The majority of these videos were taken during the last year of Rabbi Jacobs life. They are full length videos previously only available to purchase but now made available on-line. If you are new to the work and background of Rabbi Jacobs you will find the video titled - 'Britain's Greatest Jew Q & A' an excellent start.
The discussion continues! The videos that you can access from this page are recordings of seminars and lectures mostly directly on the subject of Jewish Theology as posed in the thoughts of Rabbi Jacobs. They are unedited full length videos and in some cases there is more than one video from a session.
Please let us know about any comments of feedback about the videos, by contacting us via our Contact page.
Late 60’s (?) address to Spertus College in Cincinnati by video, recorded in London....
Having written almost 50 books Louis Jacobs looks at them all....
Karen Armstrong interviewing Rabbi Louis Jacobs for Paths of Faiths in November 1984. Karen Armstrong formulates her questions so as to emphasize the unique features of the Jewish faith, attempting to discern the dynamics inherent to Judaism, the variety of experiences and movements which characterize contemporary Jewish practice, and the ways in which these differ from other…...
Rabbi Jacobs discusses the various Jewish groups which make up the contemporary world. He begins with a discussion of the charedim. He points out that their approach to religious matters, for example dress, is uncompromising, although the term ultra-orthodox is misleading. Turning to the orthodox he considers their interaction with and differences from the charedim…....
Rabbi Louis Jacobs reflects in this video upon his past appointments, starting from his early steps as assistant Rabbi in Eli Munk’s Beit Midrash in Golders Green, and concluding with the creation of the New London synagogue and the instigation of the Masorti movement. He offers intimate descriptions of his experience in these communities, each…...
Rabbi Jacobs reflects, in this video, on the Jewish notions of time and eternity. Faithful to his own convictions, he subjects both concepts to careful scrutiny – examining the biblical and rabbinic understandings of the terms – and draws out the implications of such considerations on a wide variety of theological motifs, including Creation and…...
This video made available on this site – December 2015 Lecture from 5th February 1995 This video dates from 1995 and records an open lecture at the time of the 30th anniversary of the New London Synagogue. Rabbi Jacobs starts by recalling the background which led to the publication of his controversial book We Have…...
Rabbi Jacobs offers some historical and religious reflections, in this video, on the variety of religious movements which compose the contemporary Jewish world since the Enlightenment. He starts with the Sephardim, noting that their communities display far greater uniformity than their Ashkenazi peers (in spite of some influence from the European Haskalah movement). He then…...
Rabbi Jacobs published close to 50 books, on subjects spanning between theology and religious practice, mysticism and hasidism, and talmudic studies. In his video, he presents his bibliography, with a number of comments concerning the thesis of each work, their successive republications, and their impact on his career....
Rabbi Jacobs shares his thoughts, in this video (shot on two separate days), on the Masorti movement in England – its history, its ideology, and its goals. He starts his account with the establishment of the New London and New North London Synagogues, founded in the aftermath of the Jacobs Affair as traditional, English Orthodox…...
In this video Rabbi Jacobs discusses Maimonides system of thought, his philosophy, his view of the cosmos and his attitudes to the commandments. He considers Maimonides’s supreme idea, that Judaism as God’s law has purpose and that a state of intellectual perfection is the supreme achievement. However it is a mistake to think of Maimonides…...
Rabbi Jacobs presents, in this lecture, a sketch of Maimonides’ life and thought. He starts by noting the scarcity of details available from medieval sources concerning the thinker’s family – his wives, siblings, and children – as well as his physique. The dates and details of his birth (Cordoba, April 1135) and death (December 1204),…...
This video features some of the reflections which made Louis Jacobs such a unique thinker in Anglo-Jewry. He tackles some of the issues which led to the original Jacobs Affair, including contemporary historical challenges to traditional Jewish beliefs. He starts by noting that the literal interpretation of the biblical account of Creation has yielded, as…...
Rabbi Louis Jacobs responds, in this video, to his election as the ‘greatest British Jew’ in the Jewish Chronicle. He describes the whole enterprise of casting a vote for such a figure as absurd and daft, and demonstrates that the notion of greatness is necessarily subjective. Indeed, the candidates each distinguished themselves in very different…...
In 2005, The Jewish Chronicle readers voted Louis Jacobs as the ‘greatest British Jew’. The vote proved a clear indication of Jacobs’s popularity and influence in the British-Jewish community, and provided the Friends with the opportunity to celebrate his legacy with this Q&A. Reuven Hammer hosted the event, putting forward ten questions from the audience,…...
In this video, Rabbi Jacobs reflects on his long-standing friendship with and admiration for a teacher and colleague of his, R. Koppel Kahanah. He describes R. Kahanah as a colourful and very influential rabbi, once well-known in the Anglo-Jewish community, but now remembered only be his few disciples. Kahanah came to England from Lithuania just…...
Louis Jacobs answers a number of important questions, in this video, relating to the status of women in Judaism. Can women be ordained as rabbis or cantors in synagogues? Can they be counted in a minyan? Can they read the Torah, or receive an aliyah? Can they wear tefilin or tsitsit? He discusses each of…...
The gaonim were purported to live to a very old age. The Vilna Gaon died at 70. Israel Kagan, the Chofetz Chaim, the great exponent of harmony among people died at 90. This video tells us more about their lives than we may care to know. ...
Rabbi Jacobs discusses the significance of the Ten Commandments in Jewish thought. He questions the assumption that they sit at the heart of revelation. How do we understand the two versions of the Ten Commandments? Rabbinic tradition presents a range of views. Equally, there are different ways of understanding them today. Historically, the role of…...
This was the lecture Louis Jacobs was supposed to give to celebrate the move of his library to the Oxford Centre. Due to his illness he was unable to deliver the talk but this video covers much of his intended lecture and was taken just a few days before his death. Jewish learning today is…...
