Derek J. Penslar is a professor of Jewish history and directs Harvard’s Center for Jewish Studies. He is also the co-chair of Harvard’s Presidential Task Force on Combatting Antisemitism and Anti-Israeli Bias and teaches the history class “One Land, Two Peoples: The Modern History of Israel/Palestine.” This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
FM: What is your favorite joke?
DJP: So there’s a Jewish grandmother who lives in Florida, and she loves it when her grandson, little Davey, comes to visit.
But Davey’s mother is worried that Bubbe — that’s Yiddish for grandma — is getting older and a little distracted, and she’s worried that if she leaves Davey with Bubbe, that maybe she won’t look after him appropriately.
But Bubbe says, “No, of course, I’ll look after little Davey. I'll watch him like a hawk. Don’t worry.”
So Davey is left with his Bubbe, and Bubbe takes him to the beach.
Bubbe sees a bunch of other Bubbes on the beach, and she starts talking to them and gossiping. And she totally forgets about Davey, and she turns around a few minutes later, and he’s gone.
She’s panicked. “Where’s Davey, where could my grandson be?” She raises her head to heaven and says, “Oh, God, please bring back my little grandson. I’ll do anything. I’ll go to synagogue every day. I’ll give money to charity. Bring back my little grandson.”
Suddenly, the waters recede. A huge wave forms, moves towards the shore. It has Davey on top of the wave, and the water deposits. The wave deposits Davey right at his Bubbe’s feet, not a hair harmed on his head.
And she looks up at the heavens and she says, “He had a hat.”
FM: Love that. You study Judaism, have you become more religious over the course of your life and your study?
DJP: I don’t know which came first. That is, I was raised in a non-religious home; I became interested in religion already a little bit in high school, certainly in university. So I began to go to synagogue. I began to learn more about Judaism, but I think that I reached a certain level of religious observance already in my 20s that hasn’t really changed in the last 40 plus years.
My studying has gone on and on and on. Although Jewish life means a great deal to me, and the Jewish religion is part of that life, I don’t think it is inextricably linked with my scholarship. I think my scholarship and teaching are actually different.
FM: Now, you taught a course this semester called “One Land, Two peoples: The Modern History of Israel/Palestine.” How did the course unfold?
DJP: Well, it went very well. Most importantly, because I had fantastic students.
They brought into the course an open mind, a willingness to do the work and a willingness to engage with each other. So all of that was the most important precondition.
We also had a course assistant, Shira Z. Hoffer ’25, who, at the very beginning of the course, led a session on constructive dialogue, respectful disagreement. And I don’t know if students in that first session really heard things they had never heard before, but it was symbolically very important then for them to see that Professor Penslar really cares about them, how they communicate with each other. I want them to learn from each other.
As the course went on — to get back to what I said a moment ago — I can’t escape my own subjecthood, my own strengths and limitations as a scholar and as a human being, and I was very honest about that. I’ve never taught a course before where so often I would say to the students, “Here’s what I don’t know.”
I think that the students appreciated that honesty. Simply put, I believe that within a few weeks of the start of term, we had developed trust in each other. And when the professors and the students trust each other, then you can really have a terrific and valuable learning experience.
