Analytic philosophy—which since World War II has dominated the discipline in British and American universities—focuses on logic, mathematics, the meaning of words, and the construction of valid arguments. While many of its foremost practitioners rejected religion, along with all claims not grounded in empirical proof, a group of scholars have recently produced a volume that tries to apply analytic thinking to Judaism.

Thus one author seeks to elucidate arguments among medieval commentators over a thorny talmudic legal discussion. In his review, Cole Aronson contends that yeshiva students studying this passage would benefit from this essay. “To ignore tools that explicate a key text or conceptual problem just because those tools were forged outside the tradition would be to miss an opportunity,” writes Aronson.

In another essay, Tyron Goldschmidt, drawing on an argument made by the 12th-century philosopher and poet Judah Halevi, makes an analytical case for the historicity of the Exodus. Aronson comments:

Whether you love or hate (or are pareve about) Goldschmidt’s argument, consider what it represents—a renaissance of Jewish philosophical theology in an analytic mode. Together with his collaborator Samuel Lebens—who’s penned a brilliant article in this collection about midrashic views about meaning in language—Aaron Segal, and others in and out of this volume, Goldschmidt is doing something that to my knowledge hasn’t been attempted by philosophers in English: defending a key empirical thesis of Judaism. Also, Goldschmidt, along with most of the other contributors to this volume, writes like a regular person rather than a member of a clandestine order.

Physicists, historians, psychologists, and linguists may not always (or ever) thank philosophers for their interest, but philosophy has a proud record of learning from and spurring advances in other disciplines. I suspect the same will be true for Jewish thought and analytic philosophy.

Last Tuesday, the Houthis—the faction now ruling much of Yemen—said that they intend to renew attacks on international shipping through the Red and Arabian Seas. They had for the most part paused their attacks following the January 19 Israel-Hamas cease-fire, but their presence has continued to scare away maritime traffic near the Yemeni coast, with terrible consequences for the global economy.

The U.S. responded on Saturday by initiating strikes on Houthi missile depots, command-and-control centers, and propaganda outlets, and has promised that the attacks will continue for days, if not weeks. The Houthis responded by launching drones, and possibly missiles, at American naval ships, apparently without result. Another missile fired from Yemen struck the Sinai, but was likely aimed at Israel. As Ari Heistein has written in Mosaic, it may take a sustained and concerted effort to stop the Houthis, who have high tolerance for casualties—but this is a start. Ron Ben-Yishai provides some context:

The goal is to punish the Houthis for directly targeting Western naval vessels in the Red Sea while also exerting indirect pressure on Tehran over its nuclear program. . . . While the Biden administration did conduct airstrikes against the Houthis, it refrained from a proactive military campaign, fearing a wider regional war. However, following the collapse of Iran’s axis—including Hizballah’s heavy losses in Lebanon and the fall of the Assad regime in Syria—the Trump administration appears unafraid of such an escalation.

Iran, the thinking goes, will also get the message that the U.S. isn’t afraid to use force, or risk the consequences of retaliation—and will keep this in mind as it considers negotiations over its nuclear program. Tamir Hayman adds:

The Houthis are the last proxy of the Shiite axis that have neither reassessed their actions nor restrained their weapons. Throughout the campaign against the Yemenite terrorist organization, the U.S.-led coalition has made operational mistakes: Houthi regime infrastructure was not targeted; the organization’s leaders were not eliminated; no sustained operational continuity was maintained—only actions to remove immediate threats; no ground operations took place, not even special-forces missions; and Iran has not paid a price for its proxy’s actions.

But if this does not stop the Houthis, it will project weakness—not just toward Hamas but primarily toward Iran—and Trump’s power diplomacy will be seen as hollow. The true test is one of output, not input. The only question that matters is not how many strikes the U.S. carries out, but whether the Red Sea reopens to all vessels. We will wait and see—for now, things look brighter than they did before.