Rabbi Jacob Staub, Ph.D.

Episode 27: Beyond Antisemitism

January 31st, 2022  |  Season 1  |  55 mins 39 secs

antisemitism, judaism, progressive judaism

Just days before a horrifying hostage standoff at a synagogue in Colleyville, Texas, we recorded an episode about antisemitism. Rabbi Jacob Staub, Ph.D., the show’s executive producer, joins Bryan Schwartzman as a guest host as they welcome Rabbi Deborah Waxman, Ph.D, for a wide-ranging conversation about her recent Evolve essay, "Beyond Antisemitism." Rather than give in to fear, Deborah argues we should lean into Jewish identity, community and coalition-building.

Episode 26: The Reconstructionist

December 29th, 2021  |  Season 1  |  1 hr 3 mins

In this special episode celebrating the career of our podcast's executive producer, Rabbi Jacob Staub, Ph.D., guest host Rabbi Deborah Waxman, Ph.D., president and CEO of Reconstructing Judaism, traces how Jacob went from being a secular college student, intent on pursuing a literary life, to one of the most influential Reconstructionist thinkers, writers and teachers of the past 50 years.

Episode 25: 'Adoption Isn’t a Bad Thing, It’s a Tricky Thing'

November 29th, 2021  |  Season 1  |  40 mins 58 secs

adoption, evolve, jewish

The process of adoption is often thought of as children in need of a loving home being matched with couples who get to fulfill deferred dreams of becoming parents. It’s a win-win, right? Minna Scherlinder Morse, a writer and editor as well as an adoptive parent, says the reality and the history is far more nuanced.

Episode 24: Liberation from Opioids: One Rabbi’s Journey

October 12th, 2021  |  Season 1  |  1 hr 4 mins

opioid, recovery, sobriety, vicodin

Rabbi Michael Perice recently made a startling revelation to his congregation: For four years, he’d been addicted to opioids. Now, celebrating 10 years of liberation, Perice decided it was time to share his story with his community and the wider world.

Episode 23: Hidden Jews in the 21st Century

August 17th, 2021  |  Season 1  |  1 hr 2 mins

conversation, conversion, interview, jewish, judiasm

In the past few decades, descendants of Jews who had been forced to flee, convert, or hide Jewish practices during the Inquisition have been seeking to reconnect with Jewish communities. At times, they have been embraced, other times shunned, and, too often, encountered Jewish experiences that didn’t authentically reflect their Sephardic roots.

Episode 22: Hope as an Ethical Imperative

July 22nd, 2021  |  Season 1  |  52 mins 48 secs

breitman, evolve, hope, jewish, judaism, spiritual direction, staub, therapy

In Barbara Breitman’s telling, hope isn't "some fluffy thing." It's an essential Jewish practice. Hope enables leaders to imagine a different world and work to bring it out about no matter what obstacles stand in the way. Breitman, a spiritual director, therapist and scholar of religion, cites Moses, Noah and Mordechai as Biblical characters who embody this kind of hope. How can ordinary people emulate these examples?

Episode 17: Human Composting: Good for the Environment, But Is It Kosher?

February 16th, 2021  |  Season 1  |  1 hr 6 mins

In this live episode, recorded as part of the 2021 Big Bold Jewish Climate Festival, we speak with Rabbi Seth Goldstein and Rabbi Adina Lewittes, two religious leaders who’ve thought deeply about human composting, the green burial movement, and what each means for Jewish communities.

Episode 14: Fixing Broken Policing: What Does Judaism Say?

November 19th, 2020  |  Season 1  |  48 mins 41 secs

Does the Talmud offer a perspective on police reform, and whether it makes sense to, as the slogan says, defund the police? Rabbi Aryeh Cohen, a Talmudic scholar and an advocate for redirecting police funding, explains what ancient Judaism does and doesn’t have to say about policing. After a quick post-election debrief, Cohen lays out the case for a new approach to policing, one in which far fewer officers would carry arms. He addresses questions about armed guards protecting Jewish institutions during a time of rising antisemitism and touches on how his experience as a soldier in the first Lebanon War shaped his anti-violence worldview.

Episode 10: Disability Justice

July 14th, 2020  |  Season 1  |  49 mins 45 secs

In our conversation with Rabbi Elliot Kukla, we discuss his essay for Evolve: Groundbreaking Jewish Conversations about the profound and unexpected ways in which trauma can affect a person's health and overall spiritual wellbeing. In the piece and this interview, he shares some of what he's learned about life by being chronically ill. We discuss his heightened appreciation for the interdependence of people, and what that means for the responsibilities of societies and communities to care for their members, even the most vulnerable. We also talk with Rabbi Kukla about his recent New York Times piece, "My Life Is More 'Disposable' During This Pandemic", and about the COVID-19 pandemic more generally; about the newly resurgent racial justice movement; and about the challenge parents face in maintaining hope for our children and the world they're inheriting in this deeply unsettling time.

Episode 4: Slavery and Its Atonement: The Jewish Obligation to Confront Slavery’s Legacy

December 24th, 2019  |  Season 1  |  42 mins 28 secs

Slavery has been described as America’s original sin. Abolished with the passage of the 13th Amendment in 1865, slavery still casts a shadow over American life. Today, many Americans are seeking to better understand, and respond to, this tortured history. Can Judaism offer some guidelines for how to do that? Do Jews have to atone for the sin of slavery, even though mass Jewish migration to the United States didn’t happen until decades after the Civil War? Rabbi Toba Spitzer answers yes to both questions. In this episode, the religious leader of Congregation Dorshei Tzedek, a Reconstructionist congregation outside Boston, discusses ideas she first explored in a Yom Kippur sermon. Spitzer says that the ancient priests — who may have been among the Hebrew Bible’s editors —had ideas about communal sin that may offer a path toward societal acknowledgement and atonement for the sin of slavery. Rabbi Jacob Staub, Ph.D., who directs the Evolve project, sits in for this interview.

Episode 1: Reimagining Synagogues and Communities

September 17th, 2019  |  Season 1  |  45 mins 45 secs

In this inaugural episode, we speak with Rabbi Rachel Weiss of Jewish Reconstructionist Congregation in Evanston, Ill. Weiss describes her community’s effort to remain relevant at a time of great change in Jewish life and North American life more generally. From deep and respectful dialogue on divisive issues, to the transformational use of post-it notes, Rabbi Weiss shares a window into her synagogue community’s ongoing evolution.

Coming soon...

August 16th, 2019  |  Season 1  |  2 mins 54 secs

Welcome to Evolve! Listen to this brief teaser to find out what's coming soon to a podcast player near you.