02 Apr
History, Latest, Religion

Seders, and the Last Supper, and Jesus! Oh, My!

By Michelle Albert A recent article on Slate raises the question of a possible connection between the Last Supper and Passover, dredging up a long-standing source for argument and speculation. On the surface, and indeed to many Jews and Christians, the Last Supper seems to have been a seder. It is generally acknowledged that Jesus was Jewish; in fact, early Christians had to be Jews before they could be Christian. At the Last Supper, Jesus and his disciples said blessings over the bread and wine and reclined as they ate. (Though that they ate bread, not matzah, is one mark against the correlation). Three of the four gospels, those of Matthew, Mark and Luke, state that the Last Supper happened after the start of Passover. We know that the Last Supper and the resurrection happened around Passover -...

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15 Sep
Latest

Dreams about Sarah Palin (with Jewish content)

At some point before I cast my ballot this November, I am going to have a dream about Sarah Palin. It is just inevitable—she is everywhere right now. And though I may be a would-be Palin dreamer, I am not alone. As of Friday, Slate received almost 500 letters from readers whose partisan, bipartisan, juicy and just plain weird dreams about Palin were, as we would say in California, totally awesome: It's hard to generalize about such a large group of dreams, but there were a few persistent themes: Palin as a gun-toting animal killer, pregnancies and denied abortions, baby Trig, and the landscape of Alaska. Many of you reported dreaming about John McCain dying and Palin taking over the Oval Office. Both men and straight women reported sexual fantasies involving the Alaska governor... Palin appeared sticking...

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