Irene Lancaster
Wrestling Jacob: How a Genesis story speaks to Jews today
This is a seminal moment for the Jewish people. No longer will the Jewish people be known as 'Jacob' â meaning heel, outwitting, deceit. From now on, the Jewish people will be known as 'Israel'.
Tales of co-existence from Israel: how music is the food of love for Christians, Muslims and Jews
When I lived in Haifa and worked on translations, I often turned on the Israeli equivalent of Classic FM, because on Sundays it played nothing but Church music bearing in mind all those Christians in Israel who didn't work on a Sunday.
How the Bible story of Jacob's Ladder is relevant to us all today
As well as being of immediate physical significance, the site where Jacob will have his famous ladder dream is replete with psychological and spiritual significance.
How my visit to Liverpool's Metropolitan Cathedral showed the city's spirit of hope and love
Yesterday, I was invited as a guest of Liverpool's Metropolitan Cathedral to a 50th-anniversary performance performed by their own choir together with Westminster Cathedral Choir from London.
How the Bible story of Jacob and Esau shows we sometimes have to fight for survival
The synagogue reading for this Shabbat includes the story of Jacob and Esau. Jacob and Esau are twins with opposing tendencies: Jacob is studious while Esau espouses physicality, which his very name implies in Hebrew.
How the Genesis story of Abraham is the blue-print for Jewish history
G-d has told Abram to make a clean break. His birth place, relatives and home life are not the future of humanity. Abram is to look inwards and then leave Mesopotamia for ever. According to Jewish tradition Abram was born 1948 years after Creation, and his abandoning of his beginnings is one of 10 trials imposed on him by G-d.
The miracle of the Balfour Declaration: 100 years on, Israel is a flourishing democracy
The modern State of Israel is the best-integrated country in the world, with minority groups thriving at every level and in every walk of life. And this couldn't have happened without the Balfour Declaration
Why the forbidden fruit in Genesis is probably not the apple
It appears that people confused the word malum which means 'evil' with the word malum, pronounced differently, which means 'apple' and somehow conflated the two different meanings in the vernacular.
Simchat Torah: The joy of the Torah and how music and dance can change lives
In Judaism law is personified as a woman. To observant Jews, the Torah is simply the 'boss'.
What does Yom Kippur mean in today's world?
Judaism is not an easy way of life, but it does question the idea of unchequered progress, plus the violence which often goes with it.
Standing at the threshold: Facing the future with prayer, righteousness and repentance
Moses is now 120 years old, knows he is approaching death and that he will not be entering the Promised Land.
Arise Shine, for your Light has come
Why God's blessings are contingent on the ongoing behaviour of the Jewish people, and not theirs by right alone.
What does God offer His people when they reach rock bottom?
Last Shabbat's Haftorah of Consolation addressed Jerusalem as a barren woman who has reached rock bottom. And here is what she is offered as therapy: 'Break out into glad song, and broaden your tents.'
Awaiting the footsteps of the Messiah: How Jews follow the 'twists and turns' of Jerusalem with love
The Isaiah passage we read last Shabbat are verses 51:12-52:12. To many people this passage is famous for the soprano aria from Handel's Messiah, 'How beautiful are the feet...' But Jews tend to translate differently as the 'footsteps' of the herald coming nearer and nearer with the announcement that the Messiah, long-awaited by the Jews, is finally arriving.
How â and why â God promises Jerusalem a glorious future
'A nation that was previously unknown to you will run to you.' Through expressing the experience of the Jewish people as embodied in the Jerusalem of the future, the Prophet Isaiah encompasses the entire world,
As the Jewish people once more suffers rising antisemitism in Europe, what hope can be gained from the Bible?
God consoles the Jewish people with the assurance that they will not be abandoned in exile. For even if they are in exile, their own children and grandchildren will return to the Promised Land.