‘Abraham as you may never have known him before’

Come and hear Anthony Julius describe Abraham as you may never have known him before! The story of Abraham, the first Jew, portrayed as two lives lived by one person, paralleling the contradictions in Judaism throughout its history. In this new biography of Abraham - Judaism’s foundational figure - Anthony Julius offers an account of the origins of a fundamental struggle within Judaism between scepticism and faith, critique and affirmation, thinking for oneself and thinking under the direction of another.

Julius will be in conversation with Rabbi Michael Pollak and he will describe Abraham’s life as two separate lives, and as a version of the collective life of the Jewish people. Abraham’s first life is an early adulthood of questioning the polytheism of his home city of Ur Kasdim until its ruler, Nimrod, condemns him to death and he is rescued, he believes, by a miracle. In his second life, Abraham’s focus is no longer on critique but rather on conversion and on his leadership over his growing household, until God’s command that he sacrifice his son Isaac. This test, the Akedah (or “Binding”), ends with another miracle, as he believes, but as Julius argues, it is also a catastrophe for Abraham. The Akedah represents for him an unsurpassed horizon—and in Jewish life thereafter. This book focuses on Abraham as leader of the first Jewish project, Judaism, and the unresolvable, insurmountable crisis that the Akedah represents—both in his leadership and in Judaism itself.

Anthony Julius is Deputy Chairman at international law firm Mishcon de Reya and holds the Chair in Law and Arts in the Faculty of Laws, UCL. As a lawyer, he is best known for his successful defence of historian Deborah Lipstadt in the libel case brought by David Irving. As a scholar, he is the author of the widely praised Trials of the Diaspora: A History of Anti-Semitism in England, amongst other books.

Rabbi Michael Pollak studied at City of London School. He spent three years at the legendary Chevron Yeshiva in Jerusalem and subsequently he graduated in Philosophy at the London School of Economics. He works as a consultant in education for the UJIA, London School of Jewish Studies and Partnership for Jewish Schools, whilst teaching Daf Hayomi at the Ner Yisrael Community Centre and Ethics and Religion at Hendon School. He is also the Director of Education at Yad Vashem UK.

Refreshments will be served in the cafe from 7pm.

Finchley Road Station (Metropolitan, Jubilee) is just a 600metre walk or one bus stop away. West Hampstead Station(Jubilee) is an 800metre walk away. And it only takes 15 minutes to walk to JW3 from Hampstead Station (Northern).

Finchley Road & Frognal Station is a few minutes walk from JW3.