Dr. Ori Werdiger
Department of Jewish Thought
My life before BGU:
I was born and raised in Jerusalem. I completed my BA at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and then moved to the University of Chicago for my PhD. I was a postdoctoral fellow at the Franz Rosenzweig Center at the Hebrew University, a postdoctoral fellow in Jewish philosophy in the Department of Philosophy and the Centre for Jewish Studies at the University of Toronto, and then a Polonsky Fellow at the Van Leer Jerusalem Institute.
Why BGU?
BGU is a growing university with an atmosphere that combines open-mindedness and rigour. The department that I joined, the Department for Jewish Thought, is a leader in the field, with outstanding faculty, great students, and a long tradition of collegiality.
My research:
I study Jewish thought, focusing on encounters between philosophy and kabbalah in the modern period. I am interested in questions, ideas, and modes of thinking that appear in parallel, and are sometimes shared by philosophers and kabbalists. My research seeks to identify areas where direct or indirect dialogue takes place between these two traditions of practice and thought.
My research centers on Jewish thought and Jewish thinkers in twentieth century France, especially during the decades following the Second World War and the Shoah. This was an exceptionally rich era in French intellectual history, where Jewish figures participated in distinctly active ways in French philosophy and culture. Alongside thinkers such as Emmanuel Levinas and Jacques Derrida, I also study lesser-known figures, including Léon Askenazi (Manitou), Jacob Gordin, Sarah Kofman, and Éliane Amado Levy-Valensi.
An insight from my research:
My perspective as a scholar is often from a historical vantage point of one or two generations later. It is often possible to see that, alongside each thinker’s uniqueness, and despite the profound disagreements that may emerge from their differences, we share a great deal with those of that same generation and location.
Something that doesn’t appear on my CV:
I am an amateur guitarist and harmonica player, and I also like to sing.
A source of inspiration:
There are two books that made an impression on me when I was younger, JRR Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings and Jared Diamond’s Guns, Germs, and Steel. Despite their very different genres, story lines, and arguments, I see both works as great modern epics which touch upon themes that continue to be important and relevant. I may even teach them together in a seminar one day!
In brief:
- Careful planning or spontaneity? Searching for balance between them
- Pilates or spinning? Yoga!
- Morning or Night? Before I had children, night. Since I have had children, I’ve discovered that morning is also an option.
- Steak or tofu? Tofu steak. I have been vegetarian for many years.
- Berry Sakharof or Noa Kirel? Berry Sakharof and Alanis Morissette. In the music of both artists, I like their style of simple and candid texts, and the emotional depth in some of their best-known songs.
- Instant coffee or espresso? I am not a coffee person. I prefer tea.
- Car or train? On a train, one can stand up, fall asleep, read, look out the window. In short – it’s train for me.
- Dog or cat? These are two completely different ways of life, so different you can’t really choose between them. One thing’s for sure, I would not have a mouse. We once had a sub-tenant like this in an apartment abroad, and the mouse didn’t make a great pet…
- Summer or winter? It doesn’t matter if it’s summer or winter, as long as we have sunlight and a clear blue sky.
