Rabbi Joe Klein
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Bringing classes to your community on Zoom.

 - A typical class is 3 or more weeks, with custom programming available
 - Flexible scheduling across time zones
- Rabbi Klein's wide variety of courses are creative, informative and accessible.
-Though a full listing is found under "Programs", below are some of his most recent presentations.
Contact Rabbi Klein for more information. 


Reading Genesis Again For The First Time
Why are there two Creation stories in Genesis 1 and 2? Why God wanted us out of the Garden of Eden, and used the serpent as Divine Agent? ​Why does the story of Cain fit the literary archetype of tragic hero. And this is only beginning of how we’ve misread the Book of Genesis.
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Exploring Exodus
If God’s “name” is not really a name, what is it? The Israelites at Sinai could not have received, much less heard the “Ten Commandments”. What does Tradition say they in fact heard? Is there a hidden message in the description of the ten plagues on Egypt? Is the Golden Calf story really a political polemic? What’s the circumstantial evidence for the “Exodus from Egypt”?
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Sing a New Psalm
Many of our Biblical psalms hide an intricate and sophisticated structure, often with hidden secondary messages, just waiting to be uncovered.
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Reading the Gospels
What was the message and mission of Jesus of Nazareth as presented in the three Synoptic Gospels? How do they promote their own agendas and theologies? Since they were written two generations after Jesus, what can we learn from them about the early Jesus-believing community?
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Who was Paul?
The seven authentic letters of Paul, the real Father of Christianity, are the earliest records of the growing Jesus-community.  Paul's message, a blending of Hellenistic thought and Jewish theology, is our window into the character and conflicts of the early Church. What are we to make of Paul's "conversion" from a Pharisaic Jew to believing in the Risen Christ? Or did he think his was a Jewish message?

When Antisemitism Began
Antisemitism did not exist prior to the 1st C CE. Long before the Gospels, the Philistines, Assyrians, Babylonians, Persians, and Romans clashed with the Israelite and Jewish communities for geo-political control of the Land of Israel. They were not against us because we were "Jews", because of who we were or what we believed, or what they thought we believed. It is only the early Jesus community (2nd - 4th C CE) who painted the Jews as anti-God, as inherently evil. An exploration and explication of primary documents.


Jewish Messiahs
      Messiahs in Hebrew Scripture
                        Pre-Exilic Prophecy, 960 -586 BCE
                        Post-Exilic Prophecy, 530 – 200 BCE
                        Daniel, 2nd C BCE.
      Messianic Claimants in the 1st – 2nd C. CE
      Rabbinic Messianic Expectation 2nd – 6th C. CE
      During the Crusades and Middle Ages
      Shabbtai Tzvi and Jacob Frank
      Modern Messianism
The idea of the “Jewish Messiah” has changed dramatically since such a savior was predicted by the Biblical Prophets. And though it may surprise you, there have been dozens of Jewish claimants throughout history, even into the 20th C. We will discuss that history and meet those pseudo-Messiahs.

More course titles and descriptions in the Programs tab
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