In his signature plainspoken, accessible style, Rabbi Sacks shares with us traditional interpretations of the Bible, Jewish law, and theology, as well as the works of philosophers and ethicists from other cultures, to examine what constitutes morality and moral behavior. “We are here to make a difference,” he writes, “a day at a time, an act at a time, for as long as it takes to make the world a place of justice and compassion.” He argues that in today’s religious and political climate, it is more important than ever to return to the essential understanding that “it is by our deeds that we express our faith and make it real in the lives of others and the world.”To Heal a Fractured World—inspirational and instructive, timely and timeless—will resonate with people of all faiths.From the Hardcover edition.

    Charged with brilliance and daring, hypnotic in its intensity, Beaufort is at once a searing coming-of-age story and a novel for our times--one of the most powerful, visceral portraits of the horror, camaraderie, and absurdity of war in modern fiction. Beaufort. To the handful of Israeli soldiers occupying the ancient crusader fortress, it is a little slice of hell--a forbidding, fear-soaked enclave perched atop two acres of land in southern Lebanon, surrounded by an enemy they cannot see. And to the thirteen young men in his command, Twenty-one-year-old Lieutenant Liraz Erez Liberti is a taskmaster, confessor, and the only hope in the face of attacks that come out of nowhere and missions seemingly designed to get them all killed. All around them, tension crackles in the air. Long stretches of boredom and black humor are punctuated by flashes of terror. And the threat of death is constant. But in their stony haven, Erez and his soldiers have created their own little world, their own rules, their own language. And here Erez listens to his men build castles out of words, telling stories, telling lies, talking incessantly of women, sex, and dead comrades. Until, in the final days of the occupation, Erez and his squad of fed-up, pissed-off, frightened young soldiers are given one last order: a mission that will shatter all remaining illusions--and stand as a testament to the universal, gut-wrenching futility of war.

    Yeshua of Nazareth was raised in an observant Jewish family in a culture where the Torah (five books of Moses) was the National Constitution. Yeshua's teachings, which supposedly form the basis for Western Christianity, are now filtered through 2000 years of traditions born in ignorance of the land, language, and culture of the Bible. The issues over which Yeshua wrestled with the Pharisees are simply not understood by modern Christians; nor are his most important instructions followed by those who claim to be his disciples. Former Pharisee, Nehemia Gordon, a Dead Sea Scrolls scholar and Semitic language expert, explores the ancient Hebrew text of the Gospel of Matthew from manuscripts long hidden away in the archives of Jewish scribes. Gordon's research reveals that the more "modern" Greek text of Matthew, from which the Western world's versions were translated, depicts "another Jesus" from the Yeshua portrayed in the ancient Hebrew version of Matthew. Gordon explains the life-and-death conflict Yeshua had with the Pharisees as they schemed to grab the reins of Judaism in the first century, and brings that conflict into perspective for both Jew and Christian alike.

    Here we find spiritual explorations of numerous biblical narratives, including Jacob's wrestling with the angel, Joseph's kidnapping by his brothers, his near seduction by Potiphar's wife, his interpretation of Pharaoh's dreams, and his reunion with his brothers and father.Throughout, the Zohar probes the biblical text and seeks deeper meaning—for example, the divine intention behind Joseph's disappearance, or the profound significance of human sexuality. Divine and human realities intertwine, affecting one another.Toward the end of Genesis, the Bible states: Jacob's days drew near to die—an idiomatic expression that the Zohar insists on reading hyperliterally. Each human being is challenged to live his days virtuously. If he does, those days themselves are woven into a garment of splendor; at death, they "draw near," enveloping him, escorting him to the beyond.Sefer ha-Zohar (The Book of Radiance) has amazed and overwhelmed readers ever since it emerged mysteriously in medieval Spain toward the end of the thirteenth century. Written in a unique Aramaic, this masterpiece of Kabbalah exceeds the dimensions of a normal book; it is virtually a body of literature, comprising over twenty discrete sections. The bulk of the Zohar consists of a running commentary on the Torah, from Genesis through Deuteronomy.

    Instead, it’s usually scattered throughout textbooks, self-made crib sheets, and sticky-notes on their computer monitor. Now there’s a better way! The Zondervan Get an A! Study Guides to Biblical Greek and Biblical Hebrew are handy, at-a-glance study aids ideal for last minute review, a quick overview of grammar, or as an aid in translation or sermon preparation. Each set contains four information-packed sheets that are laminated and three-hole-punched, making them both durable and portable. The study guides are tied to Zondervan’s Basics of Biblical Greek and Basics of Biblical Hebrew.

    Much has been written about Rashi and his grandsons, the Tosafot, but almost nothing of his daughters. Legend has it that they were learned in a time when women were forbidden to study the sacred texts. Rashi's Daughters tells the story of these forgotten women.

    Rabbi Becher demonstrates that Judaism today is anything but anachronistic rites and disjointed rituals. Rather, his book opens a portal to a vibrant lifestyle that brings joy and meaning to Jewish living. Based on years of answering thousands of challenging inquiries, Becher's work blends elements of Jewish philosophy and law with an intensely practical explanation of how Jews actually live.

     Lew is one of the most sought-after rabbis on the lecture circuit. He has had national media exposure for his dynamic fusion of Eastern insight and Bible study, having been the subject of stories on ABC News, the McNeil Lehrer News Hour, and various NPR programs. In the past five years there have been national conferences on Jewish meditation in San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Miami where Lew has been a featured speaker. Lew's first book, One God Clapping, was a San Francisco Chronicle bestseller and winner of the PEN Josephine Miles Award for Literary Excellence. Publishers Weekly hailed him as "a perceptive thinker" for his "refreshing and sometimes startling perspective" in his last book, This Is Real and You Are Completely Unprepared.

    In one the photographs show only happy times -- from after World War II, when she and her daughters had come to America. But the other album includes much sadder times from before -- when their life in Germany was destroyed by the Nazis' rise to power. For as long as Rachel can remember, Oma has closed the other album when she's gotten to the sad part. But today Oma will share it all. Today Rachel will hear about what her grandmother, her mother, and her aunts endured. And she'll see how the power of this Jewish family's love for one another gave them the strength to survive. Marisabina Russo illuminates a difficult subject for young readers with great sensitivity. Based on the author's own family history, Always Remember Me is a heartbreaking -- and inspiring -- book sure to touch anyone who reads it.

    Miraculously, Judita Sternova of Kurima, Czechoslovakia, survives persecutions, hiding, flight, capture, deportation, and the Camp. Like the few other surviving Jews, she could not bear to remain in her village emptied of family and other Jews and emigrates to England and, eventually, the United States. After more than fifty years Sherman gets up from her years of memories, private resistance, and public silence to write this book. She is triggered to do so upon hearing a lecture by Professor Carrasco at Princeton on Religion and the Terror of History.The narrative is interspersed with Sherman's powerful poems that grab the reader's attention. Poignant original drawings made secretly by imprisoned women of Ravensbruck, at risk of their lives, illuminate the text. Sherman courageously bears witness to the terror of man and simultaneously challenges God for answers.This book should jolt us into remembrance, warning, and action.

    Set during the turbulent time of the Second Temple, this deeply evocative tale vividly brings to life the horror and destruction—through the personal, heart-wrenching story of one pious Jew.

    In Fear Less , renowned Kabbalist Yehuda Berg draws on 5,000-year old wisdom to offer a simple spiritual technology to conquer fear, eradicate anxiety, and end stress-related illness — all without drugs or expensive therapy.

    Hordes began to hear stories of Hispanos who lit candles on Friday night and abstained from eating pork. Puzzling over the matter, Hordes realized that these practices might very well have been passed down through the centuries from early crypto-Jewish settlers in New Spain. After extensive research and hundreds of interviews, Hordes concluded that there was, in New Mexico and the Southwest, a Sephardic legacy derived from the "converso" community of Spanish Jews.In "To the End of the Earth," Hordes explores the remarkable story of crypto-Jews and the tenuous preservation of Jewish rituals and traditions in Mexico and New Mexico over the past five hundred years. He follows the crypto-Jews from their Jewish origins in medieval Spain and Portugal to their efforts to escape persecution by migrating to the New World and settling in the far reaches of the northern Mexican frontier.Drawing on individual biographies (including those of colonial officials accused of secretly practicing Judaism), family histories, Inquisition records, letters, and other primary sources, Hordes provides a richly detailed account of the economic, social and religious lives of crypto-Jews during the colonial period and after the annexation of New Mexico by the United States in 1846. While the American government offered more religious freedom than had the Spanish colonial rulers, cultural assimilation into Anglo-American society weakened many elements of the crypto-Jewish tradition.Hordes concludes with a discussion of the reemergence of crypto-Jewish culture and the reclamation of Jewish ancestry within the Hispano community in the late twentieth century. He examines the publicity surrounding the rediscovery of the crypto-Jewish community and explores the challenges inherent in a study that attempts to reconstruct the history of a people who tried to leave no documentary record.

    He tells his story from childhood, through the Holocaust and through his term as Chief Rabbi.

    With this edition, the voices of Rashi, Ibn Ezra, Nachmanides, Rashbam, and other medieval commentators come alive once more, speaking in a contemporary English translation annotated and explicated for lay readers.Each page of The Commentators’ Bible contains several Hebrew verses from the book of Exodus, surrounded by both the 1917 and 1985 JPS translations and new English translations of the major commentators. This large-format volume is beautifully designed for ease of navigation among the many elements on each page, including explanatory notes and selected additional comments from the works of Bekhor Shor, Hizkuni, Abarbanel, Sforno, Gersonides, and others. JPS is pleased to make available for group study and teaching purposes individual parshiyot (weekly Torah readings) from The Commentators’ Bible.

    In this definitive volume of Italian Jewish recipes, Edda Servi Machlin, a native of Pitigliano, Italy, a Tuscan village that was once home to a vibrant Jewish community, reveals the secrets of this delicate and unique culinary tradition that has flourished for more than two thousand years.Originally introduced into the region by Jewish settlers from Judea, other Middle Eastern countries, and North Africa, Italian Jewish cuisine was always more than a mere adaptation of Italian dishes to the Jewish dietary laws; it was a brilliant marriage of ancient Jewish dishes and preparation methods to the local ingredients that relied on the imaginative use of fresh herbs, fruit, and vegetables. Fifteen hundred years later, with the influx of Iberian refugees, it was enriched by some Sephardic (from Spain and Portugal) dishes.Here you'll find recipes for the quintessential Italian Jewish dishes -- from Goose "Ham," Spicy Chicken Liver Toasts, and Jewish Caponata to Sabbath Saffron Rice, Purim Ravioli, and Tagliatelle Jewish Style (Noodle Kugel); from Creamed Baccalà, Red Snapper Jewish Style, and Artichokes Jewish Style to Creamed Fennel and Fried Squash Flowers; from Couscous Salad and Sourdough Challah Bread to Haman's Ears, Honey Cake, and Passover Almond Biscotti.Selected from Edda Servi Machlin's three widely admired books on Italian Jewish cuisine and filled with beautifully rendered memories from her birthplace, this rare collection of more than three hundred recipes is a powerful tribute to a rich cultural heritage and a rare gift to food lovers. With a special section on Jewish holiday menus, Classic Italian Jewish Cooking is a volume to treasure for generations.

    Section II addresses her nuanced understanding of oppression and includes her important work on anti-Judaism in Christian feminism. Section III contains a variety of short and highly readable pieces that make clear Plaskow's central role in the creation of Jewish feminism, including the essential "Beyond Egalitarianism." Finally, section IV presents her writings on the significance of sexual ethics to the larger project of transforming Judaism.Intelligently edited with the help of Rabbi Donna Berman, and including pieces never before published, The Coming of Lilith is indispensable for religious studies students, fans of Plaskow's work, and those pursuing a Jewish education.

    Sentenced to death, hounded at every step, they kept themselves alive by peddling cigarettes in Warsaw's Three Crosses Square - where the author, a member of the Jewish Underground in Poland, met and helped them and recorded their story. Several of the children were finally caught and killed, but most survived and are alive today. The story of the cigarette sellers has been published in Polish, Romanian, Hebrew and Yiddish, and a dramatised version has been broadcast in Israel. The book was awarded a literary prize by the World Jewish Congress in New York.

    The moment you were born, you forgot everything. But don't worry, in this book, you will learn about all those wonderful secrets again. And you will even know how you got that indentation above your lip! Noted folklorist Howard Schwartz elegantly shapes this legend. Matched with luminous art, Before You Were Born is the perfect book for bedtime - and all the time.

    For thousands of years thereafter, the distinctive practice of circumcision served to set the Jews apart from theirneighbors. The apostle Paul rejected it as a worthless practice, emblematic of Judaism's fixation on physical matters. Christian theologians followed his lead, arguing that whereas Christians sought spiritual fulfillment, Jews remained mired in such pointless concerns as diet and circumcision. Astime went on, Europeans developed folklore about malicious Jews who performed sacrificial murders of Christian children and delighted in genital mutilation. But Jews held unwaveringly to the belief that being a Jewish male meant being physically circumcised and to this day even most non-observantJews continue to follow this practice. In this book, Leonard B. Glick offers a history of Jewish and Christian beliefs about circumcision from its ancient origins to the current controversy. By the turn of the century, more and more physicians in America and England--but not, interestingly, incontinental Europe--were performing the procedure routinely. Glick shows that Jewish American physicians were and continue to be especially vocal and influential champions of the practice which, he notes, serves to erase the visible difference between Jewish and gentile males. Informed medicalopinion is now unanimous that circumcision confers no benefit and the practice has declined. In Jewish circles it is virtually taboo to question circumcision, but Glick does not flinch from asking whether this procedure should continue to be the defining feature of modern Jewish identity.

    Ian Schoenherr's beautifully rendered illustrations lovingly depict growing up in a caring family and a supportive community.

    Drawing on his 13 years of teaching this ancient form of spiritual technology to thousands of students, Berg reveals an extremely practical, step-by-step system for helping readers create extraordinary events and astonishing miracles in their daily lives. A number of helpful exercises are included.

    Jacobo loves to visit his abuelita, his grandmother, especially at Easter time. But Abuelita has a big secret. During semana santa, Holy Week, his grandmother never makes bread, only tortillas made without yeast. She never eats pork, and she lights two candles on Friday nights. But whenever Jacobo asks her questions, she answers, "Ah, mijito, my child, it is the way of our family." One day, Abuelita is finally ready to share her secret. "Sit with me on the porch. It is time to tell you the secret of our family . . ."

    With a thorough command of modern Yiddish culture as well as its centuries-old history, Jeffrey Shandler investigates the remarkable diversity of contemporary encounters with the language. His study traverses the broad spectrum of people who engage with Yiddish—from Hasidim to avant-garde performers, Jews as well as non-Jews, fluent speakers as well as those who know little or no Yiddish—in communities across the Americas, in Europe, Israel, and other outposts of "Yiddishland."

    Letters. Jewish studies. Buddhist studies. LETTERS TO A BUDDHIST JEW is a collection of letters between a Jew drawn to Buddhism and an Orthodox rabbi. "In this extraordinary exchange, David Gottlieb, speaking from a Zen perspective, pinpoints the critical questions modern Jews are moved to ask of their tradition, and Akiva Tatz, with kindness, patience and consummate skill, answers with the voice of a fully developed spiritual Judaism. This is a fascinating book: the most serious contribution in this field to date"-Zoketsu Norman Fischer, founder of the Everyday Zen Foundation. According to Jonathan Rosenblum, a columnist for the Jerusalem Post, this book is "a 'must read' for any searching Jew." Gottlieb is an award-winning fiction writer and Rabbi Dr. Tatz is a physician and the founder and director of the Jerusalem Medical Ethics Forum.

    In No Heaven, her eleventh collection, she takes a hint from John Lennon's "Imagine" to wrestle with the world as it is: "no hell below us, / above us only sky."It is a world of cities, including New York, London, Jerusalem, and Berlin, where the poet can celebrate pickup basketball, peace marches, and the energy of graffiti. It is also a world of families, generations coming and going, of love, love affairs, and friendship. Then it is a world full of art and music, of Rembrandt and Bonnard, Mozart and Brahms. Finally, it is a world haunted by violence and war. No Heaven rises to a climax with elegies for Yitzhak Rabin, assassinated by an Israeli zealot, and for the poet's mother, whose death is experienced in the context of a post-9/11 impulse to destroy that seems to seduce whole nations.Yet Ostriker's ultimate stance is to "Try to praise the mutilated world," as the poet Adam Zagajewski has counseled. At times lyric, at times satiric, Ostriker steadfastly pursuesin No Heaven her poetics of ardor, a passion for the here and now that has chastened and consoled her many devoted readers.

    Whereas for many centuries conversion to Judaism was relatively rare, in modern times it is a significant phenomenon. This book will enable readers to better understand the phenomenon and to appreciate the need for halakhic conversions.

    Peres is also a fascinating, complex man–a brilliant intellectual who is entirely at home in the corridors of power; an individual revered by the world and yet highly controversial in his own country; at once a hero and a figure of tragedy. Now, in this definitive biography, Michael Bar-Zohar takes the full measure of a towering, enigmatic leader.Drawing on his decades-long association with Peres, as well as the full cooperation of the leader’s family, friends, supporters, and political rivals, Bar-Zohar has crafted a vibrant, daring, richly textured portrait of a man whose life and career span the entire history of Israel. Born in Poland in 1923, Peres emigrated to the Holy Land at the age of twelve, already a fiercely idealistic Zionist. Peres joined a kibbutz and, while still in his teens, became the leader of a major youth movement. When the struggle for Israeli independence broke out, future prime minister David Ben-Gurion tapped him to join his inner circle. As director general of the Defense Ministry under Ben-Gurion, Peres spearheaded a far-reaching campaign to turn Israel into a major military power. He jump-started Israel’s aircraft industry, forged a secret alliance with France, and successfully pursued his dream of making Israel a nuclear power. And yet Peres’s real triumph came not as a man of war but as a peacemaker. Elected prime minister in 1984, Peres brought new hope by pulling Israeli troops out of the quagmire in Lebanon, defusing tensions with Jordan, and, at the risk of his own political future, making serious overtures to the Palestinians. Peres and his longtime rival Yitzhak Rabin together secured the top-secret Oslo Accords of 1993, which won them and Yasser Arafat the Nobel Peace Prize–only to see the hope of peace shattered in a resurgence of regional violence.In a half-century of leadership, Peres has worked beside–or fought against–such giants as Moshe Dayan, Golda Meir, Menachem Begin, Ariel Sharon, and, tragically, Rabin, who was slain at the rally that marked his reconciliation with Peres. Still powerful in his eighties, Peres stands as a true hero, a visionary who embodies the history of his nation. In this stunning, courageously frank, and scrupulously factual biography, Michael Bar-Zohar gives an eminent man his due.From the Hardcover edition.

    Encompassing Jewish mystical literatures from those of late antiquity to works of Polish Hasidism, Moshe Idel highlights the diversity of Kabbalistic views on eros and distinguishes between the major forms of eroticism.The author traces the main developments of a religious formula that reflects the union between a masculine divine attribute and a feminine divine attribute, and he asks why such an “erotic formula” was incorporated into the Jewish prayer book. Idel shows how Kabbalistic literature was influenced not only by rabbinic literature but also by Greek thought that helped introduce a wider understanding of eros. Addressing topics ranging from cosmic eros and androgyneity to the affinity between C. J. Jung and Kabbalah to feminist thought, Idel’s deeply learned study will be of consuming interest to scholars of religion, Judaism, and feminism.

    The Baal Shem Tov, or the Besht, as he is commonly called, led a revival in Judaism that put love and joy at the center of religious life and championed the piety of the common folk against the rabbinic establishment. He has been recognized as one of the greatest teachers in Jewish history, and much of what is alive and vibrant in Judaism today, in all denominations, derives from his inspiration. Abraham Joshua Heschel, who was descended from several illustrious Hasidic dynasties, wrote: "The Baal Shem Tov brought heaven to earth. He and his disciples, the Hasidim, banished melancholy from the soul and uncovered the ineffable delight of being a Jew."

    It was the year 1159 when the medieval Jewish traveler Benjamin left his native town of Tudela in northern Spain on an adventure to see the places he had read about in the Bible. He traveled for fourteen years - from Rome to Constantinople to Jerusalem to Baghdad, among others - by ship, by cart, and on foot, enduring great hardships in his quest for knowledge of other places and people.Working from Benjamin's original chronicle, written in Hebrew, as well as other sources on the period, Uri Shulevitz captures the true spirit of this amazing adventurer, using a text written in the first person and superlative illustrations.The Travels of Benjamin of Tudela is a 2006 Bank Street - Best Children's Book of the Year.

    Some find in sacrifice the key to the mysterious and violent origins of human culture. Others see these cultic rituals as merely the fossilized vestiges of primitive superstition. Some believe that ancient Jewish sacrifice was doomed from the start, destined to be replaced by the Christian eucharist. Others think that the temple was fated to be superseded by the synagogue. In Purity, Sacrifice, and the Temple Jonathan Klawans demonstrates that these supersessionist ideologies have prevented scholars from recognizing the Jerusalem temple as a powerful source of meaning and symbolism to the ancient Jews who worshiped there. Klawans exposes and counters such ideologies by reviewing the theoretical literature on sacrifice and taking a fresh look at a broad range of evidence concerning ancient Jewish attitudes toward the temple and its sacrificial cult. The first step toward reaching a more balanced view is to integrate the study of sacrifice with the study of purity-a ritual structure that has commonly been understood as symbolic by scholars and laypeople alike. The second step is to rehabilitate sacrificial metaphors, with the understanding that these metaphors are windows into the ways sacrifice was understood by ancient Jews. By taking these steps-and by removing contemporary religious and cultural biases-Klawans allows us to better understand what sacrifice meant to the early communities who practiced it. Armed with this new understanding, Klawans reevaluates the ideas about the temple articulated in a wide array of ancient sources, including Josephus, Philo, Pseudepigrapha, the Dead Sea Scrolls, New Testament, and Rabbinic literature. Klawans mines these sources with an eye toward illuminating the symbolic meanings of sacrifice for ancient Jews. Along the way, he reconsiders the ostensible rejection of the cult by the biblical prophets, the Qumran sect, and Jesus. While these figures may have seen the temple in their time as tainted or even defiled, Klawans argues, they too-like practically all ancient Jews-believed in the cult, accepted its symbolic significance, and hoped for its ultimate efficacy.

    When Rabbi Nachman first started telling his stories, he declared: "Now I am going to tell you stories." The reason he did so was because in generations so far from God the only remedy was to present the secrets of the Torah--including even the greatest of them--in the form of stories. --from the Preface For centuries, spiritual teachers have told stories to convey lessons about God and perceptions of the world around us. Hasidic master Rebbe Nachman of Breslov (1772-1810) perfected this teaching method through his engrossing and entertaining stories that are fast-moving, brilliantly structured, and filled with penetrating insights. This collection presents the wisdom of Rebbe Nachman, translated by Rabbi Aryeh Kaplan and accompanied by illuminating commentary drawn from the works of Rebbe Nachman's pupils. This important work brings you authentic interpretations of Rebbe Nachman's stories, allowing you to experience the rich heritage of Torah and Kabbalah that underlies each word of his inspirational teachings.

    His Foundation trilogy paved the way for science fiction that was more speculative and philosophical than had been previously seen in the genre, and his book I, Robot and his story "The Bicentennial Man" have been made into popular movies. First published as a teenager in John W. Campbell's groundbreaking science fiction magazine Astounding, Asimov published over two hundred books during his lifetime.While most prolific writers tend to concentrate almost exclusively on a single genre, Asimov was a polymath who wrote widely on a variety of subjects. He authored mysteries, autobiographies, histories, satires, companions to Shakespeare, children's books on science, and collections of bawdy limericks. A lifelong atheist, he nevertheless wrote more than a half dozen books on the Bible.Asimov's varied interests establish him as a premier public intellectual, one who was frequently called upon to clarify debates in science, in history, and on the effects of technology on the modern age. Conversations with Isaac Asimov collects interviews with a man considered to be--along with Robert Heinlein, A. E. van Vogt, and Arthur C. Clarke--a founder of modern science fiction. Despite this, Asimov is perhaps best known for his many books of popular science writing. Carl Sagan once described Asimov as the greatest explainer of his age, and this talent made Asimov a natural for the interview form. His manner is always crisp and lucid, his tone always engaging, and his comments always enlightening.

    Almost immediately, she found herself caught up in Israel’s War of Independence and the struggle for the survival of the nascent state. Abandoning studies, she secretly joined the underground Haganah defense forces, served as a medic in the siege of Jerusalem and in the fledgling Israel Air Force. The letters she wrote to her family during that incredible year vividly describe her impressions and feelings and capture the historic events as they occurred.Letters from Jerusalem 1947-1948 is a fascinating personal account that adds an authentic voice to the history of that pivotal period.

    In a wise, Torah-based, deeply fulfilling manner, Rebbetzin Tziporah Heller shares her enriching experiences with the reader, bringing clarity to the challenges that we all face. This eminently readable book has the power to be utterly life-changing for every reader!

    At its core, it discusses the function of a nassi, a Jewish leader, who awakens within every single person the deepest part of the soul. Similar to Moses, the nassi inspires the person so that one's most basic faith in G-d leaves the realm of the abstract and becomes real.

    Jenson focuses on the overt sense of the book as an erotic love poem in order to discover how this evocative poetry solicits a theological reading. Jenson finds a story of human love for God in this complex poetic book and offers a commentary that elucidates and inspires.

    Believing that the Torah has a message relevant to every generation, he discusses how the perennial values of Judaism are to be understood in our day. Rabbi Amital also offers guidance on deeply personal matters, such as coping with crisis and independent decision-making. He especially highlights the need to be a mensch and to respect all people created in God's image. Religious life should not contradict one's humanity and individuality, but rather flow from them.

    This new translation brings her voice to contemporary readers.

    Bar Mitzvah Disco. Everyone's Invited Pick up your table card and come be our guest on this journey back to a time when style, music, and lust went hand in hand with a Day-Glo necklace, a pair of Z Cavaricci jeans, and Vuarnet shades. In this parallel universe, tall girls slow-danced with short boys at arm's length, suburban break-dance pioneers vied with Lionel Richie fanatics for dance-floor space, Aunt Edna came ready to mount an assault on the dessert buffet in her best lime-green polyester pantsuit, and the phrase the higher the hair, the closer to God took on a whole new meaning. With special appearances from: AJ Jacobs, 99 red balloons, Ben Lee, the California Raisins, a well-intentioned Burt Reynolds impersonator, Jessi Klein, Joel Stein, DJ Squeak E. Clean, members of Foreigner (circa the Agent Provocateur tour), Sarah Silverman, OJ Simpson, Noah Tepperberg, Wendy Spero, the cast of Breakin', Mark Ronson, Steve Fortgang and southern Florida's number one Bar Mitzvah band Bar Mitzvah Disco is an irresistible journey, two parts Fantasy Island to one part Vegas, rife with gorgeous girls, piles of cash, and ungracious thank-you notes presented straight from the source.

    Filled with breathtaking photographs, including many taken by the author, this all-new keepsake illustrated book offers an unprecedented, visual journey through the actual locations of some of history's most famous events, from Mt. Ararat, to the Red Sea, to Mt. Sinai.Walking the Bible is the story of one man's personal quest. Feeling disconnected from the religious community he had known as a child, Feiler set out on a perilous journey across the Middle East to discover the roots of the Bible. The result is a fascinating, unprecedented journey -- by foot, jeep, rowboat, and camel -- through the most famous stories ever told.Walking the Bible: A Photographic Journey combinines fascinating imagery with Feiler's famously lively prose. Feiler provides a panoramic view of the land where the world's great religions were born -- and adds a new dimension to the stories that continue to inspire the human spirit.Bruce Feiler is an award-winning author, journalist, and speaker. Feiler is a graduate of Yale and Cambridge Universities. He is a frequent contributor to NPR's "All Things Considered," a contributing editor for Gourmet, and has written for The New Yorker, the New York Times Magazine, the Washington Post, USA Today, Esquire, and Conde Nast Traveler. He lives in New York City.--USA Today

    With a lively command of a wide range of Jewish sources—from the Bible and the Talmud to the legal and philosophical writings of the Middle Ages to Enlightenment thinkers and modern scholars—Shaye J. D. Cohen considers the varied responses to this provocative question and in the process provides the fullest cultural history of Jewish circumcision available.

    - Review of Chicago Sun Times.    Shortly after World War One, Van Paassen started his career as a journalist at The Globe, a Canadian newspaper in Toronto. His next job as a journalist was at the great southern liberal newspaper, The Atlanta Constitution. This is where Van Paassen actively became interested in Jewish affairs after interviewing a Rabbi from New York who had just returned from Mandatory Palestine. From this point on, Van Paassen took a great personal interest in the issues of Palestine and the plight of European Jewry. In 1925, he became the foreign correspondent for the New York Evening World, which placed him in Paris. The stage was being set for World War Two and the rise of fascism in Germany and Italy from which Van Paassen passionately reported.   In 1931, the New York Evening World stopped publishing; Van Paassen remained in France and wrote for The Globe and its competitor the Toronto Star. In 1933, Van Paassen, a fluent German speaker, reported on the Nazis and courageously exposed the doctrines and policies of Hitler's fascist regime. His news reports greatly upset the Nazis, and the Toronto Star became known as atrocity propaganda. The newspaper was banned from Germany and Van Paassen was expelled but not before he was imprisoned by the Nazis for several weeks, which included some physical blows to Van Paassen's own person.    Van Paassen spent quite some time in Palestine and wrote extensively for his newspapers and wrote many books and articles on the subject. When one reads this book today, one notices how profound and ironic it is, that the times which Van Paassen describes of his generation are now repeating themselves, the only differences are the players' names.

    In Germany, conversely, during the 1980s, when Jonas himself was an octogenarian, he became a veritable intellectual celebrity, owing to the runaway success of his 1979 book The Imperative of Responsibility. In the 1920s, Jonas studied philosophy with Edmund Husserl and Martin Heidegger, but the Nazi regime forced him to leave Germany for London in 1933. He later emigrated to Palestine and eventually enlisted in the British Army’s Jewish Brigade to fight against Hitler. Following the Israeli War of Independence, he emigrated to the United States and took a position at the New School for Social Research in New York. He became part of a circle of friends around Hannah Arendt and Heinrich Blucher, which included Adolph Lowe and Paul Tillich.   This memoir, a diverse collection of previously unpublished materials—diaries, letters, interviews, and public statements—has been organized by Christian Wiese, whose afterword links the Jewish dimensions of Jonas’s life and philosophy. Because Jonas’s life spanned the entire twentieth century, this memoir provides nuanced pictures of German Jewry during the Weimar Republic, of German Zionism, of the Jewish emigrants in Palestine during the 1930s and 1940s, and of German Jewish émigré intellectuals in New York. Since Memoirs was first published in 2008, interest in the work of Hans Jonas has grown among American academics in recent years.

    "Spiritual practice reveals that the Garden of Eden is right where you are standing and helps you to be here, now. Therefore, Jewish spiritual practices cultivate joy, hope, resilience and understanding so that you can undertake your soul's work in this lifetime with vision, passion and integrity."from the IntroductionThis innovative guidebook makes accessible Judaism's spiritual pathways, principles and applications, and empowers you to test their value within your own life. Each chapter provides step-by-step, recipe-like guides to a particular Jewish practice or group of practices, gives examples of how they might unfold inside your life, and shows how each can help refuel your spirit throughout the day.You'll discover:Prayer practices for embracing the body and creation with awe, limbering up your mind, and preparing for compassionate action How to draw sustenance from the Great Mystery, the inexplicable and unknowable Source of Life How to mine the Torah's stories, commentaries, symbols and metaphors for meaning Ways to develop your Hebrew vocabulary so you can formulate your own interpretations of sacred text How to explore and practice mitzvot as meaningful, compelling parts of your spiritual life How to view the Jewish people as a precious human resource and as a model for resilience... and much, much more.

    Later, he traveled to post-war Germany and he earned a living as a courier for his mother's black market business. His family eventually came to America where he struggled to get an education, held down three jobs and courted the girl of his dreams. Major General Shachnow began his career in the US Army as a driver for various officers in Europe, all of whom spotted potential in the young private and encouraged him to become an officer. After nearly forty years of service to his country, including two tours of duty in Vietnam, Major General Shachnow could look back on a career and a life with pride, sadness and a sense of duty spawned from freedom, both lost and earned.

    Doctorow questions the very notion of the Jewish American writer, insisting that all great writing is secular and universal. Allegra Goodman embraces the categorization, arguing that it immediately binds her to her readers. Dara Horn, among the youngest of these writers, describes the tendency of Jewish writers to focus on anti-Semitism and advocates a more creative and positive way of telling the Jewish story. Thane Rosenbaum explains that as a child of Holocaust survivors, he was driven to write in an attempt to reimagine the tragic endings in Jewish history.Here are the stories of how these writers became who they are: Saul Bellow on his adolescence in Chicago, Grace Paley on her early love of Romantic poetry, Chaim Potok on being transformed by the work of Evelyn Waugh. Here, too, are Philip Roth, Cynthia Ozick, Erica Jong, Jonathon Rosen, Tova Mirvis, Pearl Abraham, Alan Lelchuk, Rebecca Goldstein, Nessa Rapoport, and many more.Spanning three generations of Jewish writing in America, these essays — by turns nostalgic, comic, moving, and deeply provocative- constitute an invaluable investigation into the thinking and the work of some of America’s most important writers.

    Along with this secret. From the instant I found out I was not who I thought I was.” Every family has its own history. Many families carry a tragic past. Like the author’s mother, many Poles did not tell their children a complete story of their wartime exploits—of the underground Home Army, the tragedy of the Warsaw Uprising, the civil war against the Communists. Years had to pass before the stories of suffering and heroism could be told.In Family History of Fear, Agata Tuszyńska, one of Poland’s most admired poets and cultural historians, writes of the stories she heard from her mother about her secret past. Tuszyńska, author of Vera Gran (“a book of extraordinary depth and power”—Richard Eder, The Boston Globe; “captivating”—Newsweek; “darkly absorbing, shrewd, and sharply etched”—Publishers Weekly), has written a powerful memoir about growing up after the Second World War in Communist Poland—blonde, blue-eyed, and Catholic.The author was nineteen years old and living in Warsaw when her mother told her the truth—that she was Jewish—and began to tell her stories of the family’s secret past in Poland. Tuszyńska, who grew up in a country beset by anti-Semitism, rarely hearing the word “Jew” (only from her Polish Catholic father, and then, always in derision), was unhinged, ashamed, and humiliated. The author writes of how she skillfully erased the truth within herself, refusing to admit the existence of her other half. In this profoundly moving and resonant book, Tuszyńska investigates her past and writes of her journey to uncover her family’s history during World War II—of her mother at age eight and her mother, entering the Warsaw Ghetto for two years as conditions grew more desperate, and finally escaping just before the uprising, and then living “hidden on the other side.” She writes of her father, one of five thousand Polish soldiers taken prisoner in 1939, becoming, later, the country’s most famous radio sports announcer; and of her relatives and their mysterious pasts, as she tries to make sense of the hatred of Jews in her country. She writes of her discoveries and of her willingness to accept a radically different definition of self, reading the works of Isaac Bashevis Singer, opening up for her a world of Polish Jewry as he became her guide, and then writing about his life and work, circling her Jewish self in Lost Landscapes: In Search of Isaac Bashevis Singer and the Jews of Poland. A beautiful and affecting book of discovery and acceptance; a searing, insightful portrait of Polish Jewish life, lived before and after Hitler’s Third Reich.From the Hardcover edition.

    The readings in this book are for anyone seeking a deeper level of personal reflection and spiritual intimacy--and a clearer understanding of just what makes Yom Kippur so holy.Drawn from a variety of sources--ancient, medieval, modern, Jewish and non-Jewish--this selection of readings, prayers and insights explores the opportunities for inspiration and reflection inherent in the themes addressed on the Day of Atonement: sin, forgiveness, repentance, spiritual growth, and being at one with self, family, community and God. These readings enable you to enter into the spirit of Yom Kippur in a personal and powerful way while they uplift and inform. They will add to the benefits of your High Holy Day experience year after year.

    From traditional poetic forms (sonnet, terza rima, villanelle, sestina, acrostic, loose ottava rima) to an austere free verse, Osherow mixes humor and seriousness while maintaining a conversational tone. These poems deal with Jewish tradition and the land of Israel in revelatory new ways.Jacqueline Osherow is the author of four previous poetry collections. Her work has appeared in The Norton Anthology of Jewish American Literature, The Penguin Book of the Sonnet, Best American Poetry (1995 and 1998) and The Extraordinary Tide: New Poetry by American Women. Awards include fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation and the NEA. She is a distinguished professor of English at the University of Utah.

    The movement, founded in the 1880s, was dominated by Russian-speaking intellectuals, including Abraham Cahan, Mikhail Zametkin and Chaim Zhitlovsky. Socialist leaders quickly found Yiddish essential to convey their message to the Jewish immigrant community, and they developed a remarkable public culture through lectures and social events, workers' education societies, Yiddish schools, and a press that found its strongest voice in the mass-circulation newspaper Forverts. Arguing against the view that socialism and Yiddish culture arrived as Old World holdovers, Michels demonstrates that they arose in New York in response to local conditions and thrived not despite Americanisation, but because of it. And the influence of the movement swirled far beyond the Lower East Side, to a trans-national culture in which individuals, ideas, and institutions crossed the Atlantic. New York Jews, in the beginning, exported Yiddish socialism to Russia, not the other way around. States well into the 20th Century and left an important political legacy that extends to the rise of neo-conservatism. A story of hopeful successes and bitter disappointments, A Fire in Their Hearts brings to vivid life this formative period for American Jews and the American left.

    An aid to reading Torah and the essays in Etz Hayim.

    When the Germans crashed through American lines during what became known as the "Battle of the Bulge," in December 1944, thousands of stunned American soldiers who had never before been in combat were taken prisoner. Most were sent to prisoner-of-war camps, where their treatment was dictated by the Geneva Convention and the rules of warfare.For an unfortunate few - mostly Jewish or other "ethnic" GIs - a different fate awaited them. Taken first to Stalag 9B at Bad Orb, Germany, 350 soldiers were singled out for "special treatment," segregated from their buddies, and transported by unheated railroad boxcars with no sanitary facilities on a week-long journey to Berga-an-der-Elster, a picturesque village 50 miles south of Leipzig. Awaiting them at Berga was a sinister slave-labor camp bulging with 1,000 inmates. The incarceration at Berga is the only known instance of captured American soldiers being turned into slave laborers at a Nazi concentration camp. Given Up for Dead is the story of their survival.For over three months, the American soldiers worked under brutal, inhuman conditions, building tunnels in a mountainside for the German munitions industry. The prisoners had no protective masks or clothing; were worked for 12 hours per shift with no food, water, or rest; were beaten regularly for the most minor infractions (or none at all); were fed only starvation rations; slept two to a bed in ghastly, lice-infested bunks; and were never allowed a bath or a change of clothing. Of the 350 GIs in the original contingent, 70 of them died within the first two months at Berga; the others struggled to survive in a living nightmare. As the Allies' front lines moved inexorably closer to Berga, the Nazi guards forced the inmates to endure a death march as a way of keeping them from being liberated; many died along the route. Only the timely arrival of an American armored division at war's end saved them all from certain death.Strangely, when the war was over, many of the Americans who had survived Berga were required to sign a "security certificate" which forbade them from ever disclosing the details of their imprisonment at Berga. Until recent years, what had happened to the American soldiers at Berga has been a closely guarded secret.

    Book 1 in the series.

    Sachar, gives us a comprehensive and enthralling chronicle of the achievements and traumas of the Jews over the last four hundred years. Tracking their fate from Western Europe’s age of mercantilism in the seventeenth century to the post-Soviet and post-imperialist Islamic upheavals of the twenty-first century, Sachar applies his renowned narrative skill to the central role of the Jews in many of the most impressive achievements of modern civilization: whether in the rise of economic capitalism or of political socialism; in the discoveries of theoretical physics or applied medicine; in “higher” literary criticism or mass communication and popular entertainment. As his account unfolds and moves from epoch to epoch, from continent to continent, from Europe to the Americas and the Middle East, Sachar evaluates communities that, until lately, have been underestimated in the perspective of Jewish and world history—among them, Jews of Sephardic provenance, of the Moslem regions, and of Africa. By the same token, Sachar applies a master’s hand in describing and deciphering the Jews’ unique exposure and functional usefulness to totalitarian movements—fascist, Nazi, and Stalinist. In the process, he shines an unsparing light on the often widely dissimilar behavior of separate European peoples, and on separate Jewish populations, during the Holocaust.A distillation of the author’s lifetime of scholarly research and teaching experience, A History of the Jews in the Modern World provides a source of unsurpassed intellectual richness for university students and educated laypersons alike.From the Hardcover edition.

    Somehow, she lived - and lived with her Judaism intact! As a young orphan, all alone, she kept Pesach and Yom Kippur, and remained faithful to her parents faith in Hashem and love of Judaism. She retained her humanity after a series of harrowing experiences and miraculaous rescues that would have destroyed a less resourceful, less pure person. When the War was over, the memories of her past lay dormant inside her for fifty years, while she put together a new life in Canada and raised a fine Jewish family. But then she remembered her legacy, her mother's constant charge to her during the last weeks of her life: "Leah, you must live! You must remember! You must tell the world!" She has been telling it ever since. She speaks for those who are forever silenced.

    Finally - it's here! Every word of the full-size edition is here, but on a compact 7" x 10" page size lighter, with thinner paper. Learning is everywhere when you are at home or on the road. So now, in addition to your full-size Gemara at home, you can now have a travel Gemara for times when you need something more portable for the road. As new volumes in the full-size Schottenstein Edition are published in the series, we plan to publish this smaller, Daf Yomi size Edition, as well, so you can keep up with Daf Yomi or expand your sets on an ongoing basis. So if you want the advantages of the full-size edition, you'll still have it. But if you're a traveler who needs a smaller size or your budget is tight, the blatt Gemara can still be yours, and you can take it with you.

    Hinde Bergner, future mother of one of Yiddish literature's greatest poets and grandmother of one of Israel's leading painters, recalls the gradual impact of modernization on a traditional world as she finds herself caught between her thirst for a European education and true love, and the expectations of her traditional family. Written during the late 1930s as a series of episodes mailed to her children, and never completed due to Bergner's murder at the hand of the Nazis, the memoir provides details about her teachers and matchmakers, domestic religion and customs, and the colorful characters that peopled a Jewish world that is no more. Translated from the Yiddish and with a critical introduction by Justin Cammy, it is a lively addition to the library of Jewish women's memoir, and should be of interest to students of Eastern European Jewish culture and women's studies.

    Nature versus nurture. Free will versus determinism. Every November at the University of Chicago, the best minds in the world consider the question that ranks with these as one of the most enduring of human history: latke or hamantash? This great latke-hamantash debate, occurring every year for the past six decades, brings Nobel laureates, university presidents, and notable scholars together to debate whether the potato pancake or the triangular Purim pastry is in fact the worthier food. What began as an informal gathering is now an institution that has been replicated on campuses nationwide. Highly absurd yet deeply serious, the annual debate is anopportunity for both ethnic celebration and academic farce. In poetry, essays, jokes, and revisionist histories, members of elite American academies attack the latke-versus-hamantash question with intellectual panache and an unerring sense of humor, if not chutzpah. The Great Latke-Hamantash Debate is the first collection of the best of these performances, from Martha Nussbaum's paean to both foods—in the style of Hecuba's Lament—to Nobel laureate Leon Lederman's proclamation on the union of the celebrated dyad. The latke and the hamantash are here revealed as playing a critical role in everything from Chinese history to the Renaissance, the works of Jane Austen to constitutional law. Philosopher and humorist Ted Cohen supplies a wry foreword, while anthropologist Ruth Fredman Cernea provides historical and social context as well as an overview of the Jewish holidays, latke and hamantash recipes, and a glossary of Yiddish and Hebrew terms, making the book accessible even to the uninitiated. The University of Chicago may have split the atom in 1942, but it's still working on the equally significant issue of the latke versus the hamantash. “As if we didn’t have enough on our plates, here’s something new to argue about. . . . To have to pick between sweet and savory, round and triangular, latke and hamantash. How to choose? . . . Thank goodness one of our great universities—Chicago, no less—is on the case. For more than 60 years, it has staged an annual latke-hamantash debate. . . . So, is this book funny? Of course it’s funny, even laugh-out-loud funny. It’s Mickey Katz in academic drag, Borscht Belt with a PhD.”—David Kaufmann, Forward

    The study begins by defining what midrash is, discussing why it can be so difficult to understand, and explaining how the Jewish sages used midrash to interpret biblical text. It then explores two genres of midrash—the parable and the midrashic story—and utilizes detailed readings to demonstrate how to “translate” the language of the sages into contemporary terminology. Among the texts analyzed in the book are some of the most fascinating and complex biblical stories, including the binding of Isaac, the sin of David and Bathsheba, the book of Jonah, and Moses and the burning bush. This study conveys a sensitivity to the language and meanings of the Hebrew Bible and helps readers develop an appreciation for the language and teachings of the Jewish sages.

    They enjoyed a renaissance in these lands until their expulsion from Spain in 1492, when they settled in the countries along the Mediterranean, throughout the Ottoman Empire, in the Balkans, and in the lands of North Africa, Italy, Egypt, Palestine, and Syria, mixing with the Mizrahi, or Oriental, Jews already in these locations. Sephardic Jews have contributed some of the most important Jewish philosophers, poets, biblical commentators, Talmudic and Halachic scholars, and scientists, and have had a significant impact on the development of Jewish mysticism. Sephardic and Mizrahi Jewry brings together original work from the world's leading scholars to present a deep introductory overview of their history and culture over the past 1500 years. The book presents an overarching chronological and thematic survey of topics ranging from the origin of Sephardic and Mizrahi Jewry and their history to kabbalah, philosophy, and biblical commentary, and Sephardic Jewish life in the modern era. This collection represents the most up-to-date scholarship about Sephardic and Mizrahi Jewry available.Contributors include: Mark R. Cohen, Norman Stillman, David Bunis, Jonathan Decter, Yitzhak Kalimi, Moshe Idel, Annette B. Fromm, Zvi Zohar, Morris Fairstein, Pamela Dorn Sezgin, Mark Kligman, and Henry Abramson.

    Twenty-five articles by influential thinkers such as former presidential candidate Pat Buchanan, syndicated columnists Sam Francis, Joseph Sobran, Eric Margolis, and Charley Reese, leading economist Jude Wanniski, social critics Tom Fleming and Paul Gottfried, and religious figures Bishop John Michael Botean and the late Alfredo Cardinal Ottaviani make the case against the Iraqi conflict using conservative arguments on geopolitics, Christian morality, and common sense. Four detailed appendices on the war teachings of the Roman Catholic Church are also provided.

    Matthue Roth is an American original: an Orthodox Jew who cites Outkast and Michelle Tea among his influences, who won’t touch a light switch on Shabbos but mimics a screaming orgasm onstage while reading his paean to Orthodox girls.From the World Bank riots (what can you do when the revolution starts on Shabbos?) to Thursday night tranny basketball in San Francisco’s Dolores Park, Matthue takes readers on a journey among the queer and hip streets of urban America in his exuberant memoir, Yom Kippur a Go-Go. With humor and insight, Roth describes the tension between contemporary life and the demands of faith. He falls in love and in lust with a panoply of girls, both strictly kosher and determinedly secular, to the accompaniment of MP3 rabbinical lectures on modesty (“Boys are nothing but perverts and filthy animals!”).

    Read about the treasures of Amen - how it can open all the heavenly gates, enriching you with good fortune and success. You will rejoice with the people in these true stories when they reap the fruit of their efforts in this world.Begin reading these heartwarming anecdotes involving both ordinary people and our Torah giants of past and present, and you will find it hard to stop. Travel with the characters to other continents and eras, learning about the inherent power of answering AMEN to berachos or Kaddish and of the careful recitation of berachos. These moving stories will leave you inspired long after you've put the book down.This revised and expanded edition comprises the halachos of Amen and seventy five amazing true stories and meshalim. The message gleaned from them, when applied appropriately, can bring you untold blessing and bounty, enriching your life both spiritually and physically.

    This is the extraordinary true story of an English political tragedy - the bizarre tale of how the son of a member of Churchill's wartime cabinet was hanged for treason.

    The publisher's description of the book follows:"On July 10, 1941, the Jewish inhabitants in the small Polish town of Jedwabne were massacred by German policemen and some Polish townsmen and peasants. Chodakiewicz provides us with a criminal investigation of this mass murder. In this detailed study of a small area in Poland, Chodakiewicz examines the conditions that led to the heinous slaughter of Jedwabne's Jewish population.A dominant interpretation of this event depicts the Germans as the perpetrators of the crime while the Poles looked on. An alternative version suggests that the Germans plotted the crime, while the Poles executed the slaughter. The author argues that these two competing theses are not supported by the available evidence. Despite the limitation of sources, Chodakiewicz emphasizes a comprehensive methodology using all available documents, testimonies, oral recollections, and forensic and other physical evidence to reconstruct the history.In addition, Chodakiewicz provides an alternative interpretation to the dominant paradigms concerning Jewish-Polish relations in general and the mass murder in Jedwabne in particular." Professor Chodakiewicz is a Professor of History at The Institute of World Politics.Source (21st September 2015):http://www.iwp.edu/news_publications/...Description in Polish (21st September 2015):http://xlm.pl/ksiazka/mord-w-jedwabne...

    German society shunned Jews in the eighteenth century and opened unevenly to them in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, only to turn murderous in the Nazi era. By examining the everyday lives of ordinary Jews, this book portrays the drama of German-Jewish history -- the gradual ascent of Jews from impoverished outcasts to comfortable bourgeois citizens and then their dramatic descent into genocidal torment during the Nazi years. Building on social, economic, religious, and political history, it focuses on the qualitative aspects of ordinary life -- emotions, subjective impressions, and quotidian perceptions. How did ordinary Jews and their families make sense of their world? How did they construe changes brought about by industrialization? How did they make decisions to enter new professions or stick with the old, juggle traditional mores with contemporary ways? The Jewish adoption of secular, modern European culture and the struggle for legal equality exacted profound costs, both material and psychological. Even in the heady years of progress, a basic insecurity informed German-Jewish life. Jewish successes existed alongside an antisemitism that persisted as a frightful leitmotif throughout German-Jewish history. And yet the history that emerges from these pages belies simplistic interpretations that German antisemitism followed a straight path from Luther to Hitler. Neither Germans nor Jews can be typecast in their roles vis � vis one another. Non-Jews were not uniformly antisemitic but exhibited a wide range of attitudes towards Jews. Jewish daily life thus provides another vantage point from which to study the social life of Germany. Focusing on both internal Jewish life -- family, religion, culture and Jewish community -- and the external world of German culture and society provides a uniquely well-rounded portrait of a world defined by the shifting sands of inclusion and exclusion.

    Why should American Jews be an exception? In a land where racial and ethnic boundaries are becoming increasingly blurred, the American Jewish community is also shifting. In Every Tongue is both a groundbreaking look at the changing faces of the Jewish people and an examination of the timelessness of those changes. Ranging from distinct communities of African American Jews and adopted children of color in white Jewish families to the growing number of religious seekers of all races who hope to find a home in Judaism, In Every Tongue explores the origins, traditions, challenges, and joys of diverse Jews in America. This book explodes the myth of a single authentic Judaism and shines a bright light on the thousands of ethnically and racially diverse Jews in the United States who live full and rich Jewish lives. It is impossible to read In Every Tongue without coming away with a deeper respect for and a broader understanding of the Jewish people today. In a time when Jewish community leaders decry the shrinking of the Jewish population, In Every Tongue imagines a vibrant and daring future for the Jewish people: becoming who they have always been.

    Louis. This didn't happen yesterday. It was 1919." So begins a modern folktale based on the Yiddish community of the author's great-grandparents in the early 20th century. In original and engaging storytelling, Shlemiel Crooks introduces young readers to the history of Passover, as Pharaoh and a town of Jewish immigrants play tug-of-war with wine made from grapes left over from the Exodus from Egypt. Punctuated by colorful Yiddish expressions, the customs and language of a Jewish community of another time come alive.In a review, Booklist noted: "Shtetl humor and magic realism come to St. Louis in 1919 in this wry Pesach story. The best thing here is Olswanger's Yiddish storyteller's voice, particularly the hilarious curses she weaves into the story. Great for reading aloud." Shlemiel Crooks is a Sydney Taylor Honor Book in the Young Reader's Category from the Association of Jewish Libraries and a PJ Library Book.