In this class we will look at the Talmudic story of the Oven of Akhnai and Dostoevsky's story-within-a-story of The Grand Inquisitor, two stories about human authority prevailing over Divine decree. We will compare stories and discuss both similarities and the ways in which they offer very different perspectives on what authority, religious law, and God mean in our lives.

Sivan Piatigorsky-Roth is a cartoonist and a rabbinical student.