In a recent application, I was asked to reflect on my thoughts about nonviolence and whether I consider myself a pacifist. This turned out to be a much more difficult question than you might assume,...Read More
State of Formation recently announced that it would nominate its Contributing Scholars to be featured in the Council on Foreign Relation’s “Religion and Foreign Policy Bulletin.” This is a great...Read More
One of the unexpected things I have told friends about in my learning to speak Arabic over the past five years is the fact that I am much more talkative in Arabic than I am in English. In Arabic, my...Read More
Does Religion Cause War ? If so, How ? The sociologist David Martin, in his book Does Christianity Cause War? (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1997), investigates the empirical evidence from “Europe as a...Read More
After Auschwitz, no theology: From the chimneys of the Vatican, white smoke rises — a sign the cardinals have chosen themselves a Pope. From the crematoria of Auschwitz, black smoke rises —...Read More
He only says, ‘Good fences make good neighbors’. Spring is the mischief in me, and I wonder If I could put a notion in his head: ’Why do they make good neighbors? Isn’...Read More
The period of Counting the Omer (we count 49 days from the second day of Passover to Shavuot) in which we currently find ourselves is a reminder of the road between redemption and revelation. It seems...Read More
Every once in a while, maybe even once in a lifetime, someone comes into your life, unexpectedly, and changes it forever. That happened to me in the Fall of 2001. By this time, I had already gone back...Read More
Yehezkel Landau is a Faculty Associate in Interfaith Relations at Hartford Seminary. In June, 2002, I spent six days at a place that is holy for me: the Community of Grandchamp, a convent of Protest...Read More
Why does our current prison system exist? Why do we continue to support a punitive approach that blames the individual rather than putting the bulk of our resources into rehabilitation and reform? Per...Read More