I’m a father, a husband, a dog-owner, and a challah baker (not in order of importance), but writing and talking are what I do for work. Since June 2023, I have been director of open learning at American Jewish University.

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From 2010-2016 I wrote the Beliefs column, about religion, for The New York Times. My fifth and latest book is Squirrel Hill: The Tree of Life Synagogue Shooting & the Soul of a Neighborhood. It’s about Squirrel Hill, Pittsburgh, after the 2018 synagogue massacre. It was reviewed in the Times (“propulsive”), the  Post (“powerful”), the  Journal (“compelling”), and elsewhere.

I have also written a book about American religion in the late 1960s, a book about the bar and bat mitzvah in contemporary America, and a memoir of my years as a high school debater. And I co-authored The Newish Jewish Encyclopedia. I’m working on two biographies—of Judy Blume and Ann Landers—and a history of the great Princeton antisemitism scandal of 1958. I hold a Ph.D. in religious studies from Yale, but I believe only medical doctors should be called “Doctor.”

I have done a good deal of magazine and newspaper writing. Here are some very favorite magazine pieces; here is the archive of my Times columns.

My radio work includes including pieces for This American Life, Snap Judgment, and other bigshot shows, and I created and, for eight years and 360 episodes, hosted Unorthodox, a podcast about Jewish life and culture. It became the most popular English-language podcast about Jewish life and culture ever, and you can find all the episodes here. I also co-created and hosted a podcast called Gatecrashers: The Hidden History of Jews in the Ivy League.

I live in the Westville neighborhood of New Haven, Connecticut, with my wife, five children, and two dogs. I love Westville, but I do leave it: sometimes to report, sometimes to do live shows of the podcast, sometimes to talk about a book I have written, and sometimes to speak or lecture at a college, university, synagogue, community center, or public event of some sort. (I taught at Yale for fifteen years, and I’ve also taught at Stanford, NYU, and many other schools worthy of admission scandals.) I am not on social media; I prefer meeting people in person. If you’d like to reach me, please refer to that Gmail account at the top of the page, and do use my middle initial (the “e” distinguishes me from the South African barrister and the South Dakota Scrabble champion who share my name).

I believe in paid family leave, the 30-hour work week, original Coca-Cola, the one-handed backhand, the Oxford comma, and animal rights. Lately I have read novels by Jennifer Close, Ann Patchett, and Nathan Hill, as well as Andrew Leland’s book about going blind. I’ve been listening to albums bought at this great neighborhood vinyl shop and watching Bosch: Legacy and rewatching Flaked. Last summer, I got to see The Heavy Heavy, my new I enjoyed the TV version of Daisy Jones & the Six, but the novel was better. Coffee ice cream—there’s always that.