Best of
Jewish

2012

Fugitive Colors


Lisa Barr - 2012
    Booklist calls the WWII era novel, "Masterfully conceived and crafted, Barr’s dazzling debut novel has it all: passion and jealousy, intrigue and danger." Fugitive Colors asks the reader: How far would you go for your passion? Would you kill for it? Steal for it? Or go to any length to protect it?Hitler’s War begins with the ruthless destruction of the avant-garde, but there is one young painter who refuses to let this happen. An accidental spy, Julian Klein, an idealistic American artist, leaves his religious upbringing for the artistic freedom of Paris in the early 1930s. Once he arrives in the “City of Light,” he meets a young German artist, Felix von Bredow, whose larger-than-life personality overshadows his inferior artistic ability, and the handsome and gifted artist Rene Levi, whose colossal talent will later serve to destroy him. The trio quickly becomes best friends, inseparable, until two women get in the way—the immensely talented artist Adrienne, Rene’s girlfriend with whom Julian secretly falls in love, and the stunning artist’s model Charlotte, a prostitute-cum-muse, who manages to bring great men to their knees.Artistic and romantic jealousies abound, as the characters play out their passions against the backdrop of the Nazis' rise to power. Felix returns to Berlin, where his father, a blue-blooded Nazi, is instrumental in creating the master plan to destroy Germany’s modern artists, and seeks his son’s help. Bolstered by vengeance, Felix will lure his friends to Germany, an ill-fated move, which will forever change their lives. Twists and turns, destruction and obsession, loss and hope will keep you up at night, as you journey from Chicago to Paris, Berlin to New York. With passionate strokes of captivating prose, Barr proves that while paintings have a canvas, passion has a face—that once exposed, the haunting images will linger . . . long after you have closed the book.The Hollywood Film Festival awarded Fugitive Colors first prize for “Best Unpublished Manuscript” (Opus Magnum Discovery Award). The novel has been optioned for movie development by Hollywood producer Arthur Sarkissian (Rush Hour trilogy, While You Were Sleeping).

Isaac's Army: A Story of Courage and Survival in Nazi-Occupied Poland


Matthew Brzezinski - 2012
    For the next six years, separately and in concert, they waged a heroic war of resistance against Hitler’s war machine that culminated in the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising. In Isaac’s Army, Matthew Brzezinski delivers the first-ever comprehensive narrative account of that struggle, following a group of dedicated young Jews—some barely out of their teens—whose individual acts of defiance helped rewrite the ending of World War II.  Based on first-person accounts from diaries, interviews, and surviving relatives, Isaac’s Army chronicles the extraordinary triumphs and devastating setbacks that befell the Jewish underground from its earliest acts of defiance in 1939 to the exodus to Palestine in 1946. This is the remarkable true story of the Jewish resistance from the perspective of those who led it: Isaac Zuckerman, the confident and charismatic twenty-four-year-old founder of the Jewish Fighting Organization; Simha Ratheiser, Isaac’s fifteen-year-old bodyguard, whose boyish good looks and seeming immunity to danger made him an ideal courier; and Zivia Lubetkin, the warrior queen of the underground who, upon hearing the first intimations of the Holocaust, declared: “We are going to defend ourselves.” Joined by allies on the left and right, they survived Gestapo torture chambers, smuggled arms, ran covert printing presses, opened illegal schools, robbed banks, executed collaborators, and fought in the two largest rebellions of the war.   Hunted by the Germans and bedeviled by the “Greasers”—roving bands of blackmailers who routinely turned in resistance fighters for profit—the movement was chronically short on firepower but long on ingenuity. Its members hatched plots in dank basements, never more than a door knock away from summary execution, and slogged through fetid sewers to escape the burning Ghetto to the forests surrounding the city. And after the initial uprising was ruthlessly put down by the SS, they gambled everything on a bold plan for a citywide revolt—of both Jews and Gentiles—that could end only in victory or total destruction. The money they raised helped thousands hide when the Ghetto was liquidated. The documents they forged offered lifelines to families desperate to escape the horror of the Holocaust. And when the war was over, they helped found the state of Israel.   A story of secret alliances, internal rivalries, and undying commitment to a cause, Isaac’s Army is history at its most heart-wrenching. Driven by an unforgettable cast of characters, it’s a true-life tale with the pulse of a great novel, and a celebration of the indomitable spirit of resistance.Advance praise for Isaac’s Army   “Told with care and compassion, Matthew Brzezinski’s Isaac’s Army is a riveting account of the Jewish resistance in wartime Poland. This is an intense story that transcends the horror of the time and finds real inspiration in the bravery of those who fought back—some of whom lived to tell their stories. Highly recommended.”—Alan Furst, author of Mission to Paris

The Orchard


Yochi Brandes - 2012
    The Orchard, her eighth book, is considered the most daring and ambitious of her novels. Critics went so far as to call it a cultural phenomenon after it eclipsed the Fifty Shades of Grey trilogy on the Israeli bestseller lists. The novel depicts the beginnings of modern Judaism and Christianity (in the first and second centuries) and the historical circumstances and tumultuous disputes that accompanied their births. The heroes of that generation (such as Rabbi Eliezer, Rabbi Ishmael, Rabban Gamaliel, Paul of Tarsus, and many others) become flesh and blood in this stunning interweaving of biblical and Talmudic lore into a page-turning read. At the heart of the book is Rabbi Akiva and his complicated relationship with his wife, Rachel, who met him when he was a forty-year-old illiterate shepherd, married him against her father's wishes, and compelled him to study the Torah until he became the nation of Israel's greatest sage. His novel method of interpreting Scripture provides his people with a life-giving elixir, but also gives them a lethal injection the Bar Kokhba Revolt (the second rebellion against the Romans), which brought a terrible holocaust upon the nation of Israel that nearly caused its end. The Orchard offers a brilliant narrative solution to the riddle of the Bar Kokhba Revolt by tying the rebellion to one of the most fascinating stories in the Jewish tradition, the story of four sages who entered a metaphysical orchard: one died, one lost his mind, one became a hater of God, and one, Rabbi Akiva, made it out unscathed. Or did he?

Letters to Talia


Dov Indig - 2012
    Dov Indig was killed on October 7, 1973, in a holding action on the Golan Heights in Israel during the Yom Kippur War. Letters to Talia, published in his memory by family and friends, contains excerpts from an extensive correspondence Dov maintained with Talia, a girl from an irreligious kibbutz in northern Israel, in 1972 and 73, the last two years of his life. At the time, Talia was a highschool student, and Dov was a student in the Hesder yeshiva Kerem B Yavneh, which combines Torah study with military service. It was Talia s father who suggested that Talia correspond with Dov, and an intense dialogue developed between them on questions of Judaism and Zionism, values and education. Their correspondence continued right up to Dov s death in the Yom Kippur War."

Between Friends


Amos Oz - 2012
    We're all supposed to be friends but very few really are.'Amos Oz's compelling new fiction offers revelatory glimpses into the secrets and frustrations of the human heart, played out by a community of misfits united by political disagreement, intense dissatisfaction and lifetimes of words left unspoken.Ariella, unhappy in love, confides in the woman whose husband she stole; Nahum, a devoted father, can't find the words to challenge his daughter's promiscuous lover; the old idealists deplore the apathy of the young, while the young are so used to kibbutz life that they can't work out if they're impassioned or indifferent. Arguments about war, government, travel and children are feverishly taken up and quickly abandoned - and amid this group of people unwilling and unable to say what they mean, Martin attempts to teach Esperanto.At the heart of each drama is a desire to be better, more principled and worthy of the community's respect. With his trademark compassion and sharp-eyed wit, Amos Oz leaves us with the feeling that what matters most between friends is the invisible tie of our shared humanity.

The Real Kosher Jesus: Revealing the Mysteries of the Hidden Messiah


Michael L. Brown - 2012
    The most controversial Jew who ever lived. He has been called a rabbi, a rebel, a reformer, a religious teacher, a reprobate sinner, a revolutionary, a redeemer. Some have claimed he was a magician, others the Messiah. Some say he was a deceiver; others say he was divine. Who is this Jesus-Yeshua, and why are we still talking about him two thousand years later? Recently a prominent Orthodox Jewish rabbi presented a new version of Jesus, a “Kosher Jesus” that Jews can accept. By reclaiming Yeshua as a fellow Jew and rabbi, he has taken a very major and truly wonderful step in the right direction, but by re-creating Jesus, he has also robbed him of his uniqueness. The Real Kosher Jesus takes you on a journey to uncover the truth. It is a journey filled with amazing discoveries and delightful surprises, a journey that is sometimes painful but that ends with joy, a journey through which you will learn the real story of this man named Yeshua: the most famous Jew of all time, the Jewish nation’s greatest prophet, the most illustrious rabbi ever, the light of the nations—and Israel’s hidden Messiah.

Koren Talmud Bavli - Berakhot


Adin Even-Israel Steinsaltz - 2012
    The Koren Talmud Bavli Standard Edition is a full-size, full-color edition that presents an enhanced Vilna page, a side-by-side English translation, photographs and illustrations, a brilliant commentary, and a multitude of learning aids to help the beginning and advanced student alike actively participate in the dynamic process of Talmud study.

The Invention of the Land of Israel: From Holy Land to Homeland


Shlomo Sand - 2012
    The Invention of the Land of Israel deconstructs the age-old legends surrounding the Holy Land and the prejudices that continue to suffocate it. Sand's account dissects the concept of 'historical right' and tracks the invention of the modern geopolitical concept of the 'Land of Israel' by nineteenth cntury Evangelical Protestants and Jewish Zionists. This invention, he argues, not only facilitated the colonization of the Middle East and the establishment of the State of israel; it is also what is threatening the existence of the Jewish state today.

The Jewish Gospels


Daniel Boyarin - 2012
    Commenting on this startling discovery at the time, noted Talmud scholar Daniel Boyarin argued that “some Christians will find it shocking—a challenge to the uniqueness of their theology.”Guiding us through a rich tapestry of new discoveries and ancient scriptures, The Jewish Gospels makes the powerful case that our conventional understandings of Jesus and of the origins of Christianity are wrong. In Boyarin’s scrupulously illustrated account, the coming of the Messiah was fully imagined in the ancient Jewish texts. Jesus, moreover, was embraced by many Jews as this person, and his core teachings were not at all a break from Jewish beliefs and teachings. Jesus and his followers, Boyarin shows, were simply Jewish. What came to be known as Christianity came much later, as religious and political leaders sought to impose a new religious orthodoxy that was not present at the time of Jesus’s life.In the vein of Elaine Pagels’s The Gnostic Gospels, here is a brilliant new work that will break open some of our culture’s most cherished assumptions.

Apprentice


Maggie Anton - 2012
    The world around her is full of conflict. Rome, fast becoming Christian, battles Zoroastrian Persia for dominance while Rav Hisda and his colleagues struggle to establish new Jewish traditions after the destruction of Jerusalem's Holy Temple. Against this backdrop Hisdadukh embarks on the tortuous path to become an enchantress in the very land where the word 'magic' originated. But the conflict affecting Hisdadukh most intimately arises when her father brings his two best students before her, a mere child, and asks her which one she will marry. Astonishingly, the girl replies, “Both of them.” Soon she marries the older student, although it becomes clear that the younger one has not lost interest in her. When her new-found happiness is derailed by a series of tragedies, a grieving Hisdadukh must decide if she does, indeed, wish to become a sorceress. Based on actual Talmud texts and populated with its rabbis and their families, Rav Hisda's Daughter: Book I – Apprentice brings the world of the Talmud to life - from a woman's perspective.

Davening: A Guide to Meaningful Jewish Prayer


Zalman Schachter-Shalomi - 2012
    We go to synagogue dutifully enough. We rise when we should rise, sit when we should sit. We read and sing along with the cantor and answer 'Amen' in all the right places. We may even rattle through the prayers with ease. We sacrifice vitality for shelf-life, and the neshomeh, the Jewish soul, can taste the difference."--from the IntroductionThis fresh approach to prayer is for all who wish to appreciate the power of prayer's poetry and song, jump into its ceremonies and rituals, and join the age-old conversation that Jews have had with God. Reb Zalman, one of the most important Jewish spiritual teachers in contemporary American Judaism, offers you new ways to pray, new channels for communicating with God and new opportunities to open your heart to God's response.With rare warmth and authenticity, Reb Zalman shows you:How prayer can engage not just spirit, but mind, heart and bodyMeditations that open the door to kavanah, the focus or intention with which we prayHow to understand the underlying "deep structure" of our prayer servicesHow to find and feel at home in a synagogueHow to sing and lead niggunim, the simple, wordless tunes that Jews sing to get closer to Godand more

Transcending Darkness: A Girl’s Journey Out of the Holocaust


Estelle Glaser Laughlin - 2012
    “I cannot take the indignities and brutalities. Let’s step forward and make them kill us now.” But Estelle’s mother fiercely responded to her two daughters: No! Life is sacred. It is noble to fight to stay alive. Their mother’s indomitable will was a major factor in the trio’s survival in the face of brutal odds. But Estelle recognized other heroes in the ghetto as well, righteous individuals who stood out like beacons and kept their spirits alive. Their father was one, as were hungry teachers in dim, cold rooms who risked their lives to secretly teach imprisoned children. Estelle’s memoir, published sixty-four years after their liberation from the concentration camp, is a narrative of fear and hope and resiliency. While it is a harrowing tale of destruction and loss, it is also a story of the goodness that still exists in a dark world, of survival and renewal.

Become a Medical Intuitive: Complete Developmental Course


Tina M. Zion - 2012
    Each chapter advances you, step-by-step, to intensify your psychic abilities and develop your x-ray perception. A medical background is not necessary to excel as a medical intutitive. "Become a Medical Intuitive" provides you with the following: How to physically see like an x-ray machine; How to take charge of your energy field; How imagination and intuition work together; Develop inner sight for the deeper cause of illness; See, feel, and sense the entire person on all levels; Understand the electromagnetic energy of thought and emotion; Receive the pure essence of someone's life story; How to use medical intuition as a healing technique; Understand and use the "knowing" you have; Inform without diagnosing; Identify general areas and organs of the human body; Assess auric colors for vibrational accuracy; Actual case studies and assessments to learn from. You are already intuitive. It is only a matter of noticing all of the information you are receiving in a different way. The medical intuitive's life is feeling, sensing, knowing, and perceiving on multiple levels with all of your senses. When you have completed the course contained in this book, you will have truly developed x-ray vision. Contact Tina Zion at www.livingawareinc.com

The Gilboa Iris


Zahava D. Englard - 2012
    When the Harows are targeted by a terror cell in hot pursuit of technology not yet found in any country's arsenal, Dara finds herself at the center of a hierarchy of terror that threatens her life and the lives of those she loves. The Gilboa Iris is a blazing tale of romance, deceit and international intrigue. Its rich characters and explosive plot take readers from Israel's Gilboa Mountains to the streets of New York, to Germany's Zehlendorf Forest, and back to Israel amid seminal events that rocked the world between 1983 and 2002.

Unorthodox: The Scandalous Rejection of My Hasidic Roots


Deborah Feldman - 2012
    It was stolen moments spent with the empowered literary characters of Jane Austen and Louisa May Alcott that helped her to imagine an alternative way of life. Trapped as a teenager in a sexually and emotionally dysfunctional marriage to a man she barely knew, the tension between Deborah’s desires and her responsibilities as a good Satmar girl grew more explosive until she gave birth at nineteen and realized that, for the sake of herself and her son, she had to escape.

The Book of Job: When Bad Things Happened to a Good Person


Harold S. Kushner - 2012
    Yet after losing everything, Job—though confused, angry, and questioning God—refuses to reject his faith, although he challenges some central aspects of it. Rabbi Harold S. Kushner examines the questions raised by Job’s experience, questions that have challenged wisdom seekers and worshippers for centuries. What kind of God permits such bad things to happen to good people? Why does God test loyal followers? Can a truly good God be all-powerful?  Rooted in the text, the critical tradition that surrounds it, and the author’s own profoundly moral thinking, Kushner’s study gives us the book of Job as a touchstone for our time. Taking lessons from historical and personal tragedy, Kushner teaches us about what can and cannot be controlled, about the power of faith when all seems dark, and about our ability to find God. Rigorous and insightful yet deeply affecting, The Book of Job is balm for a distressed age—and Rabbi Kushner’s most important book since When Bad Things Happen to Good People.

As Long As I Live: The Life Story of Aharon Margalit


Aharon Margalit - 2012
    By age seven, Aharon Margalit had already suffered a terrible trauma which rendered him mute, and was lying in a sanitarium, completely paralyzed by polio. His mother's indomitable efforts to save him from paralysis are inspiration enough, but as the story unfolds, the inspiration mounts. This is a man who meets tragedy with perfect calm; who has fought cancer three times--and with a positive, assertive spirit that boggles the mind. This is a book that will give strength, courage, and hope to every reader, young and old, no matter where their life's journey has brought them. A testament to faith, optimism, and the power of mind over matter. When Rav Chaim Kanievski was presented with this book in the original hebrew, Es'halech, he read it cover to cover and announced that it gave him chizuk. See what it can do for you!

Judaism and Christianity: A Contrast


Stuart Federow - 2012
    The rise of Christians calling themselves messianic “Jews,” the successes of Christian missionaries, Jews ingratiating themselves to Evangelical Christians because of their support for the State of Israel, the overuse of the term “Judeo-Christian,” and the increasing use of Jewish rituals in Christian churches, blur the lines between Judaism and Christianity. Develop a better understanding of the irreconcilable differences between Judaism and Christianity, and where the two faiths hold mutually exclusive beliefs. You’ll learn how • Their views differ regarding God, humanity, the devil, faith versus the law, the Messiah, and more; • Both faiths read the same Biblical verses but understand them so differently; and • Missionary Christians use this blurring of the lines between the two faiths, and other techniques, to convert Jews to Christianity. Real interfaith dialogue begins when those engaging in it not only speak of how they are similar, but also where they differ. Real understanding begins when the topics discussed are in areas of disagreement. Judaism and Christianity: A Contrastwill help you understand the Jewish view of these disagreements."

Hannah's Way


Linda Glaser - 2012
    When her teacher tries to arrange carpools for a Saturday class picnic, Hannah is upset. Her Jewish family is observant, and she knows she cannot ride on the Sabbath. What will she do? A lovely story of friendship and community.This is a fixed-format ebook, which preserves the design and layout of the original print book.

The Wooden Sword: A Jewish Folktale from Afghanistan


Ann Redisch Stampler - 2012
    When he encounters a poor Jewish shoemaker full of faith that everything will turn out just as it should, the shah grows curious. Vowing that no harm will befall the poor man, he decides to test that faith, only to find that the shoemaker’s cheerful optimism cannot be shaken. But the biggest challenge of the poor man’s life is yet to come! Ann Stampler’s retelling of this classic Afghani Jewish folktale is enriched by Carol Liddiment’s charming and vivid paintings.

The New American Haggadah


Collective - 2012
    No decisions! No skipping! No guilt!A Haggadah long enough to cover everything, yet short enough to conquer boredom.A Haggadah that's easy to follow, even for those who have never led or attended a Seder before.A Haggadah that encourages everyone to participate, without any confusion as to who says what.A Haggadah that celebrates freedom.A Haggadah that highlights traditional Jewish values alongside modern American ideals.A Haggadah that explains everything!~~~~~Please Note: There are no Hebrew characters in this book--all Hebrew is transliterated.

German Girl?


Vivian Bolten Herz - 2012
    In thetone of voice that adults reserve for talking to six-year-olds,he asks again, “Now, tell me Vivian, when did you last seeyour Papa?”I shake my head and say, “No, I haven’t seen him for along time. I don’t know where he is.”The finger comes again, hooking my chin and forcingmy head up and toward him. I look into the pale, wateryeyes of the man in the gray Gestapo uniform. My heartpulses so hard in my ears that I can barely hear his words.“Have you seen Papa this week, Liebchen” (Sweetie), hecoos. “Who are his friends?” I shake my head “No,” knowingthat a few hours earlier Papa came to our street, near theapartment. He stood in the shadow of the corner house,watching me. I knew that he had come to see me, andsomehow, instinctively, I also knew that I should not go tohim and that he could not come to me. We looked at eachother, and then he turned and slipped away. It will bealmost ten years before I would see him again.The Gestapo man stands and abruptly leaves the bedroom.It isn’t until I see him in the living room, talking to Oma, that my tears come.In German Girl?, I reflect on my extraordinary childhood years, 1942 to 1953, growing up in Nazi Germany. As a "Mischling", a child with one Jewish parent and one Christian parent, my experiences during World War II, and its effect on the years that followed, provide a unique picture of wartime life as seen through the eyes of a child. My Lutheran grandparents hid and protected me while my mother was jailed and questioned tortuously on the whereabouts of my father. A Jewish man, my father lived “underground.” In "German Girl", I describe my father’s ingenuity and bravery, the enduring strength of my mother and the simple pleasures and comforting love of my grandparents stolen in a time of horror for so many. I have included copies of historical documents and photographs of the people discussed in the book.* In "German Girl", I have filled my book with memories, pictures, reproductions of forged documents and the incredible story of growing up alongside the appalling destruction of WWII in East Berlin.Copyright © 1998 Vivian Ert Bolten Herz.All rights reserved.The Library of Congress, catalog card number 2005351683United States Holocaust Memorial Museum,Washington D.C.Catalogue card number DS135.G5 H 4659 1998;Jüdisches Museum Berlin, GermanyYad Vashem Library, Jerusalem, Israel., catalog card number 105-0271Yad Vashem - Bet Vahlin Library, Israel., catalog card number HER-09

The Mile End Cookbook: Redefining Jewish Comfort Food from Hash to Hamantaschen


Noah Bernamoff - 2012
    Using their grandmothers’ recipes as a starting point, Noah and Rae updated traditional dishes and elevated them with fresh ingredients and from-scratch cooking techniques. The Mile End Cookbook celebrates the craft of new Jewish cooking with more than 100 soul-satisfying recipes and gorgeous photographs. Throughout, the Bernamoffs share warm memories of cooking with their families and the traditions and holidays that inspire recipes like blintzes with seasonal fruit compote; chicken salad whose secret ingredient is fresh gribenes; veal schnitzel kicked up with pickled green tomatoes and preserved lemons; tsimis that’s never mushy; and cinnamon buns made with challah dough. Noah and Rae also celebrate homemade delicatessen staples and share their recipes and methods for pickling, preserving, and smoking just about anything.For every occasion, mood, and meal, these are recipes that any home cook can make, including:SMOKED AND CURED MEAT AND FISH: brisket, salami, turkey, lamb bacon, lox, mackerelPICKLES, GARNISHES, FILLINGS, AND CONDIMENTS: sour pickles, pickled fennel, horseradish cream, chicken confit, sauerkraut, and soup mandelSUMPTUOUS SWEETS AND BREADS: rugelach, jelly-filled doughnuts, flourless chocolate cake, honey cake, cheesecake, challah, rye ALL THE CLASSICS: the ultimate chicken soup, gefilte fish, corned beef sandwich, latkes, knishesWith tips and lore from Jewish and culinary mavens, such as Joan Nathan and Niki Russ Federman of Russ & Daughters, plus holiday menus, Jewish cooking has never been so inspiring.

The Illustrated Bible


D.K. Publishing - 2012
    All the greatest stories are brought to life from the Creation to the Book of Revelation through photographs, historical documents, maps and artefacts.

The Promise of Israel: Why Its Seemingly Greatest Weakness Is Actually Its Greatest Strength


Daniel Gordis - 2012
    In The Promise of Israel, Daniel Gordis points out that Israel has defied that conventional wisdom. It has provided its citizens infinitely greater liberty and prosperity than anyone expected, faring far better than any other young nation. Israel's "magic" is a unique blend of democracy and tradition, of unabashed particularism coupled to intellectual and cultural openness. Given Israel's success, it would make sense for many other countries, from Rwanda to Afghanistan and even Iran, to look at how they've done it. In fact, rather than seeking to destroy Israel, the Palestinians would serve their own best interests by trying to copy it.Takes many of the most compelling arguments against Israel and turns them completely on their heads, undoing liberals with a more liberal argument and the religious with a more devout argumentPuts forth an idea that is as convincing as it is shocking—that Iran's clerics and the Taliban should want to be more like IsraelWritten by Daniel Gordis, the author of the National Jewish Book Award winner, Saving IsraelDaniel Gordis has been called "one of Israel's most thoughtful observers" (Alan Dershowitz) and "a writer whose reflections are consistently as intellectually impressive as they are moving" (Cynthia Ozick)Certain to generate controversy and debate, The Promise of Israel is one of the most interesting and original books about Israel in years.

The Zohar: Pritzker Edition, Volume Seven


Daniel C. Matt - 2012
    Written in lyrical Aramaic, this masterpiece of Kabbalah exceeds the dimensions of a normal book; it is virtually a body of mystical literature, comprising over twenty discrete sections. The bulk of the Zohar consists of a mystical interpretation of the Torah, from Genesis through Deuteronomy.This seventh volume of The Zohar: Pritzker Edition consists of commentary on more than half the book of Leviticus. How does the Zohar deal with a biblical text devoted largely to animal sacrifices, cereal offerings, and priestly ritual? Here these ancient laws and procedures are spiritualized, transformed into symbols of God's inner life, now that both the Desert Tabernacle and the Temple in Jerusalem no longer exist. For example, the ascent offering, which was totally consumed on the altar, is known in Hebrew as olah (literally, "that which ascends"). In the Zohar, this symbolizes Shekhinah, last of the ten sefirot (divine potencies), who ascends to unite with Her beloved, the blessed Holy One.The biblical narrative describes how two of Aaron's sons, Nadab and Abihu, offered alien fire before YHVH and were immediately consumed in a divine blaze. Rabbinic tradition suggested various reasons why they were killed: they lacked the proper priestly garments, or had not washed their hands and feet, or were drunk, or were not married. For the Zohar, marriage enables one to imitate the divine union of male and female energies, and to stimulate that union above. By not marrying, Nadab and Abihu remained incomplete and unfulfilled. According to a related Zoharic passage, their ritual act failed because in their contemplation of the divine qualities they did not include Shekhinah. Without Her, God is incomplete.

FDR and the Jews


Richard Breitman - 2012
    Defenders claim that FDR saved millions of potential victims by defeating Nazi Germany. Others revile him as morally indifferent and indict him for keeping America's gates closed to Jewish refugees and failing to bomb Auschwitz's gas chambers.In an extensive examination of this impassioned debate, Richard Breitman and Allan J. Lichtman find that the president was neither savior nor bystander. In "FDR and the Jews," they draw upon many new primary sources to offer an intriguing portrait of a consummate politician-compassionate but also pragmatic-struggling with opposing priorities under perilous conditions. For most of his presidency Roosevelt indeed did little to aid the imperiled Jews of Europe. He put domestic policy priorities ahead of helping Jews and deferred to others' fears of an anti-Semitic backlash. Yet he also acted decisively at times to rescue Jews, often withstanding contrary pressures from his advisers and the American public. Even Jewish citizens who petitioned the president could not agree on how best to aid their co-religionists abroad.Though his actions may seem inadequate in retrospect, the authors bring to light a concerned leader whose efforts on behalf of Jews were far greater than those of any other world figure. His moral position was tempered by the political realities of depression and war, a conflict all too familiar to American politicians in the twenty-first century.

Full Harvest


Etka Gitel Schwartz - 2012
    Eighteen-year-old Gella Drozdinski arrives on the foreign plains of North Dakota afire with hope for a new life of happiness... only to find her new family haunted by sudden tragedy. As the seasons turn and change, she and the Rvorskys struggle to bridge past and present, laying old fears and secrets to rest even as an uncertain future looms. But when the daily toil of prairie life devolves into a fight for their very survival, the Rvorskys must reach beyond the limits of endurance for what might be their last, heartbreaking chance at redemption. Presented at last in novel format, the beloved story serialized in Binah Magazine now brims with over 250 pages of behind-the-scenes features and bonus historical content, including rare photos, documents, and a collection of fully annotated memoirs, as well as the previously published tie-in story Clandestined and prologue and epilogue vignettes.

Mishkan R'fuah: Where Healing Resides


Shira Stern - 2012
    This beautiful compilation contains contemplative readings and prayers for many different moments of spiritual need, including illness, surgery, treatment, chronic illness, hearing good news, transitions, addiction, infertility, end-of-life, and more.

The Garden of Education: Education with Love


Shalom Arush - 2012
    His method, built around positive reinforcement and educating with love, demonstrates the proper way to establish clear boundaries without reprimanding or upsetting the child. First of all, as Rav Arush stresses throughout the book, parents must correct themselves before they correct their children. If the father is a Haman, he cannot expect to raise a Mordechai.This book is a great read, written in clear and comprehensible style. It's a must for every parent.

Faith Unravels: A Rabbi's Struggle with Grief and God


Daniel Greyber - 2012
    Many look to how clergy understand loss but few religious traditions have a defined mourning process—or even a role in mourning—for non-family members. Faith Unravels speaks to the profound pain experienced by a forgotten mourner, not by making an argument about God or by offering a recipe of rituals, but by sharing a profound story of faith lost and regained anew.

Return: Daily Inspiration for the Days of Awe


Erica Brown - 2012
    It was a personal ladder for me to try to achieve a greater sense of holiness and responsibility and go into the Days of Awe feeling the requisite awe. Each day I scaled a new topic for self-improvement rooted in Jewish tradition. I was so absorbed in it that I expanded it into a book that has just been published, Return: Daily Inspiration for the Days of Awe. In addition to a daily essay, I included portions of study on repentance in translation from Maimonides - the rationalist, Rabbi Kook, the mystic, and Rabbi Chaim Moshe Luzzato, the ethicist. I attached a life homework assignment to integrate study and action, using myself as a test case. I feel privileged to share what I learned."

Stones for Grandpa


Renee Londner - 2012
    They tell stories that help the boy deal with his loss, reminding him of the wonderful memories he has of his grandpa.

The Death of an American Jewish Community: A Tragedy of Good Intentions


Lawrence Harmon - 2012
    The frightening personal testimonies and blatant evidence of manipulated housing prices illustrate how inadequate government regulation of banks can contribute to ethnic conflict and lives destroyed. “There were no winners,” the authors warn.Hillel Levine and Lawrence Harmon believe that their findings may be true for American cities in general. Had we learned from what went wrong in Boston — blockbusting by a group of banks, federal programs promoting mortgages to people unable to afford them, real estate brokers seeking quick profits —, perhaps the 2008 nationwide real estate meltdown could have been anticipated. The lessons from this book are essential for students of ethnic relations and urban affairs.“This candid, disturbing, and highly readable book recounts how Boston’s working-class Jewish neighborhoods were transformed into economically devastated black ghettoes.” — The New Yorker“Bankers and real-estate brokers still shape the dynamics of daily life in our fragile urban neighborhoods. Levine and Harmon movingly capture the human side of this often destructive process in their story of redlining and blockbusting in Boston during the 1960s. But their book is more than history. It is a lesson about how to understand and improve our cities and neighborhoods, today and in the future.” — Raymond L. Flynn, Mayor of Boston, President, U.S. Conference of Mayors“Levine and Harmon are sympathetic to the goals of racial integration but are indignant over the brutality and unfairness that accompanied these orchestrations. Bankers and politicians are indicted here by elaborate court evidence and by supplementary research cited by the authors, who use their insiders’ passion (Harmon was born and raised in Dorchester) and professional expertise to forever preserve the corned-beef flavor of old Blue Hill Avenue. As much an elegiac memory book of old Jewish Boston as a searing indictment against her killers.” — Kirkus Reviews“Combines the rigor of good scholarship with the obsessive curiosity of good journalism” — J. Anthony Lukas, Author of Common Ground“What keeps a community alive? What are the social and historical forces that shape or stifle its aspirations? When does a community soar and when does it yield to resignation? These and other questions take on an urgency of their own in Hillel Levine and Lawrence Harmon’s perceptive, brilliant, and disturbing inquiry.” — Elie Wiesel, University Professor and Andrew W. Mellon Professor in the Humanities, Boston University“Levine and Harmon have written a prophetic indictment of the real estate speculation and elite indifference that, along with black crimes, destroyed Boston’s most vibrant Jewish neighborhoods. Have the courage to take their terrible journey; you will not return unchanged!” — Jim Sleeper, Author of The Closest of Strangers: Liberalism and the Politics of Race in New York“This engagingly written and brilliantly illuminating portrait of the destruction of a vibrant Jewish community radically revises our understanding of the process of neighborhood change. The authors also break new ground in portraying the critical role of social class in American life and the powerful, if unconscious, class bias of Jewish communal leaders.” — Charles E. Silberman, Author of A Certain People: American Jews and Their Lives Today

This is America!


Henye Meyer - 2012
    

The Bar Mitzvah and the Beast: One Family's Cross-Country Ride of Passage by Bike


Matt Biers-Ariel - 2012
    But then his hard-to-impress teenage son, Yonah, refused to have a Bar Mitzvah as he approached age thirteen. No dancing with grandma or chanting traditional prayers? Something had to be done to celebrate this rite of passage. So Matt, his wife Djina, Yonah, and little brother Solomon decided to saddle up for a physical ride of passage -- one that would take them 3,804 miles by bicycle from the waters of the Pacific Ocean, across the Rockies, through Midwest small towns, and all the way to Washington D.C. Armed with ibuprofen, several gallons of Gatorade, and one unpredictable tandem bike (the "Beast"), the Biers-Ariel family pedaled across the middle of America, chatting with locals along the way, roasting marshmallows at campgrounds, and quarrelling over the state of climate change, religious identity, and several flat tires. They also collected thousands of signatures on a self-made global-warming petition calling for the United States to undergo its own rite of passage -- one of energy conservation.The Bar Mitzvah and The Beast is a funny, thoughtful memoir of one ordinary American family's extraordinary journey by bicycle, and an enlightening, warm exploration of the bond between a spiritual, nature-loving father and his ambivalent, computer game-loving son.

The Book of Yahweh: The Holy Scriptures


Yisrayl Hawkins - 2012
    In specific instances, certain words or phrases were left untranslated; at times, changes were made to hide the meaning of the words or phrases. In other cases, words were deleted from the original text, either by copyist error, or by flagrant intention. At times, copyists, scribes, or translators would write footnotes in their manuscripts of the Holy Scriptures, in the same way we would make notes in our books; however, these footnotes would later be included in the text by other copyists, who would write these as supposedly "inspired" Scripture to be read by later generations as part of the original text. Many phrases have been deliberately mistranslated, in order to hide their true meaning, so that Scripture would not bring to light the deceitful teachings of the established and popular religious organizations. The alteration of Yahweh's Scriptures, either by untranslating or mistranslating, has caused the True Work, which Yahweh's Prophets spoke of, to be hidden in most translations of the Scriptures, and this has been damaging to those who are searching the Holy Scriptures for the way to Eternal Life. However, the most damaging error in all the Holy Scriptures, was the error of removing YAHWEH'S NAME from the very Scriptures He inspired to be written, and writing in its place the pagan titles of GODS (ELOHIM) and SATAN HERSELF! Because of this grave error, those who are calling upon the names of gods (elohim) and Satan, even though ignorantly, are actually worshiping the gods (elohim) and Satan---for they are not calling upon, and with, The NAME of YAHWEH! These detrimental facts are not hidden. In fact, an abundance of data confirming these statements has been published for many years, but generally confined only to footnotes, Scriptural commentaries, dictionaries, encyclopedias, lexicons, concordances, and technical publications. These facts are indeed plenteous; they are openly admitted not only among scholars of the Holy Scriptures, but also among the religious denominations as well. Joseph Bryant Rotherham, in The Emphasized Bible; A New Translation, The Standard Publishing Company, Cincinnati, Ohio, Copyright 1902, says in the Introduction, The Incommunicable Name: The Name Suppressed: THE FACT It is willingly admitted that the suppression has not been absolute; at least so far as Hebrew and English are concerned. The Name, in its four essential letters (YHWH), was reverently transcribed by the Hebrew copyist, and therefore was necessarily placed before the eye of the Hebrew reader. The latter, however, was instructed not to pronounce it but to utter instead a less sacred name---ADONAY or ELOHIM. In this way The Name was not suffered to reach the ear of the listener. To that degree it was suppressed. The Septuagint, or ancient Greek version (LXX), made the concealment complete by regularly substituting Kurios, as the Vulgate, in like manner, employed Dominus, both Kurios and Dominus having at the same time their own proper service to render as correctly answering to the Hebrew ADONAY, confessedly meaning "Lord". The English versions do nearly the same things, in rendering The Name as LORD, and occasionally GOD; these terms also having their own rightful office to fill as fitly representing the Hebrew titles Adonay and Elohim and El, so that the Tetragrammaton is nearly hidden in our public English versions.

Happy Hanukkah, Curious George


H.A. Rey - 2012
    They light the menorah, spin the dreidel, make latkes, and learn the importance of mitzvah! In this tabbed board book, youngsters will even find a tasty latke recipe and instructions for constructing a dreidel, with rules for play. A festive foil-stamped cover makes this a fine holiday gift for fans of Curious George. For more monkey fun, investigate www.curiousgeorge.com.

Rebbetzin Kanievsky: A Legendary Mother to All


Naftali Weinberger - 2012
    Everyone was welcome and everyone went away enthralled and enriched.Rebbetzin Batsheva Kanievsky was one of the most remarkable, selfless, and beloved women of our time. She was the epitome of Ahavas Yisrael, Ahavas Torah, and chessed.This extraordinary biography, by a couple who knew her well, tells the story of this magnificent "mother of Klal Yisrael." Written with blessing and cooperation of Maran Harav Chaim Kanievsky shlita, and containing hundreds of pictures - including private never-before-published family photos and documents - this book will be read and read, quoted and quoted.

The Poetry of Kabbalah: Mystical Verse from the Jewish Tradition


Peter Cole - 2012
    Taking up Gershom Scholem’s call to plumb the “tremendous poetic potential” concealed in the Kabbalistic tradition, Peter Cole provides dazzling renderings of work composed on three continents over a period of some fifteen hundred years.In addition to the translations and the texts in their original languages, Cole supplies a lively and insightful introduction, along with accessible commentaries to the poems. Aminadav Dykman adds an elegant afterword that places the work in the context of world literature. As a whole, the collection brings readers into the fascinating force field of Kabbalistic verse, where the building blocks of both language and existence itself are unveiled.Excerpts from The Poetry of Kabbalah have been featured in the Paris Review, Poetry, and Conjunctions.

Justice, Justice Shall You Pursue: A History of New Jewish Agenda


Ezra Berkley Nepon - 2012
    NJA organized a progressive Jewish voice for every political issue of their decade: working for Middle East Peace, Central American Solidarity, Worldwide Nuclear Disarmament, Economic and Social Justice, and they had a powerful Jewish Feminist Taskforce that included work on LGBT issues and the emergence of the AIDS pandemic. New Jewish Agenda was most controversial for positions on the rights of Palestinians and the rights of Queer Jews. Jewish activists from a wide range of religious and secular communities coalesced in NJA, building power and analysis that continue to illuminate our movements today. This book includes afterwords essays by Dr. Rachel Mattson and Daniel Rosza Lang/Levitsky, an appendix of relevant NJA documents, and it features original cover art by Abigail Miller.Distributed by AK Press: http://www.akpress.org/justicejustice...

The Book of Life: Selected Jewish Poems, 1979 - 2011


Alicia Suskin Ostriker - 2012
    Here she ‘studies’ Jewish history, Jewish passion, Jewish contradictions, in a compendium of learned, crafted, earthy and outward-looking poems that show how this quest has informed and enriched her whole poet’s trajectory.”—Marilyn Hacker

The Purim Superhero


Elisabeth Kushner - 2012
    What will he do? With the help of his two dads he makes a surprising decision.

Majesty and Humility: The Thought of Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik


Reuven Ziegler - 2012
    This comprehensive study of Rabbi Soloveitchik's religious philosophy offers a broad perspective and balanced understanding of his work. By interpreting and analyzing both individual essays and overarching themes in an accessible and engaging manner, it uncovers the depth, majesty and fascination of his thought.

Cheeky Spanking Stories


Rachel Kramer BusselDorothy Freed - 2012
    And, nobody can spot a good spanking story better than Rachel Kramer Bussel, who has achieved mastery of the genre. Ranging from naughty and nice to fabulously kinky, this set of superb spanking stories will please aficionados as well as readers new to the pleasures of paddle, crop or whip. Author of the bestselling Spanked, Bussel notes "there are an infinite number of ways to talk about the pleasures of spanking. Me? I get off just thinking about bending over for that special someone."

God Winked: Tales and Lessons from my Spiritual Adventures


Sara Yoheved Rigler - 2012
    She spent 15 years living in an ashram and practicing and teaching meditation. Then her spiritual journey took a hair-pin turn. She went to Jerusalem and started studying what she called, "the world's most hidden religion: Torah Judaism."The tales collected in this book span the breadth of Sara Yoheved Rigler's colorful, adventure-filled life. The lessons derive from a dizzying variety of sources: A Hassidic Rebbe in Jerusalem A guru in Varanasi A Kabbalist in rural Israel Girls at a Calcutta orphanage A clown A Maharaj's palace in the foothills of the Himalayas Her 90-year-old mother-in-law A cat on a dangerous military mission A totally paralyzed author of 8 books The tales in this book will make you laugh - and cry. The lessons will transform your life.Sample chapters:Buddhism, Judaism, and the Great Cheerio FiascoEat, Pray, Love, Then What?My Five Weeks with CancerMy Son the Doctor-MurdererGod vs. ProzacMy Niece's Catholic Wedding

The Divorce Girl


Caryn Mirriam-Goldberg - 2012
    As her home explodes, a first love, a series of almost-mothers, and a comical collection of eccentric mentors show Deborah how to make art out of a life, and life from the wreckage of a broken home. Join Kansas poet laureate Caryn Mirriam-Goldberg as she explores loss, grief, and bad behavior with humor and imagination. This coming of age story illuminates how a daring heart can turn a broken girl into a woman strong enough to craft a life of art, soul, and beauty.

Journey Through the Wilderness: A Mindfulness Approach to the Ancient Jewish Practice of Counting the Omer


Yael Levy - 2012
    In addition to the Omer blessings in both Hebrew and Rabbi Levy's English translation, this guide includes readings and teachings for each day, as well as evocative photographs to inspire meditation. Daily suggestions for action deepen the experience of counting each day and making each day count. Using insights gained from more than a decade of her own spiritual exploration, Rabbi Levy has created a guide for spiritual growth for beginners and for those who have more experience with Jewish Mindfulness practice. * Rabbi Yael Levy's approach to Mindfulness is deeply rooted in Jewish tradition. Her teachings grow out of her deep personal commitment to spiritual practice and a passionate belief in its potential to change not only individuals but also the world. Named as one of “America’s Most Inspiring Rabbis” by The Jewish Daily Forward, Rabbi Levy is the founder of A Way In, a Jewish Mindfulness program based in Philadelphia. A Way In offers a range of activities, from contemplative Shabbat and holiday services to meditation sits, classes and retreats, as well as a vibrant online community. Rabbi Levy is a spiritual director for rabbinical students in both the Reconstructionist and Reform movements as well as in private practice.

What's Left Behind - Poetry Collection


Michal Mahgerefteh - 2012
    The grieving process grew more intense with every conversation she had with her father, who supported and cared for her mother for twenty-five years. The affects of this spirit-challenging period seep through every poem: "For twenty-five years Mother’s lips/ kneaded words with a pinch of salt./ Her beautiful green eyes, now colorless." In A Sign of Grief the reader follows the emotional, spiritual, and physical turmoil of both the poet and her father during the time from birth to deathbed, and all that transpired in the intervening time. The burden is unbearable and in the end the poet resorts, reluctantly, to “all I want is to flee from your dark days/ that sealed My Book of Life/ until the hurt no longer/ bears your name”(No More Hurt). Michal Mahgerefteh’s new edition is replete with remarkable sincerity, profound sensitivity, and unconditional love. Its universal message will touch every soul. Dr. Dina Ripsman EylonPublisher and Editor-in-ChiefWomen in Judaism: A Multidisciplinary JournalIntroductionMother was first diagnosed with breast cancer when she was only forty-one years old. For over twenty-five years, Father supported and cared for Mother throughout her treatments and surgeries, sometimes with anger and frustration, until her passing in 2010. As her health deteriorated over the years, he was there / in years of silent layers. Toward the end of her life, Father often showed weariness, being emotionally and physically exhausted, as he himself was diagnosed with cancer and diabetes. But for him, there was no one to take the pain away. In this collection, I reflect on Mother’s last days and give Father’s poignant struggle a voice.—Michal Mahgerefteh Father, The Caregiver Mother settles into a routine of chemo treatments. Rounds of blames and accusations always directed at Father; her twenty-five-year caregiver struggling for a little piece of dignity. He learned to pretend-- fake smiles, encouraging charm, a hiss of touch. Not valued by Family as a vital source of inspiration,Father withdrew into deep thoughts, mentally blockingpeoples’ intentions as misleading. He learned to curse,attaching hateful nick names to people he once loved.Madness hidden in Father’s delusions. The forgotten.

On the Eve: The Jews of Europe Before the Second World War


Bernard Wasserstein - 2012
    Bernard Wasserstein’s original and provocative book presents a new and disturbing interpretation of the collapse of European Jewish civilization even before the Nazi onslaught.On the Eve is the portrait of a world on the brink of annihilation. In this provocative book, Bernard Wasserstein presents a new and disturbing interpretation of the collapse of European Jewish civilization even before the Nazi onslaught. In the 1930s, as Europe spiraled toward the Second World War, the continent’s Jews faced an existential crisis. The harsh realities of the age—anti-Semitic persecution, economic discrimination, and an ominous climate of violence—devastated Jewish communities and shattered the lives of individuals. The Jewish crisis was as much the result of internal decay as of external attack. Demographic collapse, social disintegration, and cultural dissolution were all taking their toll. The problem was not just Nazism: In the summer of 1939 more Jews were behind barbed wire outside the Third Reich than within it, and not only in police states but even in the liberal democracies of the West. The greater part of Europe was being transformed into a giant concentration camp for Jews. Unlike most previous accounts, On the Eve focuses not on the anti-Semites but on the Jews. Wasserstein refutes the common misconception that they were unaware of the gathering forces of their enemies. He demonstrates that there was a growing and widespread recognition among Jews that they stood on the edge of an abyss. On the Eve recaptures the agonizing sorrows and the effervescent cultural glories of this last phase in the history of the European Jews. It explores their hopes, anxieties, and ambitions, their family ties, social relations, and intellectual creativity—everything that made life meaningful and bearable for them. Wasserstein introduces a diverse array of characters: holy men and hucksters, beggars and bankers, politicians and poets, housewives and harlots, and, in an especially poignant chapter, children without a future. The geographical range also is vast: from Vilna (the “Jerusalem of the North”) to Amsterdam, Vienna, Warsaw, and Paris, from the Judeo-Espagnol-speaking stevedores of Salonica to the Yiddish-language collective farms of Soviet Ukraine and Crimea. Wasserstein’s aim is to “breathe life into dry bones.” Based on comprehensive research, rendered with compassion and empathy, and brought alive by telling anecdotes and dry wit, On the Eve offers a vivid and enlightening picture of the European Jews in their final hour.

The Founding Fathers of Zionism


Benzion Netanyahu - 2012
    When he sat down to have his lunch at the hotel, he found a letter near his plate. Without suspecting anything he opened it and read: 'Jews are not wanted here.' And so the small stories of five extraordinary men coalesced, becoming one over-arching history that culminated in the establishment of the state of Israel.The Founding Fathers of Zionism, written by the famed historian Professor Benzion Netanyahu, profiles the men who showed the Jewish people the road to survival, freedom and revival. In this landmark work, Netanyahu gives us a glimpse intothe eras in which Max Nordau, Leo Pinsker, Theodor Herzl, Israel Zangwill, and Ze'ev Jabotinsky toiled for an epic cause.His original analysis of these men, their ideas and activities, puts flesh on bone, so that the five stand out in all their grandeur and uniqueness."

Parting Ways: Jewishness and the Critique of Zionism


Judith Butler - 2012
    Butler engages Jewish philosophical positions to articulate a critique of political Zionism and its practices of illegitimate state violence, nationalism, and state-sponsored racism. At the same time, she moves beyond communitarian frameworks, including Jewish ones, that fail to arrive at a radical democratic notion of political cohabitation. Butler engages thinkers such as Edward Said, Emmanuel Levinas, Hannah Arendt, Primo Levi, Martin Buber, Walter Benjamin, and Mahmoud Darwish as she articulates a new political ethic. In her view, it is as important to dispute Israel’s claim to represent the Jewish people as it is to show that a narrowly Jewish framework cannot suffice as a basis for an ultimate critique of Zionism. She promotes an ethical position in which the obligations of cohabitation do not derive from cultural sameness but from the unchosen character of social plurality. Recovering the arguments of Jewish thinkers who offered criticisms of Zionism or whose work could be used for such a purpose, Butler disputes the specific charge of anti-Semitic self-hatred often leveled against Jewish critiques of Israel. Her political ethic relies on a vision of cohabitation that thinks anew about binationalism and exposes the limits of a communitarian framework to overcome the colonial legacy of Zionism. Her own engagements with Edward Said and Mahmoud Darwish form an important point of departure and conclusion for her engagement with some key forms of thought derived in part from Jewish resources, but always in relation to the non-Jew.Butler considers the rights of the dispossessed, the necessity of plural cohabitation, and the dangers of arbitrary state violence, showing how they can be extended to a critique of Zionism, even when that is not their explicit aim. She revisits and affirms Edward Said’s late proposals for a one-state solution within the ethos of binationalism. Butler’s startling suggestion: Jewish ethics not only demand a critique of Zionism, but must transcend its exclusive Jewishness in order to realize the ethical and political ideals of living together in radical democracy.

Moving Waters


Racelle Rosett - 2012
    A television producer who moonlights as a cantor, an actress who leaves her husband for another woman and enters a mikvah to mark the transition, a young widow who gets her hair colored to prepare for the unveiling of her husband's gravestone – Racelle Rosett’s debut story collection enters the lives of members of a Reform Jewish community in Hollywood and explores the unexpected role that ancient ritual plays in the lives of these characters living in contemporary Los Angeles.

A Kiss on the Keppie


Lesléa Newman - 2012
    Delightful watercolor illustrations by debut artist Katherine Blackmore highlight an equally charming text that’s great for reading aloud.

Kabbalah and Psychoanalysis


Michael Eigen - 2012
    Both are preoccupied with ontological implications of the Unknown and the importance of emotional life. This work is a psychospiritual adventure touching the places Kabbalah and psychoanalysis give something to each other. Michael Eigen uses aspects of Bion, Winnicott, Akivah, Luria and Nachman (and many more) as colours on a palette to open realities for growth of experience. Bion called faith "the psychoanalytic attitude" and Eigen here explores creative, paradoxical, multidimensional aspects of faith. Eigen previously wrote of psychoanalysis as a form of prayer in The Psychoanalytic Mystic. In Kabbalah and Psychoanalysis he writes of creative faith. Sessions as crucibles in which diverse currents of personality mix in new ways, alchemy or soul chemistry perhaps, or simply homage to our embryonic nature which responds to the breath of feeling moment to moment.

Messianic Foundations


Sam Nadler - 2012
    The biblical foundations necessary to sustain sound movement of God in this generation are presented in this book including: God’s Love for Israel and You; Why the Good News is to the Jew First; Why there must be Messianic congregations; The Olive tree; The fullness of the Gentiles; Our unique unity in Messiah; The New Covenant and Messiah’s Torah and more.

New Babylonians: A History of Jews in Modern Iraq


Orit Bashkin - 2012
    New Babylonians chronicles the lives of these Jews, their urban Arab culture, and their hopes for a democratic nation-state. It studies their ideas about Judaism, Islam, secularism, modernity, and reform, focusing on Iraqi Jews who internalized narratives of Arab and Iraqi nationalisms and on those who turned to communism in the 1940s.As the book reveals, the ultimate displacement of this community was not the result of a perpetual persecution on the part of their Iraqi compatriots, but rather the outcome of misguided state policies during the late 1940s and early 1950s. Sadly, from a dominant mood of coexistence, friendship, and partnership, the impossibility of Arab-Jewish coexistence became the prevailing narrative in the region—and the dominant narrative we have come to know today.

The Pope's Conspiracy


Lewis M. Weinstein - 2012
    Weinstein's widely acclaimed first novel, The Heretic ... Benjamin and Esther Catalan have escaped the Inquisition in Spain and are seeking to re-build their lives as Jews and printers in Florence under the protection and patronage of Lorenzo de Medici, one of the wealthiest and most powerful men in Europe. Their promising future is threatened, however, as they are caught up in a secret plot to murder Lorenzo and his brother Giuliano, with the devious Pope Sixtus IV at the center of the conspiracy. Tension builds as the Pope's plan is put in motion and the Medici family responds. Based on actual historical events, The Pope's Conspiracy offers an enticing view of Renaissance Florence at the peak of its artistic and political glory, and also of the heroic struggles of a talented and ambitious Jewish couple trying to find their place in an often hostile Christian world. The Catalan's skills as printers provide not only their initial link to Lorenzo, but also their standing as a valued part of the small Florentine Jewish community. The technology of Gutenberg's printing press and the organization of a printing business play featured roles in the novel. Readers who loved Benjamin and Esther Catalan in The Heretic will be excited to see their development in The Pope's Conspiracy, as individuals and as a couple."

Famous Drownings in Literary History: Essays on 21st-Century Jewishness


Kevin Haworth - 2012
    Already the winner of a pre-publication grant from the Ohio Arts Council, from a former winner of the Samuel Goldberg Prize for Jewish fiction, this will be right up the alley of those who enjoy "The Believer" and "This American Life," a charming but darkly tinged look at circumcision, terrorist bombers, the Catskills in the '70s, and all the other confusing things that make up the life of post-9/11 Jewish American parents and artists. Download it for free, or order the special handmade paper edition, at [cclapcenter.com/drownings].

Dirty Yiddish: Everyday Slang from "What's Up?" to "F*%# Off!"


Adrienne Gusoff - 2012
     Ikh bin fershikkert. Don’t fuck with me! Bareh mikh nit! I have the shits. Ikh hob a shittern mogn. Lick my pussy. Lekh meyn lokh. Was it good for you? Tsufreedn?

The Wayward Moon


Janice Weizman - 2012
    Instead of preparing to meet her fiancé for the first time, she will have to flee, leaving behind her intended, her home, possessions, and her identity. An enemy of her father has burst into her house and killed her father. Rahel has had to kill him in self-defense. At that time and in that area of the world, Rahel’s choices and rights are limited. Rahel encounters wealthy merchants, Islamic theologians, Christian monks, illicit lovers, and shrewd innkeepers. She must outplay them all." (from AJL review)

It's a ... It's a ... It's a Mitzvah


Elizabeth Suneby - 2012
    Through lively illustrations and playful dialogue, children engage with Jewish wisdom as they share in welcoming new friends, forgiving mistakes, respecting elders, sharing food with the hungry, and much, much more.

Reference Guide to the Talmud: Fully Revised


Adin Even-Israel Steinsaltz - 2012
    An indispensable resource for students of all levels, this fully revised, English-language edition of the Reference Guide clearly and concisely explains the Talmud's fundamental structure, concepts, terminology, assumptions, and inner logic; provides essential historical and biographical information; and includes appendixes, a key to abbreviations, and a comprehensive index. For improved usability, this completely updated volume has a number of new features: topical organization instead of by Hebrew alphabet, re-edited and revised text to coordinate with the language used in the Koren Talmud Bavli, an index of Hebrew terms to enable one seeking a Hebrew term to locate the relevant entry. An excellent companion for anyone studying any edition of the Talmud.

Arise! Arise! : Deborah, Ruth and Hannah


Debra Band - 2012
    Band; foreward by Adele Berlin.Focusing on 3 women in the Bible, Band offers commentary and beautiful color illuminations of the text.

New American Haggadah


Jonathan Safran Foer - 2012
     Read each year around the seder table, the Haggadah recounts through prayer, song, and ritual the extraordinary story of Exodus, when Moses led the Israelites out of slavery in Egypt to wander the desert for forty years before reaching the Promised Land. Now, Jonathan Safran Foer has orchestrated a new way of experiencing and understanding one of our oldest, most timeless, and sacred stories, with a new translation of the traditional text by Nathan Englander and provocative commentary by major Jewish writers and thinkers Jeffrey Goldberg, Lemony Snicket, Rebecca Newberger Goldstein, and Nathaniel Deutsch. Ravishingly designed and illustrated by the acclaimed Israeli artist and calligrapher Oded Ezer, New American Haggadah is an utterly unique and absorbing prayer book, the first of its kind, that brings together some of the preeminent voices of our time. "The best book of modern religious thought in recent memory." --The Millions "What makes this haggadah shine is the combination of commentary, design, and illustration." --Financial Times

The Jewish Wardrobe: From the Collection of the Israel Museum, Jerusalem: From the Collection of the Israel Museum, Jerusalem


Daisy Raccah-Djivre - 2012
    In this colorful volume, Jewish communities--particularly those established for centuries in Eastern Europe, the Middle East, and North Africa--are revealed through their garments. Stunning photographs spin tales of family traditions and religious devotion, with a special section dedicated to jewelry worn by brides and grooms. Superb photographs of specific garments, with many close-up details, are juxtaposed with rare contextual photographs from the Israel Museum's archives to create a tapestry of a people revealed through textiles, costume, and images. More than 350 revelatory illustrations tell us how these precious articles of dress were originally worn.

Menachem Begin: A Life


Avi Shilon - 2012
    Among the many topics Avi Shilon holds up to new light are Begin's antagonistic relationship with David Ben-Gurion, his controversial role in the 1982 Lebanon War, his unique leadership style, the changes in his ideology over the years, and the mystery behind the total silence he maintained at the end of his career. Through Begin's remarkable life, the book also recounts the history of the right-wing segment of Israeli society, a story essential to understanding the Israel of today.

Grandma Rose's Magic


Linda Elovitz Marshall - 2012
    And whenever she sews, something magical happens. A tale of generosity rewarded.

The Land of Eighteen Dreams


Lawrence J. Epstein - 2012
    Lily narrates eighteen incidents describing their relationship as she grows from age eight to adulthood. As Benjamin tells her the story of his long and conflict-filled life starting with his childhood escape from being kidnapped by the Russian army, he simultaneously offers the wider story of American Jewish life over the last century and distills the inherited folk wisdom of the Eastern European Jewish heritage.

The Sensualist


Daniel Torday - 2012
    Jewish Studies. Winner of the 2012 National Jewish Book Award for Outstanding Debut Fiction. Raised in Baltimore in the '90s, 17-year-old Samuel Gerson is ready to be rid of his high school baseball team, his protective upbringing, and the tight-knit Jewish community in which he's spent his whole life. But when he befriends enigmatic Dmitri Zilber, a recent Russian Jewish immigrant who is obsessed with the works of Dostoevsky, Samuel's world begins to shift. In the wake of his grandfather's suicide, as his life increasingly entangles with that of Dmitri and his beautiful sister Yelizaveta, it sets in motion a series of events that culminates in a disturbing act of violence. A quietly devastating portrait of late adolescence, THE SENSUALIST examines the culture we inherit as it collides with the one we create.I throw at you, without reservation, this adjective: masterful. This book is fast and warm, fraught and intimate--and no slouch in the funny department, either. Daniel Torday's voice is entirely his own. Baltimore is his. Dmitri Zilber is a brilliant character, and I am in love with his sister. I am constantly happy to be in their presence.--Adam Levin

Six Cherry Blossoms: And Other Stories


Alicia Appleman-Jurman - 2012
    It is a prequel to "Alicia: My Story"Fans of "Alicia: My Story," and new readers alike, will find in these stories inspiration, and a greater understanding of life before, and immediately after the Holocaust.

My Dear Boy: The Journey of a Lifetime


Joanie Schirm - 2012
    When they passed away, she made a remarkable discovery in an old desk. It was a discovery that sent her on the adventure of a lifetime and caught her up in a world of survival, loss and suffering during World War II.To learn more about Joanie and her upcoming book visit JoanieSchirm.com

All Politics Is Religious: Speaking Faith to the Media, Policy Makers and Community


Dennis S. Ross - 2012
    Reading this book will not make you as glib as your favorite newscaster (who is probably reading a teleprompter) or as dashing or beautiful as a Hollywood celebrity, but it will make you less fearful, better trained and more likely to be used as a source again."--from the Foreword by Rev. Barry W. LynnA practical and empowering resource. It provides ideas and strategies for expressing a clear, forceful and progressive religious point of view that is all too often overlooked and under-represented in public discourse. It identifies the religious themes in today's great debates--gay rights, the needs of children and families, church-state separation and reproductive rights, including access to sex education, contraception and abortion care--and presents new language and methods for effective communication with the media, policy makers and community. It steers away from the polemics and jargon of politics--left, right, liberal, conservative, socialist--and instead relies on factual historical examples, current events and personal stories to illustrate the best ways to communicate the positive role faith can play in personal and public life by reinforcing the separation of church and state.

And So It Was Written


Ellen Brazer - 2012
    The year is 132 CE, and the proclaimed Jewish Messiah, Bar Kokhba, has defeated the Roman army and rules Judea. As the Romans prepare to reclaim Israel, the book follows two sets of brothers-one Roman and one Jewish-whose friendships, hatreds, and lives intertwine. For characters you will dream about, And So It Was Written is the ultimate treat. You will smell the spices in the markets, see the blood on the battlefields, rage with the injustice of brother against brother. From triumph to defeat, this is a saga of courage, conquest, familial loyalty, honor and love-showing man at his best and his worst.

Jewish Radicals: A Documentary Reader


Tony Michels - 2012
    Written in English and Yiddish, these documents reflect the entire spectrum of radical opinion, from anarchism to social democracy, Communism to socialist-Zionism. Rank-and-file activists, organizational leaders, intellectuals, and commentators, from within the Jewish community and beyond, all have their say. Their stories crisscross the Atlantic, spanning from the United States to Europe and British-ruled Palestine. The documents illuminate in fascinating detail the efforts of large numbers of Jews to refashion themselves as they confronted major problems of the twentieth century: poverty, anti-semitism, the meaning of American national identity, war, and totalitarianism. In this comprehensive sourcebook, the story of Jewish radicals over seven decades is told for the first time in their own words.

Witness to the Storm: A Jewish Journey from Nazi Berlin to the 82nd Airborne, 1920-1945


Werner T. Angress - 2012
    After fleeing Germany with his family, he escaped to the United States. He then worked as a chicken farmer, joined the army, trained as an interrogator, jumped as a D-Day paratrooper, helped liberate a concentration camp, and fought to rescue the country of his birth. Following a distinguished career as a history professor in the U.S., he chose to retire in Berlin, where he spent his last years talking to German schoolchildren about what it was like to grow up Jewish under the Third Reich, and working to promote tolerance and peace. Winner of a 2013 Independent Publisher Book Award: Gold Medal, Best Adult Non-Fiction Personal Ebook.

The Artist's Torah


David Ebenbach - 2012
    In this book, you'll find a yearlong cycle of weekly meditations on a life lived artistically, grounded in ancient Jewish wisdom and the wisdom of artists, composers, writers, and choreographers from the past and present. You'll explore the nature of the creative process--how it begins, what it's for, what it asks of you, how you work your way to truth and meaning, what you do when you get blocked, what you do when you're done--and encounter questions that will help you apply the meditations to your own life and work. Above all, The Artist's Torah teaches us that creativity is a natural and important part of the human spirit, a bright spark that, week after week, this book will brighten. Endorsements: "This original, eloquent, clear, and practical book is a commentary, a memoir, and a how-to manual for the aspiring artist; it is a motivational treatise and a treasury of sage quotations." --Lori Lefkovitz, Professor of Jewish Studies and Professor of English, Northeastern University "The Talmud notes that the Torah is a 'shira, ' a song or a poem--artistic, crafted, deliberate, and beautiful. David Harris Ebenbach opens our eyes and exposes our hearts to the artfulness of Torah hiding in plain view. The Torah that emerges from his gentle reading rewards the reader with deep wisdom and exquisite beauty." --Rabbi Bradley Shavit Artson, Vice President, American Jewish University "Ebenbach is a learned interpreter of the Bible, steeped in the literature of both traditional Jewish interpretation and the musings on the artistic process from self-reflective artists. His insightful readings of Scripture are profound and moving, spurring his readers both to align themselves with creative forces and to regard biblical texts in fresh and inspiring ways." --Rabbi Jacob J. Staub, Professor of Jewish Philosophy and Spirituality, Reconstructionist Rabbinical College Author

The Observant Life: The Wisdom of Conservative Judaism for Contemporary Jews


Martin S. Cohen - 2012
    

Greenhorn


Anna Olswanger - 2012
    In Greenhorn, a young Holocaust survivor named Daniel arrives at a Brooklyn yeshiva in the 1940s with only a small box that he won't let out of his sight. His obsessive attachment to the mysterious box excites the curiosity and unkind attention of the other boys. Free downloads of a Discussion Guide and Classroom Guide for Greenhorn are available from the publisher's website: www.newsouthbooks.com/greenhorn.

The Significance of Religious Experience


Howard Wettstein - 2012
    His orientation is broadly naturalistic, but not in the mode of reductionism or eliminativism. This collection explores questions of broad religious interest, but does so through a focus on theauthor's religious tradition, Judaism. Among the issues explored are the nature and role of awe, ritual, doctrine, religious experience; the distinction between belief and faith; problems of evil and suffering with special attention to the Book of Job and to the Akedah, the biblical story of thebinding of Isaac; the virtue of forgiveness. One of the book's highlights is its literary (as opposed to philosophical) approach to theology that at the same time makes room for philosophical exploration of religion. Another is Wettstein's rejection of the usual picture that sees religious life assitting atop a distinctive metaphysical foundation, one that stands in need of epistemological justification.

Holocaust Literature: A History and Guide


David G. Roskies - 2012
    Beginning in wartime, it proceeds from the literature of mobilization and mourning in the Free World to the vast literature produced in Nazi-occupied ghettos, bunkers and places of hiding, transit and concentration camps. No less remarkable is the new memorial literature that begins to take shape within weeks and months of the liberation. Moving from Europe to Israel, the United States, and beyond, the authors situate the writings by real and proxy witnesses within three distinct postwar periods: “communal memory,” still internal and internecine; “provisional memory” in the 1960s and 1970s, when a self-conscious Holocaust genre is born; and “authorized memory,” in which we live today. Twenty book covers—first editions in their original languages—and a guide to the “first hundred books” show the multilingual scope, historical depth, and artistic range of this extraordinary body of writing.

Zayde Comes to Live


Sheri Cooper Sinykin - 2012
    Though no one has told her, Rachel knows it is because Zayde is dying, and she worries what will happen to him. Her friends religions offer her no solace, and although she gets some answers from her Rabbi about where Zayde may go, Rachel still cant imagine her own life without Zayde in it. It is only when she realizes that Zayde will live on in the love and the memories they have shared that she finally begins to find some peace. Author Sheri Sinykins understated text and illustrator Kristina Swarners beautiful illustrations combine to create a moving story about truth, love, and loss.

The Gerus Guide - The Step By Step Guide to Conversion to Orthodox Judaism


Aryeh Moshen - 2012
    Drawing from over 25 years of experience counseling hundreds of candidates through the process, Rabbi Aryeh Moshen lays out a roadmap that's been proven successful time and again. Here, you'll find a comprehensive guide to keeping Kosher and observing the Sabbath, finding your community, Jewish prayer, and everything you need to live as an Orthodox Jew on a daily basis.

Marriage and Divorce in the Jewish State: Israel's Civil War


Susan M. Weiss - 2012
    Israeli religious courts possess the exclusive right to conduct and terminate marriages. There is no civil marriage or divorce in Israel, irrespective of one’s religious inclinations. All Muslims must marry and divorce in accordance with shariya laws, all Catholics in accordance with canon law, and all Jews in accordance with Torah law (halakha). The interpretation and implementation of Torah law is in the hands of the Orthodox religious establishment, the only stream of Judaism that enjoys legal recognition in Israel. The rabbinic courts strenuously oppose any changes to this so-called status quo arrangement between religious and secular authorities. In fact, religious courts in Israel are currently pressing for expanded jurisdiction beyond personal status, stressing their importance to Israel’s growing religious community. This book shows how religious courts, based on centuries-old patriarchal law, undermine the full civil and human rights of Jewish women in Israel. Making a broad argument for civil marriage and divorce in Israel, the authors also emphasize that religious marriages and divorces, when they do occur, must benefit from legislation that makes divorce easier to obtain. Making this issue their focal point, they speak to a larger question: Is Israel a democracy or a theocracy?

Better-Than-Best Purim, The


Naomi Howland - 2012
    But when she asks her pets to help, they’re all too busy. What could they be up to? Soon the little old lady will find out! Author-illustrator Naomi Howland’s bright artwork perfectly illustrates this sweet Purim tale.

Needle in the Bone: How a Holocaust Survivor and a Polish Resistance Fighter Beat the Odds and Found Each Other


Caryn Mirriam-Goldberg - 2012
    As mere teenagers during World War II, the two men defied daunting odds, lost everything and nearly everyone in the war, and yet summoned the courage to start new lives in the United States. Captured by the German army during the Warsaw Ghetto uprising, Frydman survived six concentration camps and three death marches. By the war’s end, everyone in his extended family had been killed except for his brother. Piekalkiewicz started his own underground army at age sixteen. In addition, one of his uncles was the main leader and another the head treasurer for the Polish resistance before the Nazis discovered, tortured, and murdered them. After the war, Frydman and Piekalkiewicz began the long process of healing, taking different paths through the refugee camps of Europe, and then through university, marriage, and work, eventually leading them both to teaching positions at the University of Kansas, where they met in 1975. Recognizing the trauma and courage of each other’s experiences, they became best friends, forming a lasting bond. Needle in the Bone offers insight into the Holocaust and the Polish resistance by entwining the stories of these two survivors. By blending extensive interviews with Frydman and Piekalkiewicz, historical research, and the author’s own responses and questions, this emotionally stirring book provides a unique perspective on still-compelling issues, including the meaning of the Holocaust, the nature of good and evil, and how people persevere in the face of unbearable pain and loss.

The Posen Library of Jewish Culture and Civilization, Volume 10: 1973–2005


Deborah Dash Moore - 2012
    The volume vividly demonstrates the interaction of Jewish ideas and themes across continents and languages, revealing the complex transnational character of Jewish life and cultural production. With hundreds of examples from literature, visual arts, and popular culture, as well as intellectual and spiritual works, the volume adopts a deliberately pluralistic perspective. High and low, elite and popular, folk and mass, famous and obscure—all have a place in this groundbreaking anthology.Readers will quickly come to appreciate the impact on Jewish culture of major social, political, and economic events during the past quarter century—the feminist movement, Israeli politics after the Yom Kippur War, Russian Jewish emigration, the Israeli occupation of Palestinian territory, the rise of identity politics in the United States, South American revolutions and dictatorships, and North African emigration to France, among many others. Offering a rich encounter with an array of expressions of Jewish identity, the anthology reflects the exuberance, diversity, and vigor of Jewish culture in the decades since 1973.

Torah Mietzion: Shemot: New Readings in Tanakh


Yeshivat Har Etzion - 2012
    Since its founding in Israel in 1968, Yeshivat Har Etzion has emphasized Bible study alongside Talmud study in order to foster what its founder, Rabbi Yehuda Amital z"l, called an "organic understanding" of Torah and Torah philosophy. The result has been the development of a unique, analytically rigorous, creative, interpretive method that is infused with a profound quest for meaning.

Leading Men: Presidential Campaigns and the Politics of Manhood


Jackson Katz - 2012
    Over the past thirty years, Democrats have made major gains with women, while Republicans have been doing far better with men especially white working class men. The question is why? In Leading Men, Jackson Katz offers stunning evidence that American presidential campaigns have evolved into nothing less than quadrennial referenda on competing versions of American manhood. And in the process, he never takes his eye off what this development means for women as both candidates and citizens. Written in an engaging style that will appeal to general readers, political experts, and activists alike, Katz explores some of the major political developments and offers a new way to understand the power of image in presidential politics. In the end, Leading Men offers nothing less than a paradigm-shifting way to understand the dynamics of presidential elections, and the very nature of the American presidency

Footsteps: Perspectives for Daily Life


Esther Jungreis - 2012
    In Footsteps: Perspectives for Daily Life, the Rebbetzin Jungreis speaks to readers directly from the pages, providing universal wisdom on how to live more meaningfully. The book is divided into concise, impactful chapters such as Purpose, Confidence and Creativity.

Rebels in the Holy Land: Mazkeret Batya, an Early Battleground for the Soul of Israel


Sam Finkel - 2012
    But this is no typical story of pioneering; it is one of monumental idealism in the face of duplicity and cynical betrayal. The farmers' simple wish to observe the Sabbatical year of 1889-1890 - despite their patron's opposition - thrust them into the swirling epicenter of worldwide controversy. Reviled by the Baron's administrators, vilified in the press, ridiculed and nearly abandoned even by some of their religious countrymen, they stood firm. Their fight for what later became Mazkeret Batya sheds dazzling historical light on some of the very issues facing Israel today.Richly illustrated with maps and vintage photography, this riveting account takes the reader on a journey of remarkable courage and self-sacrifice - a journey history has forgotten.

Israel's Silent Defender: An Inside Look at Sixty Years of Israeli Intelligence


Amos Gilboa - 2012
    Through its professionalism, daring and creativity, it has made important contributions to intelligence services around the world in the struggle against global terrorism. But how much is known about it? How was it built? What are its areas of activity -and what are the secrets of its success? In Israel's Silent Defender, Brigadier Generals (Res.) Amos Gilboa and Ephraim Lapid have compiled thirty-seven essays written by experts and leaders of Israeli intelligence, among them high-ranking analysts and J2s, commanders of human intelligence (HUMINT), signal intelligence (SIGINT), visual intelligence (VISINT) and open source intelligence (OSINT) units, and heads of the Israel Defense Intelligence (IDI), the Mossad and the Shabak. This book is a project of the Israel Intelligence Heritage and Commemoration Center and dedicated to the memory of Meir Amit, who was both head of the Mossad and director of IDI. It is published in memory of the fallen heroes of the intelligence community, with profound appreciation for its founders - those who laid the groundwork for the security of the State of Israel.

Shuva: The Future of the Jewish Past


Yehuda Kurtzer - 2012
    By now "history" has surpassed "memory" as a means of relating to the past--a development that falls short in building identity and creates disconnection between Jews and their collective history. Kurtzer seeks to mend this breach. Drawing on key classical texts, he shows that "history" and "memory" are not exclusive and that the perceived dissonance between them can be healed by a selective reclamation of the past and a translation of that past into purposefulness.

Oy! Only Six? Why Not More? Six-Word Memoirs on Jewish Life


Larry Smith - 2012
    Six words. What's yours?The enormously popular Six-Word Memoir project examines a subject bursting with words: Jewish life. With contributions from machers like Larry David, Jonathan Safran Foer, Henry Winkler, Elizabeth Wurtzel, Gary Shteyngart, Maira Kalman, Walter Mosley and Mayor Ed Koch, along with hundreds of first-time writers, Six-Word Memoirs on Jewish Life offers stories of faith and family, duty and identity, celebration and tsuris that will inform, delight and inspire.

Jewish Ethics & Social Justice


Shmuly M. Yanklowitz - 2012
    If we want Judaism to matter in today's world, we must respond - deeply - to society's call. The Torah is a living tradition that we need to bring to the most urgent social issues of our time. We must fully enter the public arena, recognizing that our common responsibilities transcend our particular paths. The essence of spiritual life shines at the core of all the crude and harsh realities we see every day - and when we ignore these realities, we are like blind fish completely unaware of the very water in which they swim. Jewish Ethics & Social Justice is a collection of sweeping meditations on how to make Judaism universally relevant again. Explore hot social issues - global hunger, prison reform, worker rights, and more - through the eyes of the Jewish ethical tradition. Learn about the core values of Jewish activism - discover a deeper connection to the timeless issu

Jews of the Wild West a Multicultural True Story


Kay Miller - 2012
    Julia Staab had a scary encounter with Billy the Kid. Hebrew was written in stone above a cathedral entrance. Ludwig Ilfeld landed a role in the movie, The Rattlesnake. There were rumors of a ghost at the Palace Avenue mansion. Hopi snake dancers, a horse named Maude, a President and a freed slave appear in this true story of family, friendship and adventure in New Mexico. Interest Level--Ages 8 to 108 available at www.jewsgowest.comebook at Amazon.com

Relics for the Present: Contemporary Reflections on the Talmud


Levi Cooper - 2012
    How much time should it take to pray? Is one allowed to argue with God? Who can give a blessing? And what is worth crying for? In this page-by-page companion to Berakhot, the first tractate of the Talmud, popular teacher and community leader Rabbi Levi Cooper explores the wisdom of the Jewish sages, transforming their ancient teachings into lessons for everyday life.

Nothing Happened: Charlotte Salomon and an Archive of Suicide


Darcy Buerkle - 2012
    But Salomon's focus on suicide was not merely a familial idiosyncrasy. Nothing Happened argues that the social history of early-twentieth-century Germany has elided an important cultural and social phenomenon by not including the story of German Jewish women and suicide. This absence in social history mirrors an even larger gap in the intellectual history of deeply gendered suicide studies that have reproduced the notion of women's suicide as a rarity in history. Nothing Happened is a historiographic intervention that operates in conversation and in tension with contemporary theory about trauma and the reconstruction of emotion in history.

Israel's Right of Self-Defense: International Law and Gaza


Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs - 2012
    It concludes that existing international law permits a nation to act in self-defense, and that Israel gives more thought to upholding the laws of war during its military operations than any other nation in history.The broad questions discussed include the law of armed conflict, proportionality, asymmetric conflicts, self-defense, accountability, and "lawfare." More specific topics include the work of the Goldstone Commission, "civilian" casualty figures from the Gaza war, Israel's naval blockade, and the supply of utilities and goods to Gaza. Authors include Dr. Abraham Bell, Dr. Amichai Cohen, Prof. George P. Fletcher, Lt. Col. (ret.) Jonathan D. Halevi, Sigall Horovitz, Col. Richard Kemp, Prof. Ruth Lapidoth, Maj. Gil Limon, Dr. Roy S. Schond.

Maimonides on Teshuvah: The Ways of Repentance


Maimonides - 2012
    Teshuvah expresses a restoration of personal balance and a return to spiritual center. Maimonides on Teshuvah explores the thought of Judaism's greatest philosopher on the process of finding a path through the thicket of transgressions past and present, seeking the elusive yet healing light of forgiveness--from God, from others, and even from one's own self. "A Master of Teshuvah should not think that he is far from the level of the righteous because of the sins he committed, intentionally or otherwise. This is not so. Rather, he is beloved and cherished by the Creator as if he had never sinned at all. Furthermore, his reward is greater, for he tasted the taste of sin and separated from it, conquering his evil inclination. The Sages taught that in the place where the Masters of Teshuvah stand, not even the completely righteous can stand." (The Ways of Repentance, 7:4) Author of the brilliant Guide for the Perplexed and the massive Mishneh Torah, Moses Maimonides' thought continues to influence and inspire students almost a thousand years after his passing in 1204. Known as the Great Eagle for his incomparable mastery of Jewish scholarship, of Maimonides it has been said "from Moses to Moses, there was no one like Moses." Maimonides on Teshuvah is a translation and commentary on The Ways of Repentance, the first comprehensive study of teshuvah in Jewish literary history. In this work, Maimonides surveys the philosophical, psychological, and practical aspects of teshuvah. Carefully weaving threads drawn from the tapestry of Jewish religious writings, Maimonides describes the theoretical foundations of teshuvah (free will versus predeterminism, nature versus nurture, and the afterlife) and provides pragmatic recommendations for readers who yearn for the cleansing power of teshuvah.