והיא שעמדה

I make no pretense about the fact that I derive great spiritual inspiration and sustenance from the study of Jewish History. For me, in a trope that I first heard from the late Prof. Jacob Katz ז"ל, each time I approach our people's history, I do so on two levels, simultaneously. The academic historian in me looks solely for a 'natural' chain of causality. For the classroom, for the academic journal, that is where the historian's efforts, properly, end.

At the same time, I am have been blessed to be a person of faith, who is unable to simply turn off his sense of שויתי ד' לנגדי תמיד, of consistently (if not perpetually) feeling God's Presence. The Believer transcends the limits of the academic historian when I delve into Jewish History.