A powerful hero of the Bible, Jacob is also one of its most complex figures.Join us with Israel Prize winner... more

Episode 59: MENACHEM MENDEL SCHNEERSONMenachem Mendel Schneerson (1902–1994) was the seventh and last rebbe of the Chabad-Lubavitch movement, one of... more

Ayn Rand (1905–1982) was one of America’s most provocative writers of the 20th century. Her best-selling novels The Fountainhead and... more

The “German Socrates,” Moses Mendelssohn (1729–1786) was the most influential Jewish thinker of the 18th and 19th centuries. A Berlin... more

Léon Blum (1872–1950), France’s prime minister three times, socialist activist, and courageous opponent of the pro-Nazi Vichy regime, profoundly altered... more

Herod the Great (73–4 BCE) was a phenomenally energetic ruler who took advantage of the chaos of the Roman revolution... more

Get ready for Passover with Jewish Lives. Rabbi Elliot Cosgrove of Park Avenue Synagogue and Professor Daniel Matt, author of... more

Henrietta Szold (1860–1945) is renowned as the founder of Hadassah, the Women’s Zionist Organization of America, which quickly became one... more

On January 5, 1895, Captain Alfred Dreyfus’s cries of innocence were drowned out by a mob shouting “Death to Judas!”As... more

Baruch (Benedictus) Spinoza (1632–1677) was a radical free thinker who led a life guided by strong moral principles despite his... more