Today’s episode is a conversation with Rabbi Vanessa Ochs, Professor Emerita of Religious Studies at UVA, and author of Inventing Jewish Ritual, Sarah Laughed, and The Passover Haggadah: A Biography.
Through her work and interview, Rabbi Ochs describes the parallels between rituals and choreographed performance – and how both elevate experiences, mark time, and help us understand who we are as people.
Release date: 5/1/26
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Your home has always been a sacred stage. This guidebook — inspired by scholar and author Rabbi Vanessa Ochs — explores how ordinary objects and everyday moments become Jewish ritual. You`ll discover how to hang a mezuzah with intention, create a personalized home blessing, bring Shabbat into your week with simple blessings, and mark the first flowers of spring. Along the way: writing prompts, a chevruta reflection on the theater of daily life, and a blessing for imperfect homes. No grand gestures required. Just your home, your people, and a willingness to pay attention.
Professor Emerita of Religious Studies at University of Virginia
Rabbi Vanessa Ochs, Ph.D., is Professor Emerita of Religious Studies at the University of Virginia (UVA), where she was a founding member of the Jewish Studies Program and a core faculty participant since its inception. She has taught and written extensively on Jewish feminism, Jewish weddings, the Passover Haggadah, ethnographic fieldwork in religion, and spiritual writing, and chairs the Professional Consulting Committee for UVA Chaplaincy Services and Pastoral Education at the UVA Health System.
Her research explores new Jewish ritual, Jewish material culture, and what she calls “Jewish Sensibilities,” a theme that has shaped the journal Sh`ma, the work of the Lippman Kanfer Foundation, and is now featured as a curriculum produced by Hillel International.
Ochs is the author of several books, including The Passover Haggadah: A Biography, Inventing Jewish Ritual (winner of a 2007 National Jewish Book Award), Sarah Laughed, Words on Fire: One Woman’s Journey into the Sacred, and Safe and Sound: Protecting Your Child in an Unpredictable World, and co-author of The Jewish Dream Book and The Book of Jewish Sacred Practices. Her writing has been recognized with a Creative Writing Fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts.
She lives in Rhode Island with her husband, Peter Ochs, and is currently serving as a visiting fellow at the Katz Center for Advanced Judaic Studies at the University of Pennsylvania.
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