Jewish Theological Seminary of America
Rabbinical seminary in Morningside Heights, Manhattan. In Surely You’re Joking, Mr. Feynman! Feynman lodges there during a conference on ethics and argues with the students about electricity and the Sabbath.
At a glance
| Source | Author | Role | In one line |
|---|---|---|---|
| ”Surely You’re Joking, Mr. Feynman!”: Adventures of a Curious Character | Richard P. Feynman | setting | Feynman lodges there during an ethics conference and argues with rabbinical students about electricity and the Sabbath. |
”Surely You’re Joking, Mr. Feynman!”: Adventures of a Curious Character — Richard P. Feynman (1985)
Source: Original · Readwise highlight
While I was at the conference, I stayed at the Jewish Theological Seminary, where young rabbis—I think they were Orthodox—were studying.
- Role: setting
- In the book: Invited to a conference on the “ethics of equality”, Feynman stays at the Jewish Theological Seminary. The young rabbinical students ask him whether electricity is fire, since that bears on what may be done on the Sabbath; he sees a man employed to push the elevator buttons for them on Saturdays, and fails to trap them in a contradiction.
- Why it matters: The seminary is where his frustration with the conference turns into a lesson about how the students approach science only through Talmudic questions.