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We're in America Now: A Survivor's Stories
By Fred Amram. 2016
"Epic in scope, but gentle and charming in delivery, Fred Amram's We're in America Now is a quiet chronicle of…
a clamorous era. Politics and war compel Amram's family to leave the only home they ever knew and embark on a personal exodus, fleeing a new pharaoh, pursuing a new promised land. They arrive in America to discover that paradise is not all milk and honey, but love, loyalty, and faith conspire to hold the family together, and the story of how they rebuild the life that was robbed them is moving, probing, and insightful." -J.C. Hallman, author of B & Me: A True Story of Literary ArousalThese compelling stories form a riveting memoir that begins with the author's birth during the rise of Hitler in 1930s Germany. He and his surviving family soon escape to Holland and sail to America where they encounter many challenges as immigrants in a new world. This country truly becomes a land of opportunity where one can build a new life and become more than a "Holocaust survivor."Fred Amram is a retired University of Minnesota professor of communication and creativity. He spent his early years in Hanover, Germany, where he experienced the Holocaust from its inception in 1933. He witnessed Kristallnacht and the Gestapo invading his home. He watched the British bombers from his balcony when Jews were banned from air raid shelters. The loss of uncles, aunts, a grandmother, and many more relatives has motivated him to share his experiences in hopes of ending genocide everywhere.The Secret Life of God: Discovering the Divine within You
By Rabbi David Aaron. 2004
How much does our perception of God really matter? Many of us aren't conscious of our image of a "higher…
power." For some of us, that unspoken image is a Judgmental Parent or an exacting Old Man in the Sky. For others, God is an Imaginary Friend who is there to fix problems after we create them. David Aaron can help you discover a mature, new understanding of God and lead you to discover the wellspring of Divinity within you. By drawing on teachings of Kabbalah that were secret for millennia, he helps you to reclaim the power you've given away to negative images of God or passive images of yourself. These mystical secrets of Judaism can offer reassuring guidance, meaning, and purpose to the lives of people of all faiths. In the journey to discovering God's secret life you will: * Awaken to your life's deepest purpose * Delight in a deeper connection to your true inner self, God, and others * Learn to experience God's infinite love for you * Rise to new heights, cope with challenges, and make courageous choices * Achieve true peace of mind and freedom from anxiety Aaron shares these profound ancient teachings in simple, everyday language with a touch of wit and humor. Rich in personal stories and anecdotes, his examples from daily life help us tap the transformational power hidden within and illuminate the surprising paradoxes of spiritual growth. Awakened to finally experience a personal connection to God, we are at last able to receive God's love unconditionally and discover our ultimate identity, divine purpose, and true happiness." Rabbi David Aaron, the son of a Holocaust survivor, has struggled since early youth to understand the world's potential for hatred and paradoxical yearning for meaning, love, and creativity. His own spiritual journey led him to Israel, where he studied Torah and Jewish mysticism under the tutelage of the great masters. He received his rabbinical ordination in 1979 from the Israel Torah Research Institute (Yeshivat ITRI). A popular lecturer in North America and a frequent guest on radio and TV, he is the founder and dean of Isralight (www.isralight.org), an international organization with programs throughout North America, South Africa, and Israel. He lives in Jerusalem with his wife, Chana, and their seven children and three grandchildren. For more information visit www.rabbidavidaaron.com. ""With a tone that is soft but firm, Aaron offers a particularly embracing sort of guidance. His approach, open and honest with a nice dose of humor, makes the mysteries of God less frightening."--Publishers Weekly "This is a very inspiring work on a subject that deserves more exploration. Rabbi Aaron has given us much to think about with his rich reservoir of fresh images. His advice is simple and sound."--Spirituality and Health "Aaron's humor, engaging narrative style, and use of anecdotes makes the biblical material and philosophical concepts he delineates accessible. The Secret Life of God offers individuals of any religious background assistance in dealing with some of the paradoxes of the mystical life."--Dragonfly "David Aaron is a wise, compassionate, brilliant teacher who uses irony, paradox, and gentle humor to reveal the deepest, ultimate teaching of Jewish mysticism. It is simple and simultaneously profound. . . . An essential read."--Rabbi David A. Cooper, author of God Is a Verb "The most brilliant and profound exploration of the Kabbalistic teachings and philosophy about our transcendent and immanent relationship with the Divine that I have read in twenty-six years of Kabbalah study."--Gabriel Cousens, M.D., director of the Tree of Life Rejuvenation Center, Patagonia, ArizonaPutting God Second
By Donniel Hartman. 2016
Why have the monotheistic religions failed to produce societies that live up to their ethical ideals? A prominent rabbi answers…
this question by looking at his own faith and offering a way for religion to heal itself.In Putting God Second, Rabbi Donniel Hartman tackles one of modern life's most urgent and vexing questions: Why are the great monotheistic faiths--Judaism, Christianity, and Islam--chronically unable to fulfill their own self-professed goal of creating individuals infused with moral sensitivity and societies governed by the highest ethical standards?To answer this question, Hartman takes a sober look at the moral peaks and valleys of his own tradition, Judaism, and diagnoses it with clarity, creativity, and erudition. He rejects both the sweeping denouncements of those who view religion as an inherent impediment to moral progress and the apologetics of fundamentalists who proclaim religion's moral perfection against all evidence to the contrary.Hartman identifies the primary source of religion's moral failure in what he terms its "autoimmune disease," or the way religions so often undermine their own deepest values. While God obligates the good and calls us into its service, Hartman argues, God simultaneously and inadvertently makes us morally blind. The nature of this self-defeating condition is that the human religious desire to live in relationship with God often distracts religious believers from their traditions' core moral truths.The answer Hartman offers is this: put God second. In order to fulfill religion's true vision for humanity--an uncompromising focus on the ethical treatment of others--religious believers must hold their traditions accountable to the highest independent moral standards. Decency toward one's neighbor must always take precedence over acts of religious devotion, and ethical piety must trump ritual piety. For as long as devotion to God comes first, responsibility to other people will trail far, far behind.In this book, Judaism serves as a template for how the challenge might be addressed by those of other faiths, whose sacred scriptures similarly evoke both the sublime heights of human aspiration and the depths of narcissistic moral blindness. In Putting God Second, Rabbi Hartman offers a lucid analysis of religion's flaws, as well as a compelling resource, and vision, for its repair.From the Hardcover edition.Holocaust Icons
By Oren Baruch Stier. 2015
The Holocaust has bequeathed to contemporary society a cultural lexicon of intensely powerful symbols, a vocabulary of remembrance that we…
draw on to comprehend the otherwise incomprehensible horror of the Shoah. Engagingly written and illustrated with more than forty black-and-white images, Holocaust Icons probes the history and memory of four of these symbolic relics left in the Holocaust's wake. Jewish studies scholar Oren Stier offers in this volume new insight into symbols and the symbol-making process, as he traces the lives and afterlives of certain remnants of the Holocaust and their ongoing impact. Stier focuses in particular on four icons: the railway cars that carried Jews to their deaths, symbolizing the mechanics of murder; the Arbeit Macht Frei ("work makes you free") sign over the entrance to Auschwitz, pointing to the insidious logic of the camp system; the number six million that represents an approximation of the number of Jews killed as well as mass murder more generally; and the persona of Anne Frank, associated with victimization. Stier shows how and why these icons--an object, a phrase, a number, and a person--have come to stand in for the Holocaust: where they came from and how they have been used and reproduced; how they are presently at risk from a variety of threats such as commodification; and what the future holds for the memory of the Shoah. In illuminating these icons of the Holocaust, Stier offers valuable new perspective on one of the defining events of the twentieth century. He helps readers understand not only the Holocaust but also the profound nature of historical memory itself."Peering Through the Lattices": Mystical, Magical, and Pietistic Dimensions in the Tosafist Period
By Ephraim Kanarfogel. 2000
During the high Middle Ages, the tosafists flourished in northern Europe and revolutionized the study of the Talmud. These Jewish…
scholars did not participate in the philosophical and religious thought that concerned Christendom, and today they are seen as having played a limited role in mystical or esoteric studies. Ephraim Kanarfogel now challenges this conventional view of the tosafists, showing that many individuals were influenced by ascetic and pietistic practices and were involved with mystical and magical doctrines. He traces the presence of these disciplines in the pre-Crusade period, shows how they are intertwined, and suggests that the widely available Hekhalot literature was an important conduit for this material. He also demonstrates that the asceticism and esotericism of the German Pietists were an integral part of Ashkenazic rabbinic culture after the failure of Rashbam and other early tosafists to suppress these aspects of pre-Crusade thinking. The identification of these various forms of spirituality places the tosafists among those medieval rabbinic thinkers who sought to supplement their Talmudism with other areas of knowledge such as philosophy and kabbalah, demonstrating the compatibility of rabbinic culture and mysticism. These interests, argues Kanarfogel, explain both references to medieval Ashkenazic rabbinic figures in kabbalistic literature and the acceptance of certain ascetic and mystical practices by later Ashkenazic scholars. Drawing on original manuscript research, Kanarfogel makes available for the first time many passages produced by lesser known tosafists and rabbinic figures and integrates the findings of earlier and contemporary scholarship, much of it published only in Hebrew. "Peering through the Lattices" provides a greater appreciation for these texts and opens up new opportunities for scholarhship in Jewish history and thought.And I Will Dwell in Their Midst
By Etan Diamond. 1954
Suburbia may not seem like much of a place to pioneer, but for young, religiously committed Jewish families, it's open…
territory." This sentiment--expressed in the early 1970s by an Orthodox Jew in suburban Toronto--captures the essence of the suburban Orthodox Jewish experience of the late twentieth century. Although rarely associated with postwar suburbia, Orthodox Jews in metropolitan areas across the United States and Canada have successfully combined suburban lifestyles and the culture of consumerism with a strong sense of religious traditionalism and community cohesion. By their very existence in suburbia, argues Etan Diamond, Orthodox Jewish communities challenge dominant assumptions about society and religious culture in the twentieth century.Using the history of Orthodox Jewish suburbanization in Toronto, Diamond explores the different components of the North American suburban Orthodox Jewish community: sacred spaces, synagogues, schools, kosher homes, and social networks. In a larger sense, though, his book tells a story of how traditionalist religious communities have thrived in the most secular of environments. In so doing, it pushes our current understanding of cities and suburbs and their religious communities in new directions.The 613
By Archie Rand. 2015
Archie Rand's career as an artist spans five decades and myriad themes and genres. Among his pioneering explorations, The 613…
is surely one of his most ambitious feats yet. Without any idea where the work would be exhibited, Rand began transforming each and every one of the 613 mitzvahs, or commandments, into its own breathtaking painting, a series that took five years to complete. Each of the gorgeous and perplexing panels features a vibrant, unexpected image that brings forth the heart of its law and commands our eyes to linger. Rand is startling and original in his rich color choices, bold characters, and extraordinarily expressive approach. The New York Times describes the paintings as "rendered in the style of comics and pulp fiction book jackets, a dash of Mad magazine, a spoonful of Tales of the Crypt, some grotesques, some superheroes, always action, emotion, drama." Whether grotesque or dramatic, each painting provokes a sense of wonder and self-reflection, making The 613 a book to be visited time and time again. Perfect for readers of art, religion, or popular visual culture, The 613 may be the most audacious and distinctive gift book of its kind.From the Hardcover edition.The Responsive Self
By Susan Niditch. 2015
Works created in the period from the Babylonian conquest of Judea through the takeover and rule of Judea and Samaria…
by imperial Persia reveal a profound interest in the religious responses of individuals and an intimate engagement with the nature of personal experience. Using the rich and varied body of literature preserved in the Hebrew Bible, Susan Niditch examines ways in which followers of Yahweh, participating in long-standing traditions, are shown to privatize and personalize religion. Their experiences remain relevant to many of the questions we still ask today: Why do bad things happen to good people? Does God hear me when I call out in trouble? How do I define myself? Do I have a personal relationship with a divine being? How do I cope with chaos and make sense of my experience? What roles do material objects and private practices play within my religious life? These questions deeply engaged the ancient writers of the Bible, and they continue to intrigue contemporary people who try to find meaning in life and to make sense of the world. The Responsive Self studies a variety of phenomena, including the use of first-person speech, seemingly autobiographic forms and orientations, the emphasis on individual responsibility for sin, interest in the emotional dimensions of biblical characters, and descriptions of self-imposed ritual. This set of interests lends itself to exciting approaches in the contemporary study of religion, including the concept of "lived religion," and involves understanding and describing what people actually do and believe in cultures of religion.Living with Loss, Healing with Hope
By Earl A. Grollman. 2000
Earl Grollman's Living When a Loved One Has Died has brought comfort to more than 250,000 readers. In Living with…
Loss, Healing with Hope, Grollman speaks directly to mourners of the Jewish faith. By weaving quotations from Jewish writers and philosophers into his comforting and expert prose, Grollman guides readers through the journey of mourning, healing, and hope.A colleague of Grollman's once told him, "Earl, I am not a member of your faith, but if I wanted the soundest emotional and spiritual approach to death, I would be a Jew." Occasionally quoting from sacred texts as well as Jewish writers and philosophers, Living with Loss, Healing with Hope illuminates Judaism's powerful recognition of the trauma of grief and of the mourner's responsibility eventually to return to the rhythm of life. In a brief final section, the author guides readers through Jewish funeral observances, Shiva, and beyond, and reminds all that these symbolic customs are 'about change-remembrance, letting go, and moving on.'Yearnings of the Soul
By Jonathan Garb. 2015
In Yearnings of the Soul, Jonathan Garb uncovers a crucial thread in the story of modern Kabbalah and modern mysticism…
more generally: psychology. Returning psychology to its roots as an attempt to understand the soul, he traces the manifold interactions between psychology and spirituality that have arisen over five centuries of Kabbalistic writing, from sixteenth-century Galilee to twenty-first-century New York. In doing so, he shows just how rich Kabbalah's psychological tradition is and how much it can offer to the corpus of modern psychological knowledge. Garb follows the gradual disappearance of the soul from modern philosophy while drawing attention to its continued persistence as a topic in literature and popular culture. He pays close attention to James Hillman's "archetypal psychology," using it to engage critically with the psychoanalytic tradition and reflect anew on the cultural and political implications of the return of the soul to contemporary psychology. Comparing Kabbalistic thought to adjacent developments in Catholic, Protestant, and other popular expressions of mysticism, Garb ultimately offers a thought-provoking argument for the continued relevance of religion to the study of psychology.Neighboring Faiths: Christianity, Islam, and Judaism in the Middle Ages and Today
By David Nirenberg. 2014
Christianity, Judaism, and Islam are usually treated as autonomous religions, but in fact across the long course of their histories…
the three religions have developed in interaction with one another. In Neighboring Faiths, David Nirenberg examines how Muslims, Christians, and Jews lived with and thought about each other during the Middle Ages and what the medieval past can tell us about how they do so today. There have been countless scripture-based studies of the three "religions of the book,” but Nirenberg goes beyond those to pay close attention to how the three religious neighbors loved, tolerated, massacred, and expelled each other--all in the name of God--in periods and places both long ago and far away. Nirenberg argues that the three religions need to be studied in terms of how each affected the development of the others over time, their proximity of religious and philosophical thought as well as their overlapping geographies, and how the three "neighbors” define--and continue to define--themselves and their place in terms of one another. From dangerous attractions leading to interfaith marria≥ to interreligious conflicts leading to segregation, violence, and sometimes extermination; to strategies for bridging the interfaith gap through language, vocabulary, and poetry, Nirenberg aims to understand the intertwined past of the three faiths as a way for their heirs to produce the future--together.Enlighten Up
By Barrie Dolnick. 2005
Throughout the ages, the Kabbalah has influenced some of the world's most impressive movers and shakers. Now every woman who…
wants to expand her knowledge and venture into new mystical experiences can access this ancient source of wisdom. Written by the author of AstroBabe and KarmaBabe, this tantalizing book unlocks the treasures of the Kabbalah to help readers navigate the universe-and answer the most important questions about human existence. Once shrouded in secrecy and passed down through men alone, this ancient mystical tradition has helped thousands of people make their dreams come true. For both the merely curious and truly serious, this fascinating peek into this mystical Jewish tradition will change and illuminate every reader's life.Connecting to God
By Abner Weiss. 2005
Distinguished rabbi, marriage and family therapist, kabbalist, and popular lecturer, Abner Weiss is extraordinarily qualified to write this book. In…
Connecting to God, he elucidates the teachings of Kabbalah, showing how the Ten Sefirot of the Tree of Life are the transformers of divine energy in our bodies and the building blocks of creation--Weiss calls them "our spiritual genome." He has created a psychological system and diagnostic method from kabbalistic texts, and he uses these clinically tested interventions in his therapeutic practice. Here he tells twenty-eight stories of people he has helped liberate from their dysfunctional behavior, empowering them to achieve spiritual growth. With Rabbi Weiss as our guide, we can use this kabbalistic approach to psychology to inform our lives with its insights, rebalance what is out of kilter, and heal the emotional wounds we have suffered. Connecting to God is a wise, wonderful, and transformational book.From the Hardcover edition.The Hebrew Impact on Western Civilization
By Dagobert D. Runes. 1951
An eye-opening classic volume on the enduring cultural impact of the Jewish people This authoritative work considers the creative and…
cultural influence of the Jews throughout our time. At more than 800 pages, D. D. Runes has complied a mid-twentieth century account of the various contributions in many spheres in which the Jews have had an impact on western civilization. Eminent scholars consider the ways in which the Jews contributed toward the making of modern society and helped in raising human standards and values. Richard Van Dyck, in "The Jewish Influence on Journalism," observes that the preponderance of Jewish newspapermen disproves the commonly held belief that Jewish journalism is "necessarily subversive." William B. Ziff's "The Jew as Soldier, Strategist and Military Adviser" delineates the successes of Jewish military forces throughout history. Dr. Abraham I. Katsh discusses "The Hebraic Foundations of American Democracy," noting the influence of Hebrew Scriptures on standards of conduct in western civilization. Curtis Lubinski's "The Jew in Drama, Theatre, and Film" traces the success of Jewish performers and dramatists. The essays compiled in this volume are a fascinating and expansive look at the far-reaching impact Jews have had on Western life.The Woman Who Laughed at God
By Jonathan Kirsch. 2001
Who is a Jew? In this colorful, eye-opening work, bestselling author and lecturer Jonathan Kirsch takes us on a three-thousand-year…
tour of Jewish identity and diversity and offers answers to this complex and difficult question. Kirsch reveals that Judaism has never been a religion of strict and narrow orthodoxy. For every accepted tradition in Jewish faith there are countertraditions rooted in biblical antiquity: the Maccabee freedom fighters who closed the Bible and picked up swords, dervish-like ecstatics who claimed to enjoy direct communication with God even after they had been excommunicated by a distrustful rabbinate, and courageous men and women who were the forgotten heroes of the Holocaust. With drama and narrative verve, Kirsch explores these and many other "Judaisms" that make up the rich tapestry of Jewish identity.Women's Divination in Biblical Literature
By Esther J. Hamori. 2015
Divination, the use of special talents and techniques to gain divine knowledge, was practiced in many different forms in ancient…
Israel and throughout the ancient world. The Hebrew Bible reveals a variety of traditions of women associated with divination. This sensitive and incisive book by respected scholar Esther J. Hamori examines the wide scope of women's divinatory activities as portrayed in the Hebrew texts, offering readers a new appreciation of the surprising breadth of women's "arts of knowledge" in biblical times. Unlike earlier approaches to the subject that have viewed prophecy separately from other forms of divination, Hamori's study encompasses the full range of divinatory practices and the personages who performed them, from the female prophets and the medium of En-dor to the matriarch who interprets a birth omen and the "wise women" of Tekoa and Abel and more. In doing so, the author brings into clearer focus the complex, rich, and diverse world of ancient Israelite divination.Secrets of the 7th Day
By Sara Schley. 2013
Life is hectic. Moms, dads, kids - all of us - are running at breakneck speed. We need to find…
ways to be renewed-as individuals, as families and in our communities. Sara Schley, who runs at her own breakneck speed as wife and mother of twins while leading a successful company consulting to businesses on sustainability, has found soul-saving-sanity and renewal through her family's observance of the Jewish Sabbath (Shabbat). Inspired by a non-Jewish friend who said, "Sara there is no center in our lives, you have to teach us how to do Shabbat!", Sara has written Secrets of the 7th Day, the first book of her Radical Renewal series, about how everyone can learn from this ancient Jewish ritual, whether or not they are Jews or even religious. The practice of unplugging from the world, slowing down, sharing in the simple joys of food, stories, songs and the outdoors can be celebrated by all. Secrets of the 7th Day invites all of us to make these beautiful practices for renewing the spirit our own. Ancient as the Sabbath is, we need it now more than ever.Kaddish
By Leon Wieseltier. 1998
Winner of the 1998 National Jewish Book Award"An astonishing fusion of learning and psychic intensity; its poignance and lucidity should…
be an authentic benefit to readers, Jewish and gentile." --The New York Times Book ReviewChildren have obligations to their parents: the Talmud says "one must honor him in life and one must honor him in death." Leon Wieseltier, a diligent but doubting son, recites the Jewish prayer of mourning at his father's grave, and then embarks on the traditional year of saying the kaddish daily.Wieseltier's highly acclaimed Kaddish is the spiritual and thoughtful journal of one of America's most brilliant intellectuals. Driven to explore th origins of the kaddish, from the ancient legend of a wayeard ghost to a 17th-century Ukranian pogrom, he offers as well a mourner's response to the questions of fate, freedom, and faith stirred up in death's wake. Lyric, learned, and deeply moving, Kaddish is suffused with love: a son's embracing of the traditon bequethed to him by his father, a scholar's savoring of its beauty, and a writer's revealing it, proudly unadorned, to the reader.From the Trade Paperback edition.The Cantor's Daughter
By Scott Nadelson. 2006
The Cantor's Daughter is the compelling new collection from Oregon Book Award Winner and recipient of the GLCA's New Writers…
Award for 2005, Scott Nadelson. In his follow-up to Saving Stanley, these stories capture Jewish New Jersey suburbanites in moments of crucial transition, when they have the opportunity to connect with those closest to them or forever miss their chance for true intimacy. In "The Headhunter," two men develop an unlikely friendship at work, but after twenty years of mutually supporting each other's families and careers their friendship comes to an abrupt and surprising end. In the title story, Noa Nechemia and her father have immigrated from Israel following a tragic car accident her mother did not survive. In one stunning moment of insight following a disastrous prom night, Noa discovers her ability to transcend grief and determine the direction of her own life. And in "Half a Day in Halifax" Beth and Roger meet on a cruise ship where their shared lack of enthusiasm for their trip sparks the possibility of romance. Nadelson's stories are sympathetic, heartbreaking, and funny as they investigate the characters' fragile emotional bonds and the fears that often cause those bonds to falter or fail.Behind God's Back
By Harri Nykanen, Kristian London. 2015
Praise for Harri Nykänen's Nights of Awe:"The clever combination of classic Jewish themes with the traditions of Nordic crime makes…
for a refreshing tale with wide appeal. And the subtle humor makes it even better."--Booklist"Professional responsibility and ethnic affiliation clash in Nykänen's intriguing first novel. The resolution will satisfy noir fans."--Publishers Weekly"Ariel Kafka wins the award for most intriguing name for a fictional detective, and it suits this impressively labyrinthine mystery series."--Time OutThe second in the Ariel Kafka series.There are two Jewish cops in all of Helsinki. One of them, Ariel Kafka, a lieutenant in the Violent Crime Unit, identifies himself as a policeman first, then a Finn, and lastly a Jew. Kafka is a religiously non-observant forty-something bachelor who is such a stubborn, dedicated policeman that he's willing to risk his career to get an answer. Murky circumstances surround his investigation of a Jewish businessman's murder. Neo-Nazi violence, intergenerational intrigue, shady loans--predictable lines of investigation lead to unpredictable culprits. But a second killing strikes closer to home, and the Finnish Security Police come knocking. The tentacles of Israeli politics and Mossad reach surprisingly far, once again wrapping Kafka in their sticky embrace.Harri Nykänen, born in Helsinki in 1953, was a well-known crime journalist and is now dedicated to writing fiction. The first in the Ariel Kafka series was Nights of Awe. Nykänen's work exposes the local underworld through the eyes of the criminal, the terrorist, and now from the point of view of an eccentric Helsinki police inspector.