How to be a Jew … and a pragmatist

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Religion & Spirituality, Judaism, Society & Culture

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🗓️ 22 January 2025

⏱️ 36 minutes

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Summary

On the brink of the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem, Yohanan ben Zakkai made an astonishing decision. When faced with an opportunity to ask for anything from the new Roman emperor, Vespasian, rather than choosing to ask him to spare the Temple, Yochanan asked only for permission to start a school and preserve Jewish teachings in Yavneh, south of modern day Tel Aviv. Rabbi Marc Katz argues that this decision underscores how the Rabbis were the ultimate pragmatists in his new book Yochanan’s Gamble: Judaism’s Pragmatic Approach to Life. Is Katz right, and how should we consider pragmatism through a modern perspective?

Transcript

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0:00.0	Hello Shalom, what's up? How are you? Welcome to How to Be a Jew. This is Courtney
0:25.5	Hazelit, one of your hosts. This week's episode is an interview with Rabbi Mark Katz about his new book,
0:31.1	Yohran Scamble, Judaism's pragmatic approach to life. You're hearing me now, but you will not hear me
0:36.9	in the actual episode. This was
0:39.0	recorded at the height of the LA wildfire, so I wasn't able to be a part of it. Rabbi Diana
0:43.0	Fersko and Josh Krosh more than handled it well. So I hope you'll have a listen and then come back
0:48.4	at the end for our usual post-game wrap up.
1:10.7	So sometimes you don't know someone so well personally, but you connect with them intellectually, immediately.
1:13.1	And that's what's happened with me and our guest today about 15 or 20 years ago when I met
1:20.0	him in rabbinical school. And I've been following his career and his writings since then.
1:27.1	And he has just come out with a new book called
1:30.7	Yohanan's Gamble. And he is the rabbi of Temple Nairatamed in New Jersey. And he is also my friend
1:38.5	and colleague, Mark Katz, welcome to How to Be a Jew. Thank you. It's wonderful to be here. So what is Yohanan's gamble?
1:47.0	Let's start with that. Of course. So 2,000 years ago, the temple was about to be destroyed.
1:54.2	And while Rome was in the process of getting ready to invade Jerusalem, a rabbi whose name is
1:59.8	Johannan Benzhakai snuck out of Jerusalem
2:02.4	and ended up having an audience with the governor at the time, whose name is Vespasian.
2:07.9	And he meets him and basically says to Vespasian, hail Caesar.
2:12.9	Vespasian says to him, look, I'm the governor.
2:15.1	What are you talking about?
2:16.6	And this, which becomes the founding
2:18.5	myth of rabbinic Judaism, no sooner does he say that, then someone walks in and says to him,
	...

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