The Torah of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

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Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., one of our great American heroes, was a uniquely gifted orator. His speeches are breathtaking performances, by any standard. But heard through Jewish ears, they strike particular chords of resonance. For King was able to effortlessly weave in references to the Hebrew Bible that evoke classic moments from the Jewish narrative. By turning back to reflect on those passages, we can gain a deeper understanding of King’s message, and the ways in which he was offering his own novel interpretations of these texts that are so beloved to our tradition.

ABOUT THIS SPEAKER: David Kasher is an Associate Rabbi at IKAR, a non-denominational spiritual community in Los Angeles. He received his BA in Political Science at Wesleyan University, holds a J.S.D. from Berkeley Law, and received his Rabbinic Ordination at Yeshivat Chovevei Torah. Rabbi Kasher grew up bouncing back and forth between the Bay Area and Brooklyn, hippies and hassidim – and has been trying to synthesize these two worlds ever since. After graduating from college, he studied for several years in yeshivot in Israel before heading off to rabbinical school. He was ordained in 2007, and returned to Northern California, where he became the Senior Jewish Educator at Berkeley Hillel. He was part of the founding team at Kevah, a non-profit specializing in Adult Jewish Education, and worked from 2012 to 2018. He has served on the faculty of Berkeley Law, the Wexner Heritage Program, Reboot, and BINA: The Secular Yeshiva, and also taught at Pardes, SVARA, The Hartman Institute, Dorot and various Limmuds. Rabbi Kasher is a teacher of nearly all forms of classical Jewish literature, but his greatest passion is Torah commentary, and he spent the last five years producing the weekly ParshaNut blog and podcast (www.parshanut.com), exploring the riches of the genre.

LM