If you ever hopped on the Pokémon GO craze, you’ll have an inkling of how digital technology is increasingly capable of adding rich new slices to everyday life. The public exhibition ‘Unreal City’, which ran from 8 December 2020 to 5 January 2021 on the River Thames in London – and is, until 9 February 2021, available for at-home viewing – similarly superimposed digital layers on to reality, but with an aim to transform the city into an immersive augmented reality (AR) art gallery.

…scholars generally do agree that conspiracy theories have always existed and always will. They tap into basic aspects of human cognition and psychology, which may help explain why they take hold so easily — and why they’re seemingly impossible to kill.

Over the past few decades, this ethos of cheerless duty has been overtaken by the imperative to love your work. Graduation speakers, human resources departments, and motivational memes keep telling us we ought to merge passion with profession. But work remains stubbornly unlovable.

As an Israeli, I am puzzled about America’s state of mind. It seems that Americans often forget how good it is for them to be American — to have all the advantages of being American, to have a resilient political system, to have the margin of error only a superpower has. Yes, America makes mistakes, but it is strong enough to overcome even grave ones. For an Israeli, it is puzzling to see a nation so powerful and yet so restless.

As meaning-making creatures, humans are addicted to symbols. We convey emotions, stories and values through all kinds of inanimate objects… The power we impute to our synagogues, to our parliament buildings, lures haters, too. One mob of hundreds traumatized democracy-lovers worldwide by violating Capitol Hill. And one little broken person unsettled Jews — and all haters of bigotry — worldwide by putting the hated Nazi symbol on eight synagogue doors.

The U.S.-Israel relationship is about to be reset with a new administration, and everyone will be looking to see how Biden and Netanyahu will navigate each other. But we should also be keeping an eye on how each addresses the badly frayed sense of national and societal unity that currently reigns in their countries, and whether the U.S. and Israel – which have marched in lockstep in this regard for years – now begin to diverge.

“In Hebrew, the word for ‘prophet’ means to bring forth. When we look at the role of Aaron, he is the one who brings forth Moshe and helps Moshe to bring forth the people.”

The people picked up their dough when it was not yet leavened, their leftovers bound in their garments on their shoulders. -Ex. 12:34

Rabbi Nolan Lebovitz: There is a powerlessness in wandering, always relying on the tolerance of others. This verse from Exodus 12 establishes a connection between matzah and our existential wandering.

Here are two, contradictory messages: matzah represents the imminent freedom of the Israelites and the haste with which they had to grab that freedom, and it represents the years of slavery and oppression, a reminder of the scant food they survived on in Egypt.

A conversation on Rabbi Steve Leder’s new book, “The Beauty of What Remains.”

“We need to ask the question: where is the opportunity in all of this to grow and have a more meaningful and beautiful life going forward?”

For our 100th episode, host Shmuel Rosner chats with a special guest – JPPI’s new president, Prof. Yedidia Z. Stern. They chat about the IDI`s 2020 Israeli Democracy Index, its findings and more.

“We find a decline in the number of Israelis who support the idea that Israel is and should be a Jewish Democratic state.”

As a new year starts, the Bagels welcome back ultimate cinephile Jodi Berman Kustanovich (of bermanoscarblog.blogspot.com) for a report on the 365+ movies she saw in 2020. Topics include how increased access is great for movie lovers and “feeling seen” by streaming algorithms.