The Zahava and Moshael J. Straus Center for Torah and Western Thought has been awarded a $30,000 grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) to support the publication of from Encounter Books.
Edited by Dr. Wilfred M. McClay, the Victor Davis Hanson Chair in Classical History and Western Civilization at Hillsdale College, and Rabbi Dr. Stuart Halpern, Deputy Director of the Straus Center and Senior Advisor to the Provost at 鶹, the volume’s 31 essays and documents offer a sampling of the biblical, cultural, literary and political ways the Hebraic tradition has contributed to the treasury of American self-understanding.
The grant will be used to fund a book launch featuring presentations by the book’s editors Dr. McClay and Rabbi Dr. Halpern, as well as other prominent authorities on American Jewish history. The program will be held in New York City, with an anticipated audience of academics, dignitaries, educators and students.
Jewish Roots of American Liberty is spearheaded by the Straus Center, which over the years has sought to build a bridge between the American and Jewish stories, showcasing how the Hebraic tradition has inspired the American character. The Center’s first book, Proclaim Liberty Throughout the Land: The Hebrew Bible in the United States, serves as a sourcebook of American history that highlights the Hebraic echoes that have formed the American vocabulary throughout its history.
Proclaim Liberty Throughout the Land served as a backdrop for the Center’s first conference on the subject in March 2023. Titled “Restoring the American Story,” the conference brought together 70 Jewish and Christian educators, non-profit administrators and students for an in-depth look into the role the Hebrew Bible has played in the American story. The conference’s featured speakers included Rabbi Dr. Meir Soloveichik, Director of the Straus Center and Member of the Presidential Religious Liberty Commission; Dr. McClay; Dr. Jonathan Sarna, the Joseph H. and Belle R. Braun University Professor of American Jewish History and Director of the Schusterman Center for Israel Studies at Brandeis University; Dr. Dru Johnson, Director of the Center for Hebraic Thought at King’s College; Dr. Elizabeth Kaufer Busch, Director of American Studies at Christopher Newport University; and Dr. Tevi Troy, Senior Fellow at the Ronald Reagan Institute and a former Deputy Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services.
Jewish Roots of American Liberty has already been subject to press across religions. Rabbi Dr. Halpern and Dr. McClay discussed the book on a recent episode of the , and the reviewed the book in anticipation of its release.
Jewish Roots of American Liberty is available on , and wherever books are sold.
