Episode Details

Journey to 16th-century Prague to discover Rabbi Judah Loew ben Bezalel, known as the Maharal, a prodigious Talmudist, philosopher, and mystic whose works profoundly shaped Jewish thought, inspiring both Hasidism and early Zionism. . Rejecting the scholastic pilpul of his era, the Maharal sought the deeper, philosophical meaning in the Talmudic Aggadah (narrative portions), positing a universe based on natural order and asserting that the Jewish people's exile is an aberration that must inevitably be rectified through return to their proper spiritual and physical place. While his sophisticated metaphysical writings—like Tiferet Yisrael—are his true legacy, he is most famously remembered in folklore as the creator of the Golem of Prague, the mute, clay automaton brought to life to defend the Jewish community from persecution and blood libels.