A Born Episcopalian With a Traveling Menorah

Not your normal Chanukah story, or is anything really normal.

Let's ask a philosopher:

Questions for Martha Nussbaum
By DEBORAH SOLOMON

...It is fair to call you a member of the religious left?

Yes, the religious-rationalist left. I grew up in an Episcopal church, and I bonded with it mainly through music. I was in choirs all the time, and I still sing a lot. I converted to Judaism when I got married. I had kind of gotten to the end of my rope with Christian otherworldliness. I wanted a religion in which justice was done in this world.

How are you observing Hanukkah this week?

I will be in my hotel in India with my travel menorah. My friend Josef Stern gave it to me for my bat mitzvah last year. It’s about four inches long when it’s folded, and then you unfold it and it even has the ordinary-size candles...

More:

You’re an eminent philosopher at the University of Chicago. What can you tell us about the state of ideas in America?

There’s just something about our public culture that’s not that friendly to philosophy. I think religion is thought to be where you go with your big questions...



...Is that a leather top you’re wearing in this photograph?




Yes. I wore it when I went to speak at the first meeting of our University of Chicago lesbian and gay alumni association, and I thought it was so sweet for them to invite somebody who wasn’t gay to be their keynote speaker. But I wore this outfit, and they said, “We want to thank you for wearing leather.”