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In this book, James A. Greenberg examines animal sacrifice in Priestly Torah texts found in Leviticus 1–16, Exodus, and Numbers.…
Through his analysis, Greenberg identifies a new valence of kipper as a process that produces a positive result between two objects and argues that the Israelite sanctuary exists to facilitate a connection between YHWH, sancta, and the Israelites through the medium of blood.Rather than beginning with a priori assumptions of what sacrificial terms and symbols mean, Greenberg allows his interpretation to develop through an accumulation of textual clues. To avoid the exegetical pitfalls of symbolic and structuralist approaches, he focuses on what the language of the ritual says about sacrifice and what it seeks to accomplish. His investigation considers why the flesh and blood of an animal are used by the priest as he mediates on behalf of the offerer through the medium of YHWH’s sanctuary, what the difference is between intentional and unintentional sin, how the meaning of kipper changes from one sacrifice to the next, whether the sanctuary can be both holy and unclean, and how priests conceive of YHWH’s interaction with sancta, the offerer, and the animal.A New Look at Atonement in Leviticus recalibrates our understanding of kipper and furthers our knowledge of the priestly cult in ancient Israel. It will especially interest scholars of Biblical Hebrew and the Old Testament in particular.The Rabbi As Symbolic Exemplar: By the Power Vested in Me
By Jack H Bloom. 2002
The solution to the growing problem of stress and burnout in rabbis!Written by a practicing clinical psychologist who spent 10…
years as a congregational rabbi, The Rabbi As Symbolic Exemplar: By the Power Vested in Me presents positive solutions to the inevitable negative effects of symbolic exemplarhood, coaching rabbis through dilemmas of the inner soul. Being a rabbi means serving as a Symbolic Exemplar of the best that is in humankind, being experienced and treated and expected to act as a stand-in for God, and a walking, talking symbol of all that Jewish tradition represents. The burden of being a symbolic exemplar of God is extraordinary, and the struggle to live up to its requirements can be one of loneliness, frustration, and despair, alienating rabbis who tire of living in a glass house.The Rabbi As Symbolic Exemplar examines how the symbolic role that serves as the source of the rabbi&’s authority and power can lead to disillusionment and disenchantment. Author Jack H Bloom draws on his own experience as a rabbi who watched the successful career he enjoyed turn into one he desperately wanted to forsake and how he was inspired to become an athletic coach for rabbis. This unique book details how symbolic exemplarhood is created, what its downside is, what power it offers, how it can be used effectively, how rabbis can deal with their inner lives, and what can be done to help rabbis stay human while maintaining their leadership.The Rabbi As Symbolic Exemplar is equally effective as a complete text or as a source of stand-alone chapters on specific topics, including: special tensions of being a rabbi effects of symbolic exemplarhood on the rabbi&’s family educating rabbis on their power training suggestions curing and healing and The Ten Commandments for rabbisThe Rabbi As Symbolic Exemplar is essential reading for rabbis, rabbinical students, congregants, Christian clergy, seminarians and anyone interested in what it is to be a clergy person and how they can support the work clergy do. The book educates both clergy and laity on the humanity of clergy.Visit the author&’s website at http://jackhbloom.comA Wolf in the Attic: The Legacy of a Hidden Child of the Holocaust
By Sophia Richman. 2002
A Wolf in the Attic: Even though she was only two, the little girl knew she must never go into…
the attic. Strange noises came from there. Mama said there was a wolf upstairs, a hungry, dangerous wolf . . . but the truth was far more dangerous than that. Much too dangerous to tell a Jewish child marked for death. One cannot mourn what one doesn&’t acknowledge, and one cannot heal if one does not mourn . . . A Wolf in the Attic is a powerful memoir written by a psychoanalyst who was a hidden child in Poland during World War II. Her story, in addition to its immediate impact, illustrates her struggle to come to terms with the powerful yet sometimes subtle impact of childhood trauma.In the author's words: “As a very young child I experienced the Holocaust in a way that made it almost impossible to integrate and make sense of the experience. For me, there was no life before the war, no secure early childhood to hold in mind, no context in which to place what was happening to me and around me. The Holocaust was in the air that I breathed daily for the first four years of my life. I took it in deeply without awareness or critical judgment. I ingested it with the milk I drank from my mother&’s breast. It had the taste of fear and despair.”Born during the Holocaust in what was once a part of Poland, Sophia Richman spent her early years in hiding in a small village near Lwów, the city where she was born. Hidden in plain sight, both she and her mother passed as Christian Poles. Later, her father, who escaped from a concentration camp, found them and hid in their attic until the liberation.The story of the miraculous survival of this Jewish family is only the beginning of their long journey out of the Holocaust. The war years are followed by migration and displacement as the refugees search for a new homeland. They move from Ukraine to Poland to France and eventually settle in America. A Wolf in the Attic traces the effects of the author&’s experiences on her role as an American teen, a wife, a mother, and eventually, a psychoanalyst. A Wolf in the Attic explores the impact of early childhood trauma on the author&’s: education career choices attitudes toward therapy, both as patient and therapist social interactions love/family relationships parenting style and decisions regarding her daughter religious orientationRepeatedly told by her parents that she was too young to remember the war years, Sophia spent much of her life trying to ”remember to forget” what she did indeed remember. A Wolf in the Attic follows her life as she gradually becomes able to reclaim her past, to understand its impact on her life and the choices she has made, and finally, to heal a part of herself that she had been so long taught to deny.Examining the relationship between Judaism as a religious culture and kibbutz life, this is a ground-breaking work in the research…
of Judaism.The book takes as its point of departure the historical fact that it was Orthodox pioneers of German origin, in contrast to their Eastern European counterparts, who successfully developed religious kibbutz life. Employing sociological concepts and methods, the author examines the correlations between two evolutionary phases in kibbutz development and two modes of Judaism: the rational Halakhic and the emotive Hassidic modes. In doing this, he explores the relationship between two diverse dispositions towards the divinity - the transcendent and the immanent - and two diverse modes of the self and their related communities. This innovative and insightful work will be of essential interest to scholars of the sociology of religion, Jewish studies, modern Jewish history and Israel's national history, and will also interest those more broadly engaged with theology and religious studies.Between 1977 and 1985, some 20,000 Ethiopian Jews left their homes in Ethiopia and - motivated by an ancient dream…
of returning to the land of their ancestors, 'Yerussalem' - embarked on a secret and highly traumatic exodus to Israel. Due to various political circumstances they had to leave their homes in haste, go a long way on foot through unknown country, and stay for a period of one or two years in refugee camps, until they were brought to Israel. The difficult conditions of the journey included racial tensions, attacks by bandits, night travel over mountains, incarceration, illness and death. A fifth of the group did not survive the journey.This interdisciplinary, ground-breaking book focuses on the experience of this journey, its meaning for the people who made it, and its relation to the initial encounter with Israeli society. The author argues that powerful processes occur on such journeys that affect the individual and community in life-changing ways, including their initial encounter with and adaptation to their new society. Analysing the psychosocial impact of the journey, he examines the relations between coping and meaning, trauma and culture, and discusses personal development and growth.Bastards and Believers: Jewish Converts and Conversion from the Bible to the Present (Jewish Culture and Contexts)
By Theodor Dunkelgrün, Paweł Maciejko. 2020
A formidable collection of studies on religious conversion and converts in Jewish historyTheodor Dunkelgrün and Pawel Maciejko observe that the…
term "conversion" is profoundly polysemous. It can refer to Jews who turn to religions other than Judaism and non-Jews who tie their fates to that of Jewish people. It can be used to talk about Christians becoming Muslim (or vice versa), Christians "born again," or premodern efforts to Christianize (or Islamize) indigenous populations of Asia, Africa, and the Americas. It can even describe how modern, secular people discover spiritual creeds and join religious communities.Viewing Jewish history from the perspective of conversion across a broad chronological and conceptual frame, Bastards and Believers highlights how the concepts of the convert and of conversion have histories of their own. The volume begins with Sara Japhet's study of conversion in the Hebrew Bible and ends with Netanel Fisher's essay on conversion to Judaism in contemporary Israel. In between, Andrew S. Jacobs writes about the allure of becoming an "other" in late Antiquity; Ephraim Kanarfogel considers Rabbinic attitudes and approaches toward conversion to Judaism in the Middles Ages; and Paola Tartakoff ponders the relationship between conversion and poverty in medieval Iberia. Three case studies, by Javier Castaño, Claude Stuczynski, and Anne Oravetz Albert, focus on different aspects of the experience of Spanish-Portuguese conversos. Michela Andreatta and Sarah Gracombe discuss conversion narratives; and Elliott Horowitz and Ellie Shainker analyze Eastern European converts' encounters with missionaries of different persuasions.Despite the differences between periods, contexts, and sources, two fundamental and mutually exclusive notions of human life thread the essays together: the conviction that one can choose one's destiny and the conviction that one cannot escapes one's past. The history of converts presented by Bastards and Believers speaks to the possibility, or impossibility, of changing one's life.Contributors: Michela Andreatta, Javier Castaño, Theodor Dunkelgrün, Netanel Fisher, Sarah Gracombe, Elliott Horowitz, Andrew S. Jacobs, Sara Japhet, Ephraim Kanarfogel, Pawel Maciejko, Anne Oravetz Albert, Ellie Shainker, Claude Stuczynski, Paola Tartakoff.A study of the life and work of 'the Maggid"—a major figure in the mystical thought of early HasidismEnshrined in…
Jewish memory simply as "the Maggid" (preacher), Rabbi Dov Ber Friedman of Mezritsh (1704-1772) played a critical role in the formation of Hasidism, the movement of mystical renewal that became one of the most important and successful forces in modern Jewish life. In Speaking Infinities, Ariel Evan Mayse turns to the homilies of the Maggid to explore the place of words in mystical experience. He argues that the Maggid's theory of language is the key to unpacking his abstract mystical theology as well as his teachings on the devotional life and religious practice.Mayse shows how Dov Ber's vision of language emerges from his encounters with Ba'al Shem Tov (the BeSHT), the founder of Hasidic Judaism, whose teaching put forward a vision of radical divine immanence. Taking the BeSHT's notion of God's immanence as a kind of linguistic vitality echoing in the cosmos, Dov Ber developed a theory of language in which all human tongues, even in their mundane forms, have the potential to become sacred when returned to their divine source.Analyzing homilies and theological meditations on language, Mayse demonstrates that Dov Ber was an innovative thinker and contends that, in many respects, it was Dov Ber, rather than the BeSHT, who was the true founder of Hasidism as it took root, and the foremost shaper of its early theology. Speaking Infinities offers an exploration of this introspective mystic's life, gleaned from scattered anecdotes, legends, and historical sources, distinguishing the historical personage from the figure that emerges from the composite array of textual and oral traditions that have shaped the memory of the Maggid and his legacy.Contemporary Debates in American Reform Judaism: Conflicting Visions
By Dana Evan Kaplan. 2001
This is a ground breaking collection of essays that takes a hard look at the Reform Movement today. Opening essays…
look at the problem of building a religous community, the competition in the "spiritual marketplace," and why people join or do not join a Reform synagogue. Other contributors look at a host of controversial issues including Patrilineal Descent, Outreach, Intermarriage, gender issues, gay and lesbian participation, and others.Covering a diverse range of topics, case studies and theories, the author undertakes a critique of the principal assumptions on…
which the existing international human rights regime has been constructed. She argues that the decolonization of human rights, and the creation of a global community that is conducive to the well-being of all humans, will require a radical restructuring of our ways of thinking, researching and writing. In contributing to this restructuring she brings together feminist and indigenous approaches as well as postmodern and post-colonial scholarship, engaging directly with some of the prevailing orthodoxies, such as 'universality', 'the individual', 'self-determination', 'cultural relativism', 'globalization' and 'civil society'.This work explores the Jewish sources of philanthropic institutions in the Western world, a focus that has long been ignored…
by those who have focused their interest on the Greco-Roman culture. The author explores the possibility of Jewish influence on early Christian charities.How to behave in the diaspora has been a central problem for Jews over the ages. They have debated whether…
to assimilate by adopting local customs or whether to remain a God-centered people loyal to their temporal rulers but maintaining the peculiar customs that separated them from their host nations. The question not only of survival, but of the basis for survival, is also a central problem in the Joseph stories of the Book of Genesis. The work shows its readers the grand alternatives of Judaism, instilled in two larger-than-life figures, so its readers can reassess for themselves the road Judaism did not take, and understand why Joseph though admirable in many respects, is left out of the rest of the Bible. The question is answered through the stories about how Joseph, the son of Jacob, saved his people/family from famine by becoming a high-ranking administrator to Pharaoh. By analyzing his behavior to the people over whom he exercises power, Joseph lords it over his brothers, grieves his father, takes lands from Egyptian farmers, and engages in forced deportation. Wildavsky explains why Joseph-the-assimilator is replaced in the Book of Exodus by Moses-the-lawgiver. The book ends by demonstrating that Joseph and Moses are, and are undoubtedly meant to be exact opposites. As in his earlier book on The Nursing Father: Moses as a Political Leader, Wildavsky combines analysis of political and administrative leadership with both traditional and modern study of texts: thematic linkages via plot, grammar, dreams, poetry, and religious doctrine. Thus the chapter on "Joseph the Administrator" is preceded by a chapter on Joseph as The Dream Lord" and followed by an analysis and explanation of why Jacob's obscure blessings to his sons are more like curses. Always the emphasis is on the reciprocal influence of religion and politics, on rival answers to questions about how Hebrews should relate to each other and to outsiders. New, in paperback, the book will be of interest to biblical scholars and readers as well as those concerned with the interaction of religion and political life.A revealing look at Jewish men and women who secretly explore the outside world, in person and online, while remaining…
in their ultra-Orthodox religious communities What would you do if you questioned your religious faith, but revealing that would cause you to lose your family and the only way of life you had ever known? Hidden Heretics tells the fascinating, often heart-wrenching stories of married ultra-Orthodox Jewish men and women in twenty-first-century New York who lead “double lives” in order to protect those they love. While they no longer believe that God gave the Torah to Jews at Mount Sinai, these hidden heretics continue to live in their families and religious communities, even as they surreptitiously break Jewish commandments and explore forbidden secular worlds in person and online. Drawing on five years of fieldwork with those living double lives and the rabbis, life coaches, and religious therapists who minister to, advise, and sometimes excommunicate them, Ayala Fader investigates religious doubt and social change in the digital age.The internet, which some ultra-Orthodox rabbis call more threatening than the Holocaust, offers new possibilities for the age-old problem of religious uncertainty. Fader shows how digital media has become a lightning rod for contemporary struggles over authority and truth. She reveals the stresses and strains that hidden heretics experience, including the difficulties their choices pose for their wives, husbands, children, and, sometimes, lovers. In following those living double lives, who range from the religiously observant but open-minded on one end to atheists on the other, Fader delves into universal quandaries of faith and skepticism, the ways digital media can change us, and family frictions that arise when a person radically transforms who they are and what they believe.In stories of conflicts between faith and self-fulfillment, Hidden Heretics explores the moral compromises and divided loyalties of individuals facing life-altering crossroads.The Hebrew Bible is the main legislative and literary influence on European Poor Law and on literature on poverty and…
the poor. No extant literature from the ancient world placed more importance upon social welfare and the duty of the better-off toward the poor. It is the founding text for liberation movements. This book assesses why the Bible is so unambiguously positive in its view of the poor, unlike most later literary and legislative works. It seeks to understand what historical circumstances brought about this elevated perception of the poor, by exploring the clash of ideals and realities in the depiction of the poor in the Hebrew Bible and in European culture. Most legal and literary portrayals of the poor tend to be critical, associating the poor with laziness, crime or fraud: why is this not the case in the Bible? Most societies have tended to accept poverty as a natural condition, but not the Bible. The idea of ending poverty starts in the Bible – the Psalms above all inspired a daily struggle to limit the gap between rich and poor. Much of the Bible sees life - most unusually in the history of civilizations - through the eyes of the poor. The book argues that the popular appeal of the Bible in largely impoverished societies lies in its persistent relevance to, and support of, the poor. Yet, in many ways, biblical teachings were incompatible with social and political circumstances centuries and millennia later. Written in a clear, accessible style, the book shows how the Hebrew Bible, in its legislation and impassioned prophetic poetry, inspired the battle to 'make poverty history', to give dignity and hope to the poor and fight inequality. It will appeal to students and scholars of Jewish Studies, the Bible and Comparative Literature, and Development Studies.On The Road To Armageddon: How Evangelicals Became Israel's Best Friend
By Timothy P. Weber. 2004
Why do evangelicals care so much about Israel? How did this special relationship develop? What has it produced? Certain understandings…
of Bible prophecy have profoundly shaped the way evangelicals and other Americans view Israel and the political policies that have supported the Jewish state.Now in paperback, this major work on an ever timely theme is for anyone interested in American-Israeli relations, history, theology, and politics. "Timothy Weber's important and timely book illuminates the end-times beliefs that shape millions of Americans' view of current events. Well-researched and historically grounded . . . This disturbing work deserves the widest possible readership."--Paul S. Boyer, author, When Time Shall Be No MoreLet My Nation Live: The Story Of The Jewish Deliverance In The Days Of Mordechai And Esther
By Yosef Deutsch. 2002
As the textbook lesson in G-d's constant, though unobtrusive vigilance and protection of His people, the miracle of Purim is…
the Jew's wellspring of faith in times of exile and danger.In The Blink Of An Eye
By Pat Milton. 1999
One man's battle to get his life back after locked-in stroke left him totally paralysed.Peter Coghlan is an ordinary bloke…
whose life is transformed, for the second time, after a knock to the head. So begins an extraordinary story of recovery. Peter takes the reader on a journey that will appeal to those who can relate to Peter's circumstances as well as those wanting to understand what it means to be 'Locked-in', what it takes to break free and how to build a new life. A story told in two parts, it is (at times) uncomfortable, drawing the reader into a reality where what happens is not in his control; but Peter's easy dialogue, honesty and irrepressible humour make that journey very well worth taking with him. Be prepared to laugh, cringe and cry. His story offers some answers, but also raises many questions about the obstacles to overcome and what 'success' can look and feel like, as well as shining a light on how society can view people with disabilities. Despite many setbacks and difficulties, at the heart of this story is an acknowledgement of the sacrifices he and others made, with a deep appreciation of the love, care and professionalism shown by those helping him along the way to becoming Peter Coghlan - reborn.The Hare With Amber Eyes: A Hidden Inheritance
By Edmund De Waal. 2010
Edmund de Waal is a world-famous ceramicist. Having spent thirty years making beautiful pots―which are then sold, collected, and handed…
on―he has a particular sense of the secret lives of objects. When he inherited a collection of 264 tiny Japanese wood and ivory carvings, called netsuke, he wanted to know who had touched and held them, and how the collection had managed to survive. And so begins this extraordinarily moving memoir and detective story as de Waal discovers both the story of the netsuke and of his family, the Ephrussis, over five generations. A nineteenth-century banking dynasty in Paris and Vienna, the Ephrussis were as rich and respected as the Rothchilds. Yet by the end of the World War II, when the netsuke were hidden from the Nazis in Vienna, this collection of very small carvings was all that remained of their vast empire.A fascinating portrait of Jewish life in Suriname from the 17th to 19th centuriesJewish Autonomy in a Slave Society explores…
the political and social history of the Jews of Suriname, a Dutch colony on the South American mainland just north of Brazil. Suriname was home to the most privileged Jewish community in the Americas where Jews, most of Iberian origin, enjoyed religious liberty, were judged by their own tribunal, could enter any trade, owned plantations and slaves, and even had a say in colonial governance.Aviva Ben-Ur sets the story of Suriname's Jews in the larger context of Atlantic slavery and colonialism and argues that, like other frontier settlements, they achieved and maintained their autonomy through continual negotiation with the colonial government. Drawing on sources in Dutch, English, French, Hebrew, Portuguese, and Spanish, Ben-Ur shows how, from their first permanent settlement in the 1660s to the abolition of their communal autonomy in 1825, Suriname Jews enjoyed virtually the same standing as the ruling white Protestants, with whom they interacted regularly. She also examines the nature of Jewish interactions with enslaved and free people of African descent in the colony. Jews admitted both groups into their community, and Ben-Ur illuminates the ways in which these converts and their descendants experienced Jewishness and autonomy. Lastly, she compares the Jewish settlement with other frontier communities in Suriname, most notably those of Indians and Maroons, to measure the success of their negotiations with the government for communal autonomy. The Jewish experience in Suriname was marked by unparalleled autonomy that nevertheless developed in one of the largest slave colonies in the New World.The Ancient Jewish Wedding... and the Return of Messiah for His Bride
By Jamie Lash. 1997
Learn about the Ancient Jewish Wedding and begin preparing for the Marriage Supper of the Lamb! The God of Abraham,…
Isaac, and Jacob followed the bridal customs of ancient Israel in seeking a bride for His Son, Yeshua. From the selection of the bride and the bride price, to the marriage supper, this teaching by Jamie Lash will thrill your heart and reveal God's love to you in a special way. He wants to bless you with: a Messianic Jewish perspective on "the bride", a bridal anointing, an understanding of God's plan for His people Israel, and an openness to receive gifts from your Heavenly Bridegroom.Judaic Religion in the Second Temple Period: Belief and Practice from the Exile to Yavneh
By Lester L. Grabbe. 2000
The developments in Judaism which occurred during the Second Temple period (c. 550 BC to 100 AD) were of great…
importance for the nature of Jewish religion in later centuries, yet few studies have examined the era in full. Now Lester L. Grabbe's lucid and accessible volume provides a much-needed encyclopedic study and holistic interpretation of the period.Topics examined include:* views about God and the spirit world* the temple and priesthood* scripture and synagogue* the main religious sects and revolutionary movements* eschatology and messianism* magic and predicting the future* religion in the Jewish diaspora* converts and 'Godfearers'.With an extensive, up-to-date bibliography, plus numerous helpful cross-references, summaries and syntheses, this book is essential reading for scholars and students of the history of Jewish religion. It will also be of great value as a reference tool.