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• NU Graduate School

Judaism

Students interested in doing graduate work in Judaism have three different rubrics within the Religion Department:

Students who have particularly strong backgrounds in Hebrew and/or Aramaic and considerable experience reading classical Jewish texts, can study rabbinic Judaism, defined in broad historical terms to include medieval and modern texts, within the Religion Department. Such students draw upon the faculty resources both in the Religion Department (Barry Wimpfheimer and Laurie Zoloth) and in the Jewish Studies Program (Yohanan Petrovsky-Stern, Marcus Moseley, Peter Hayes and Kenneth Seeskin).

Students interested in contemporary Jewish moral philosophy and social ethics can study within the Religion, Ethics and Public Life (REPL) track. In this track, students study Jewish philosophy and bioethics with Laurie Zoloth (Religion and Medicine), gaining historical depth for their work in the study of Maimonides with Kenneth Seeskin (Philosophy) and in the rabbinic tradition with Barry Wimpfheimer (Religion and Law). To complement their historical, literary and theological study, which focuses on close textual and Scriptural reasoning, students in Jewish bioethics do clinical work at Northwestern university-affiliated hospitals and are expected to take an active role in the ongoing science research grants at Northwestern University.

Students interested in Jewish practice and thought in the contemporary world can study within the Contemporary Religions (CR)  track. In this track, students will receive broad theoretical and methodological training within the discipline of Religion, and then apply this training within the context of contemporary Judaism. Students in this track will draw upon the Core Faculty of Contemporary Religions for their guidance in theory and method, and will receive mentorship in Jewish content from faculty associated with the Jewish Studies Program including, especially, the Post-Doctoral Fellow in Jewish American religious history and culture.