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Cahill continues his study of civilizations, begun in "How the Irish Saved Civilization" (DC15036), with an extended look at the…
Torah. He shows how events therein, especially the Jews' belief in one God and their ability to look at reality in a whole new way, influenced civilization. Some strong language. Bestseller. 1998.The Dead Sea scrolls: the truth behind the mystique (The modern scholar)
By Lawrence H Schiffman. 2007
New York University professor, Lawrence Schiffman, discusses the Dead Sea Scrolls, the most important collection of Jewish texts from the…
centuries before the rise of Christianity. Only through efforts to understand what the scrolls can teach us about the history of Judaism is it possible for us to learn what they have to teach us about the history of Christianity, because Christianity came into being only after these texts were composed and copied. 2007.The complete book of Jewish observance
By Leo Trepp. 1980
An encyclopedic introduction to the tradition and rituals of the Jewish religion that covers virtually all aspects of Jewish observance.…
Rabbi Trepp briefly describes the historical development of each rite and the divergent practices among Orthodox, Conservative, Reform, and Reconstructionist Jewry. 1980.The 100-minute Torah
By Cliff Cohen. 2010
Passover: festival of freedom (Orca origins)
By Monique Polak. 2016
During Passover, Jews are reminded of how, more than three thousand years ago, their ancestors emerged from slavery to become…
free men and women. Polak explores her own Jewish roots as she tells the Passover story, which reminds us that the freedom to be who we are and practice our religion, whatever it may be, is a great gift. It also teaches us that if we summon our courage and look out for each other, we can endure and overcome the most challenging circumstances. Grades 4-7. 2016.My father's wake: how the Irish teach us to live, love, and die
By Kevin Toolis. 2018
Kabbalah works: secrets for purposeful living (Your coach in a box)
By David Aaron. 2006
Rabbi Aaron shares the divine knowledge of Jewish mystical tradition to offer practical guidance for modern times. He shows how…
you can achieve success in every aspect of your life--love, happiness, creativity, and more--when you unlock your natural self-knowledge and reclaim the abundance within you! 2006.From here to eternity: traveling the world to find the good death
By Caitlin Doughty. 2017
Fascinated by our pervasive terror of dead bodies, mortician Caitlin Doughty set out to discover how other cultures care for…
their dead. In rural Indonesia, she observes a man clean and dress his grandfather's mummified body. Grandpa's mummy has lived in the family home for two years, where the family has maintained a warm and respectful relationship. She meets Bolivian natitas (cigarette-smoking, wish-granting human skulls), and introduces us to a Japanese kotsuage, in which relatives use chopsticks to pluck their loved-ones' bones from cremation ashes. With curiosity and morbid humour, Doughty encounters vividly decomposed bodies and participates in compelling, powerful death practices almost entirely unknown in America. Introduces death-care innovators researching green burial and body composting, explores new spaces for mourning--including a glowing Buddha columbarium in Japan and America's only open-air pyre--and reveals unexpected new possibilities for our own death rituals. Bestseller. 2017.Have a little faith: a true story
By Mitch Albom. 2009
The book begins with an unusual request: an eighty-two-year-old rabbi from Albom's old hometown asks him to deliver his eulogy.…
Feeling unworthy, Albom insists on understanding the man better, which throws him back into a world of faith he'd left years ago. Meanwhile, closer to his current home, Albom becomes involved with a Detroit pastor--a reformed drug dealer and convict--who preaches to the poor and homeless in a decaying church with a hole in its roof. Moving between their worlds, Christian and Jewish, African-American and white, impoverished and well-to-do, Albom observes how these very different men employ faith similarly in fighting for survival. 2009.Chinese New Year: a celebration for everyone (Orca origins.)
By Jen Sookfong Lee. 2017
From its beginnings as a farming celebration marking the end of winter to its current role as a global party…
featuring good food, lots of gifts and public parades, 'Chinese New Year' is a snapshot of Chinese culture. Award-winning author and broadcaster Jen Sookfong Lee recalls her childhood in Vancouver, British Columbia, and weaves family stories into the history, traditions and evolution of Chinese New Year. Grades 3-6. 2017.Apron strings: navigating food and family in France, Italy, and China
By Jan Wong. 2017
Jan Wong knows food is better when shared, so when she set out to write a book about home cooking…
in France, Italy, and China, she asked her 22-year-old son, Sam, to join her. While he wasn't keen on spending excessive time with his mom, he dreamed of becoming a chef. Ultimately, it was an opportunity he couldn't pass up. On their journey, Jan and Sam live and cook with locals, seeing how globalization is changing food, families, and cultures. In southeast France, they move in with a family sheltering undocumented migrants. From Bernadette, the housekeeper, they learn classic French family fare such as blanquette de veau. In a hamlet in the heart of Italy's Slow Food country, the locals teach them how to make authentic spaghetti alle vongole and a proper risotto with leeks. In Shanghai, they cook firecracker chicken and scallion pancakes with the nouveaux riches and their migrant maids, who are part of the biggest demographic shift in world history. Along the way, mother and son explore their sometimes-fraught relationship, uniting--and occasionally clashing--over their mutual love of cooking. 2017.Presents the steps performed in a traditional Passover Seder, plus stories, songs, poetry, and pictures that celebrate the historical significance…
of this holiday to Jews all over the world. Grades 3-6 and older readers. 2004.Who wrote the Dead Sea scrolls?: the search for the secret of Qumran
By Norman Golb. 1995
A scholarly inquiry into the origins of the Dead Sea Scrolls, the first of which was discovered in the Qumran…
caves in 1947. The author refutes the theory that scribes produced the scrolls in a local Essenean monastery and asserts that the manuscripts were transferred from Jerusalem when the city was under Roman siege. c1995.When bad things happen to good people
By Harold S Kushner. 1981
Understanding Conservative Judaism (Emet ve'emunah = studies in Conservative Jewish thought ; #2)
By Robert Gordis, Max Gelb. 1978
A rabbi elucidates the ground rules by which Conservatism operates and how it applies its principles to solving communal problems.…
Also considers Jewish survival in general and the future of Conservative Judaism in particular. 1978.Tough questions Jews ask: a young adult's guide to building a Jewish life
By Edward Feinstein. 2003
Author Rabbi Feinstein answers typical teen questions about Judaism, like "Why should I believe in God?", "Is Any of That…
Stuff in the Bible True?", and "No Cheeseburgers? No Going to the Mall on Saturday? Why Does Religion Need So Many Rules?" Includes discussions about God, intermarriage, prayer, bar/bat mitzvah, Israel, Christianity, anti-Semitism, the meaning of life, and the Messiah. Some descriptions of violence. Grades 5-8. 2003.The milk lady of Bangalore: an unexpected adventure
By Shoba Narayan. 2018
When Shoba Narayan, a writer and cookbook author who had lived for years in Manhattan, moves back to Bangalore with…
her family, she befriends the milk lady, from whom she buys fresh milk every day. These two women from very different backgrounds bond over not only cows, considered holy in India, but also family, food, and life. After Narayan agrees to buy her milk lady a new cow (she needs one and Narayan can afford it, so why not?), they set off looking for just the right cow. What was at first a simple economic transaction becomes something much more complicated, though never without a hint of slapstick. 2018.The lost Ark of the Covenant: solving the 2,500 year old mystery of the fabled biblical ark
By Tudor Parfitt. 2008
Historian-adventurer, author of "Journey to the Vanished City: The Search for a Lost Tribe of Israel", recounts his quest for…
the ancient sacred chest that once held the Ten Commandments. Parfitt begins among a remote African people who claim such a box lies in a mountain cave. 2008.Getting a life: the social worlds of geek culture
By Benjamin Woo. 2018
Comic book superheroes, fantasy kingdoms, and futuristic starships have become inescapable features of today’s pop-culture landscape, and the people we…
used to deride as “nerds” or “geeks” have ridden their popularity and visibility to mainstream recognition. Yet these conventionalized representations of geek culture typically ignore the real people who have invested time and resources to make it what it is. Woo recentres our understanding of geek culture on the everyday lives of its participants, drawing on fieldwork in comic book shops, game stores, and conventions. He shows how geek culture is a set of interconnected social practices that are associated with popular media and argues that typical depictions of mass-mediated entertainment as something that isolates and pacifies its audiences are flawed because they do not account for the conversations, relationships, communities, and identities that are created by engaging with the products of mass culture. 2018. "What is a nerd?" -- Talk nerdy to me: the meaning of geek culture -- Taking geek culture seriously: a practice-theoretic account -- Values and virtues: what is best in life? -- Careers: boldly going on -- Making communities from mass culture -- Institutions: building worlds between production and consumption -- The limits of participation -- The geek, the bad, and the ugly --The last whalers: three years in the far Pacific with a courageous tribe and a vanishing way of life
By Doug Bock Clark. 2019
Journalist Doug Bock Clark tells the stunning inside story of the Lamalerans, an ancient tribe of 1,500 hunter-gatherers who live…
on a volcanic island so remote it is known by other Indonesians as "The Land Left Behind." They have survived for centuries by taking whales with bamboo harpoons, but now are being pushed toward collapse by the encroachment of the modern world. 2019.