My research is focused on the interpretations of biblical texts in the contexts of ancient culture, languages, and history.
The Third Book of Enoch (Hebrew Enoch), or "The Book of Palaces," is an ancient Jewish mystical composition. How ancient? Around the sixth century CE. The Third Book of Enoch is quite different from 1 Enoch and 2 Enoch. It does not sound like Second Temple Era Jewish...
The Tosefta is a rabbinic text often unfamiliar to people. There is a perfectly good explanation why. When the text of Mishna, the Jewish oral traditions, was being compiled into writing by Yehudah HaNassi (second century CE), some discussions were set aside and edited out. It's not that...
One of the world's foremost experts on the Dead Sea Scrolls provides an authoritative English translation of the two hundred longest and most important nonbiblical Dead Sea Scrolls found at Qumran. This book is also supplied with introductory information about the history, discovery, and publication of each manuscript....
One unique prayer is repeated multiple times daily in Jewish Prayer services besides the Shema (Deut 6:4-9). It's a prayer composed in Aramaic called Kaddish. In modern practice, it is never recited alone, and its ancient words seek to magnify and sanctify God's name corporately....
Torah says that Olah was to be brought to the entrance of the tent. Why? Because not every offering is automatically accepted. The priests carefully examined offerings at the entrance, and only then were they presented to God on the altar. Today, people rarely think that their worship can be...
Earlier, in 2023 and 2024, I crafted new translations of 1 Enoch and 2 Enoch. The book's archaic English versions are broadly available across the internet for free. Yet, my goal was to create modern and easy-to-read English texts for these classics. I received largely positive feedback from...
According to researchers of antiquity driving away bad luck, the evil eye, and, in short, envious people—this was one of the purposes of mosaics in Ancient Rome. You may know of amulets, incantations, but art and specific mosaics were also used to ward off evil. Ancient literary sources and...
Are you familiar with Tisha B'Av? On the Jewish calendar, it's a day of fasting and introspection for many reasons. Throughout history, this day has been a day of calamity for Israel as a people at large and for various Jewish communities. In this 45-minute teaching,...
Sometimes we get tired of fighting for just about everything in life. Moses was at the end of his life, well over a hundred, and yet he was still in a fight. In Numbers 31, Moses was told that he must exact vengeance for what Midian did to Israel, and...