Join us for a stimulating conversation between two Jewish public intellectuals celebrating the publication of The Secret That Is Not a Secret by Rabbi Dr. Jay Michaelson, winner of the National Jewish Book Award, as well as the imminent publication of Professor Noah Feldman's expansive new work of Jewish philosophical theology, To Be a Jew Today.
Dr. Michaelson's first book of fiction, The Secret That Is Not a Secret, invites readers into a world infused with heretical mysticism, queer eros, and magic, as its characters push against the boundaries of normative Judaism — boundaries that are also investigated in Professor Feldman's upcoming work.
How do Jewish imagination, theology, and normativity function today, when inherited conceptions of Jewish identity and meaning are challenged from without and within? What is the place of theological poetic imagination in a time of crisis? We invite you to a free-ranging conversation between two longtime friends who find themselves at surprising new intersections.
Booksales of The Secret That is not A Secret will be available onsite at The Vilna.To Be a Jew Today will be released on March 5, 2024.
Brought to you in partnership with the Public Fellows program of American Jewish University.
“This book is mesmerizing and profound. I was already a fan of Jay Michaelson’s nonfiction, but this book brings his unique theological and spiritual perspectives alive on an earthy, human level. This is a book that will make you think and feel.”
Jay Michaelson is the author of ten books, most recently The Secret That is Not a Secret. Jay’s previous book, The Heresy of Jacob Frank: From Jewish Messianism to Esoteric Myth, won the 2022 National Jewish Book Award for scholarship.
As a journalist, Jay regularly appears on CNN and in Rolling Stone, The Daily Beast, The Forward, and other publications, and won the 2023 New York Society for Professional Journalists Award for Opinion Writing. For ten years, he worked as an LGBTQ activist, and is the author of the bestselling God vs. Gay? The Religious Case for Equality. Jay is also a meditation teacher in Buddhist and Jewish traditions, and serves on the leadership team of the New York Insight Meditation Center.
Dr. Michaelson a fellow at American Jewish University and a field scholar at the Emory Center for Psychedelics and Spirituality. He holds a PhD in Jewish Thought from Hebrew University, a JD from Yale Law School, and nondenominational rabbinic ordination. He lives outside New York City.
Noah Feldman is Felix Frankfurter Professor of Law, Chairman of the Society of Fellows, and founding director of the Julis-Rabinowitz Program on Jewish and Israeli Law, all at Harvard University. He specializes in constitutional studies, with particular emphasis on power and ethics, design of innovative governance solutions, law and religion, and the history of legal ideas.
A policy & public affairs columnist for Bloomberg Opinion, Feldman also writes for The New York Review of Books and was a contributing writer for the New York Times Magazine for nearly a decade. He hosts the Deep Background podcast, an interview show that explores the historical, scientific, legal and cultural context behind the biggest stories in the news.
Through his consultancy, Ethical Compass, Feldman advises clients like Facebook & eBay on how to improve ethical decision-making by creating and implementing new
governance solutions. In this capacity, he conceived and architected the Facebook Oversight Board, and continues to advise the company on ethics and governance issues.
Feldman is the author of 10 books, including his latest forthcoming title, To Be A Jew Today: A New Guide to God, Israel and the Jewish People (Farrar Straus and Giroux,
Spring 2024).