In a season when the focus is often on bringing in light, what can we learn from looking at darkness? What lessons can we learn from the season of winter and the experience of darkness?
How do the Book of Maccabees and the Talmud present the story of Chanukah differently, and what underlies those differences? This sheet explores the ancient rabbinic relationship to the Hasmoneans and priests more generally. What do these texts have to say about different models of masculinity? What can they offer us in constructing our own understandings of gender and masculinity? These questions are informed by Dr. Marjorie Lehman's research on Masechet Yoma, as well as studies of masculinity in rabbinic literature by Daniel Boyarin and Yshai Rosen-Zvi.