Yedidah is an alumna of Midreshet Lindenbaum, the Pardes Kollel and Yeshivat Hadar, and is also a member of the steering committee for Yeshivat Talpiot, an egalitarian yeshiva initiative in Jerusalem. She is a graduate of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem in Talmud and Classics, and a fellow of the advanced Talmudic Institute at MATAN, Jerusalem Yedidah is also a teacher at the Drisha Institute for Jewish Education in New York. Yedidah, normally a resident of Jerusalem, is a member of Minyan Hakhel-Minyan Shivyoni Baka, and is a bar and bat mitzvah tutor.
Sessions:
Can a pig become kosher? – The modern food industry presents many new challenges to the ancient laws of kashrut. Behind the innocent sounding names, E-120 or E-441, there might be a long-lost cousin of a worm or a pig. Are these products a cause for alarm? Do these products still reflect their distant past, or are they something new? Does the biblical prohibition of abstaining from certain animals, also include anything derived from them, no matter how far apart they have grown? In this class we will study modern Rabbinic responses to these kinds of products, and we will use them to discuss these questions and the ideas behind kashrut laws in general.
Angels and others confronting God – We will study Rabbinic stories which present three very different characters, challenging God with the same question – Why do bad things happen to good people? We will analyze the different depictions of each character, their question and the response they (don’t) receive.