Irene Lancaster

• 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 – and why – 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.

• 'Comfort ye, my people': How Isaiah's words speak to Jews today

  After the destruction of the two Temples commemorated last week on Tisha B'Av through fasting and prayer, Jewish people now embark on the Seven Haftorahs of Consolation.

• The Sunday Times got it wrong over Kevin Myers, but it is not an antisemitic paper

  Yesterday, the Irish Sunday Times published an article by freelance contributor Kevin Myers, who is a well-known misogynist and Holocaust denier.

• 10 calamities that took place on the Jewish fast day of Tisha B'Av

  Monday night sees the start of the saddest day of the Jewish calendar, known in Hebrew as Tisha B'Av (the 9th of the Hebrew month of Av).

• 

  What are the three pillars of Judaism, and why is 'hutzpah' so important today?

  Jewish academic Irene Lancaster asks what are the three pillars of Judaism – what are the three things that hold Judaism up so that it carries on under adversity and refuses (despite the best efforts of others) to be swallowed up, fade away, or die?

• Robert Browning and Abraham ibn Ezra: A meeting of Christian and Jewish minds

  Speaking up for the Jewish people against the lethal terrors of antisemitism through the ages: English poet Robert Browning and the great Jewish poet and Bible scholar, Abraham ibn Ezra.

• 

  The spiritual genius of Rowan Williams: Thoughts on the 3rd anniversary of his visit to a Jewish-Christian dialogue group

  On the extraordinary contribution to Jewish Christian relations in the contemporary era by the former Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams

• Ruth, the ultimate pilgrim: How the Jewish festival of Shavuot can help heal Manchester's wounds

  Shavuot is the festival which marks the giving of the Torah (613 commandments) to the Jewish people. The festival is a celebration of women.