How to Transform Jewish Law into a Tool of Spiritual and Ethical Cultivation

In the 19th century, a Russian rabbi named Israel Salanter founded what came to be known as the musar movement, after a Hebrew word that can be translated as “ethics” or “admonishment.” Its purpose was to inculcate in the rabbinic elite a constant striving for virtue and inner perfection that went beyond practical adherence to the demands of halakhah. In conversations with Alex Drucker and Aryeh Grossman, David Silverstein and Shayna Goldberg explore the relationship between law and virtue in Jewish theology, the reasons many Modern Orthodox institutions have shied away from the teachings of musar, and the pedagogical challenges of ethical and spiritual self-cultivation in the 21st century. (Audio, 87 minutes.)