Dreaming of the Messiah: What Can We Learn from Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook? Artwork

Answers WithHeld

A podcast where we confront big questions with bold thinking and honest searching. Each week, Rabbi Shai Held sits down with a leading thinker or teacher to explore one powerful Jewish idea. This podcast doesn’t have all the answers, but it can uncover new insights and model what it means to take Torah and Jewish thought seriously.

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Dreaming of the Messiah: What Can We Learn from Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook?

September 25, 2025

Was Rabbi Kook a mystic, a radical, or a realist? And what did he really believe about redemption?
In this season finale, Rabbi Shai Held is joined by Professor Yehudah Mirsky to unpack the bold and complex messianic vision of Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook and the ways in which this vision still reverberates today. Together, they explore Kook’s hopes for a transformed humanity, his belief in the spiritual potential of the Jewish people, and how his messianism shaped (and was shaped by) the politics of his time.