David Bashevkin

Bashevkin began his academic career as an associate director of education at NCSY from 2010 to 2013, and as of 2013 is the director of education at the NCSY Jewish youth group, a division of the Orthodox Union. As the leader of NCSY, he has directed many youth seminars and programs, and has also developed curriculum for staff and teens.[7]

Bashevkin served as an adjunct professor at Long Island University from 2010 to 2011.[8][6] He currently teaches at Yeshiva University in the Isaac Breuer College of Hebraic Studies,[9] as well as in the Sy Syms School of Business.[10]

Bashevkin is a writer for Mishpacha magazine, where he has written a humor column called “Top 5”, cataloguing the idiosyncrasies and nuances of Jewish life.[8] He has also written essays for Tablet (magazine) on tractates of the Talmud as they have been learned in the Daf Yomi sequence.[11]

Bashevkin developed a Tablet Daf Yomi podcast called Take One with Liel Leibovitz.[12][13] In 2020 Bashevkin launched the 18Forty podcast to treat traditional Jewish issues in a modern context.[3][14] The podcasts are organized by topic, with a few guests being interviewed for each topic. Past topics include Biblical criticism, Off the derech, and Mysticism, and past guests include Gary Gulman, Moshe Weinberger, and Jeremy England.

Bashevkin's published books include B'Rogez Rachem Tizkor[15][16] Sin•a•gogue: Sin and Failure in Jewish Thoughts,[17][18] and Top 5: Lists of Jewish Character and Characters.[19]

Sin•a•gogue draws extensively from the works of Rabbi Zadok HaKohen Rabinowitz, a 19th-century Chasidic rabbi.[18] Many of Bashevkin's ideas in the book were based on Zadok's theology on sin.

He also authored the NCSY Haggadah entitled Just One.[20]

Bashevkin has written various articles on Jewish theology.[21] He has published many other articles on sin, failure,[22] and Jewish doctrine and tradition, including the application of Jewish scripture in the 21st-century digital age.[23][24]

Some of his published articles are:

• "#MeToo Should Include #SinToo," Wall Street Journal (3 October 2019).
• "Failure Comes To Yeshivah," Jewish Action (Spring 2019): 62–64.
• "Rabbi’s Son Syndrome: Religious Struggle in a World of Religious Ideals," Jewish Action (Summer 2017): 38–44.
• "Jonah and the Varieties of Religious Motivation," The Lehrhaus (9 October 2016).
• "Letters of Love and Rebuke From Rav Yitzchok Hutner," Tablet Magazine (10 October 2016).
• "Medium Matters: The Medium and Message of Torah in the Digital Age," Shavuot-To-Go (2016): 6–9.
• "A Radical Theology and a Traditional Community: On the Contemporary Application of Izbica–Lublin Hasidut in the Jewish Community," TorahMusings.com (August 2015): 54–68.
• "The Forgotten Talmud: On Teaching Aggadah in High Schools," Jewish Action (Fall 2015).
• "Life is Full of Failure: Bio Blurbs Should Be Too," First Things (8 May 2014).
• "The Custom to Recite the Priestly Blessings After Birkat ha-Torah," ha-Maor 68:1 (2015): 86-90 (in Hebrew).
• "The Pew Report’s Lesser-Known Cousin: The Phew Report," Jewish Action (Summer 2014).
• "The Jewish Community Confronts Its Crisis Crisis," Jewish Action (Summer 2013).
• "Perpetual Prophecy: An Intellectual Tribute to Reb Zadok ha-Kohen of Lublin on his 110th Yahrzeit," Seforim (19 August 2010).