brak" (Sanhedrin 96b)
Rabbi Yair Silverman
Room 625 The Use and Misuse of Midrashic Sources in Halacha and Hashkafa
Rabbi Charles Sheer
Room 623 The Authority of Gedolim:
Preliminary Examination of R. Soloveitchik and
His Circle
Rabbi Shalom Carmy
Room 628 Women, Keriah and Aliyot to the Torah
Rabbi Dr. Ephraim Bezalel HaLivni
Room 624 The Crisis of Halachic Authority
Rabbi Dr. Daniel
Tropper
Room 527 Case Studies in Ethical Dilemmas of Jewish Students
Dr. Moses Pava
5:15 – 5:30 PM Mincha – Lowenstein Auditorium
5:35 – 6:35 PM Closing
Plenary – Lowenstein Auditorium
Religiously Motivated Disobedience of Military Orders in a Democratic Society: Israeli Voices
Rabbi Dr. Naftali Rothenberg
Rabbi Dr. Shlomo Riskin
6:40 – 6:50 PM Maariv