In the 16th century, a Hebrew-speaking, battle-scarred, Black-skinned Jew named David Reubeni appeared suddenly in Venice with a desperate plan to restore Jewish pride and political independence. Why did kings, bishops, rabbis, bankers, and even a pope, open their homes and wallets for him? Some answers come from one of the weirdest documents in Jewish...

Zoom or In-Person event Click here to register In this book talk, author Diane Winston explores how after two years in the White House, an aging and increasingly unpopular Ronald Reagan looked like a one-term president, but something changed in 1983. Reagan spoke of his embattled agenda as a spiritual rather than a political project...

In-person and Zoom Register here for both in-person or Zoom The South Asian saint Shirdi Sai Baba has an ever-growing global diaspora. His inspiration and healing energies are boons reinforced for many by his defiance of religious communitarianism. In welcoming all castes, creeds, and nationalities, Baba offers an alternative to the divisiveness of his time...

ROOM FULL for in- person attendance. Accepting Zoom registration only. RSVP required. Register here Explore sources of peace and non-violence with leading teachers, including: Salam Al-Marayati - Muslim Public Affairs Council Professor Carol Bakhos - UCLA Center for the Study of Religion Rabbi Sharon Brous – Ikar Prof./Rabbi Aryeh Cohen - American Jewish University Aziza Hasan - Executive Director,...

In person (Haines 39) or on Zoom Register here for both in-person or Zoom attendance Returning to UCLA by popular demand, this lecture by Walid Saleh (University of Toronto) provides an overview of the major features of Classical Islam that solidified during the early Abbasid period. Such features include the  rise of major religious sciences...

In Person (Royce 306) or on Zoom Register here How do archaeologists unearth the daily life of people from Jesus’s time? Contrary to popular belief, archaeology of first-century Roman Galilee is not about illustrating or proving the gospels, drawing timelines, or hunting treasure. Rather, it is about understanding the lives of people, just like us,...

In person (Kaplan 365) This guest lecture examines the little known multicultural religious protests to the Spanish Conquest of colonial Latin America.  Such protests began in 1511 under the guidance of Dominican friar Antonio de Montesinos and led to “The Great Debate” in which, for the first time in recorded human history, an entire nation...

In person (Kaplan 365) or on Zoom Could knowledge about biodiversity loss be advanced through inquiry into the study of religion? Emerging from a lab that integrates humanities, arts, and sciences into research on coastal change in Virginia, this talk shows how different conceptions of religion and spirituality open unique lines of inquiry into human...

In person (Royce 314) Is sacred space protective space? This question lies at the heart of the Sanctuary Movement, the most confrontational progressive religious social movement in the United States since the heyday of the Civil Rights Movement. Modern Sanctuary Movement activists adopted the ancient practice of protecting in designated sanctuaries individuals who stood in...

Presented by the Alan D. Leve Center for Jewish Studies. Co-sponsored by the UCLA Center for the Study of Religion and the UCLA Department of Near Eastern Languages & Cultures. The story of the Twelve Tribes of Israel begins in the Hebrew Bible. But all around the world, there are stories about what happened next...