Jewish Sages of Today

Jewish Sages of Today
Author: Aryeh Rubin
Publisher:
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2009
Genre: Jews
ISBN: 9781934440964

Who are our jewish heroes? Who inspires us, makes us think, gives us hope? Who is making a difference in the jewish world? Here are the profiles of twenty-seven accomplished individuals dedicated to improving our world.

Rabbis of our Time

Rabbis of our Time
Author: Marek Čejka
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 249
Release: 2015-10-16
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 1317605446

The term ‘rabbi’ predominantly denotes Jewish men qualified to interpret the Torah and apply halacha, or those entrusted with the religious leadership of a Jewish community. However, the role of the rabbi has been understood differently across the Jewish world. While in Israel they control legally powerful rabbinical courts and major religious political parties, in the Jewish communities of the Diaspora this role is often limited by legal regulations of individual countries. However, the significance of past and present rabbis and their religious and political influence endures across the world. Rabbis of Our Time provides a comprehensive overview of the most influential rabbinical authorities of Judaism in the 20th and 21st Century. Through focussing on the most theologically influential rabbis of the contemporary era and examining their political impact, it opens a broader discussion of the relationship between Judaism and politics. It looks at the various centres of current Judaism and Jewish thinking, especially the State of Israel and the USA, as well as locating rabbis in various time periods. Through interviews and extracts from religious texts and books authored by rabbis, readers will discover more about a range of rabbis, from those before the formation of Israel to the most famous Chief Rabbis of Israel, as well as those who did not reach the highest state religious functions, but influenced the relation between Judaism and Israel by other means. The rabbis selected represent all major contemporary streams of Judaism, from ultra-Orthodox/Haredi to Reform and Liberal currents, and together create a broader picture of the scope of contemporary Jewish thinking in a theological and political context. An extensive and detailed source of information on the varieties of Jewish thinking influencing contemporary Judaism and the modern State of Israel, this book is of interest to students and scholars of Jewish Studies, as well as Religion and Politics.

Finding a Spiritual Home

Finding a Spiritual Home
Author: Rabbi Sidney Schwarz, PhD
Publisher: Turner Publishing Company
Total Pages: 432
Release: 2012-07-12
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 158023657X

The Jewish community has lost some of the most sensitive spiritual souls of this generation. They are Jews who were looking for God and found spiritual homes outside of Judaism. Their journeys traversed the Jewish community, but nothing there beckoned them. The creation of synagogue-communities in which the voices of seekers can be heard and their questions can be asked will challenge many loyalist Jews. It will upset and enrage them. But it would also enrich them. —from Chapter 18 In this fresh look at the spiritual possibilities of American Jewish life, Rabbi Sidney Schwarz presents the framework for a new synagogue model—the synagogue community—and its promise to transform our understanding of the synagogue and its potential for modern Judaism. Schwarz profiles four innovative synagogues—one from each of the major movements of Judaism—that have had extraordinary success with their approach to congregational life and presents practical ways to replicate their success. Includes a discussion guide for study groups and book clubs as well as a new afterword by the author describing developments in synagogue change projects since the book was first published.

Can We Talk About Israel?

Can We Talk About Israel?
Author: Daniel Sokatch
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing USA
Total Pages: 346
Release: 2021-10-19
Genre: History
ISBN: 1635573882

National Jewish Book Award finalist An essential and accessible introduction to one of the most complex, controversial topics in the world, from a leading expert on Israel and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. When it comes to Israel and Palestine, it can be hard to know what to say. Daniel Sokatch gets it. He heads the New Israel Fund, an organization dedicated to equality and democracy for all Israelis--Arab, Jewish, and otherwise. The question he gets asked, on an almost daily basis, is, "Can't you just explain the Israel situation to me? In, like, 10 minutes or less?" This book is his timely and much-needed answer. Can We Talk About Israel? tells the story of that country and explores why so many people feel so strongly about it without actually understanding it very well at all. Sokatch grapples with a century-long struggle between two peoples that both perceive themselves as (and indeed are) victims. And he explains why Israel (and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict) inspires such extreme feelings--why it seems like Israel is the answer to “what is wrong with the world” for half the people in it, and “what is right with the world” for the other half. As Sokatch asks, is there any other topic about which so many intelligent, educated, and sophisticated people express such strongly and passionately held convictions, and about which they actually know so little? Complete with engaging illustrations by Christopher Noxon, Can We Talk About Israel? is an easy-to-read yet penetrating and original look at a subject we could all afford to better understand.

The Book of Jewish Values

The Book of Jewish Values
Author: Rabbi Joseph Telushkin
Publisher: Harmony
Total Pages: 546
Release: 2011-06-01
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 0307794458

Rabbi Joseph Telushkin combed the Bible, the Talmud, and the whole spectrum of Judaism's sacred writings to give us a manual on how to lead a decent, kind, and honest life in a morally complicated world. "An absolutely superb book: the most practical, most comprehensive guide to Jewish values I know." —Rabbi Harold Kushner, author of When Bad Things Happen to Good People Telushkin speaks to the major ethical issues of our time, issues that have, of course, been around since the beginning. He offers one or two pages a day of pithy, wise, and easily accessible teachings designed to be put into immediate practice. The range of the book is as broad as life itself: • The first trait to seek in a spouse (Day 17) • When, if ever, lying is permitted (Days 71-73) • Why acting cheerfully is a requirement, not a choice (Day 39) • What children don't owe their parents (Day 128) • Whether Jews should donate their organs (Day 290) • An effective but expensive technique for curbing your anger (Day 156) • How to raise truthful children (Day 298) • What purchases are always forbidden (Day 3) In addition, Telushkin raises issues with ethical implications that may surprise you, such as the need to tip those whom you don't see (Day 109), the right thing to do when you hear an ambulance siren (Day 1), and why wasting time is a sin (Day 15). Whether he is telling us what Jewish tradition has to say about insider trading or about the relationship between employers and employees, he provides fresh inspiration and clear guidance for every day of our lives.

Burnt Books

Burnt Books
Author: Rodger Kamenetz
Publisher: Schocken
Total Pages: 385
Release: 2010-10-19
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 0307379337

From the acclaimed author of The Jew in the Lotus comes an "engrossing and wonderful book" (The Washington Times) about the unexpected connections between Franz Kafka and Hasidic master Rabbi Nachman of Bratslav—and the significant role played by the imagination in the Jewish spiritual experience. Rodger Kamenetz has long been fascinated by the mystical tales of the Hasidic master Rabbi Nachman of Bratslav. And for many years he has taught a course in Prague on Franz Kafka. The more he thought about their lives and writings, the more aware he became of unexpected connections between them. Kafka was a secular artist fascinated by Jewish mysticism, and Rabbi Nachman was a religious mystic who used storytelling to reach out to secular Jews. Both men died close to age forty of tuberculosis. Both invented new forms of storytelling that explore the search for meaning in an illogical, unjust world. Both gained prominence with the posthumous publication of their writing. And both left strict instructions at the end of their lives that their unpublished books be burnt. Kamenetz takes his ideas on the road, traveling to Kafka’s birthplace in Prague and participating in the pilgrimage to Uman, the burial site of Rabbi Nachman visited by thousands of Jews every Jewish new year. He discusses the hallucinatory intensity of their visions and offers a rich analysis of Nachman’s and Kafka’s major works, revealing uncanny similarities in the inner lives of these two troubled and beloved figures, whose creative and religious struggles have much to teach us about the Jewish spiritual experience.

The Beauty of What Remains

The Beauty of What Remains
Author: Steve Leder
Publisher: Penguin
Total Pages: 242
Release: 2021-01-05
Genre: Self-Help
ISBN: 0593187555

The national bestseller From the author of the bestselling More Beautiful Than Before comes an inspiring book about loss based on his most popular sermon. As the senior rabbi of one of the largest synagogues in the world, Steve Leder has learned over and over again the many ways death teaches us how to live and love more deeply by showing us not only what is gone but also the beauty of what remains. This inspiring and comforting book takes us on a journey through the experience of loss that is fundamental to everyone. Yet even after having sat beside thousands of deathbeds, Steve Leder the rabbi was not fully prepared for the loss of his own father. It was only then that Steve Leder the son truly learned how loss makes life beautiful by giving it meaning and touching us with love that we had not felt before. Enriched by Rabbi Leder's irreverence, vulnerability, and wicked sense of humor, this heartfelt narrative is filled with laughter and tears, the wisdom of millennia and modernity, and, most of all, an unfolding of the profound and simple truth that in loss we gain more than we ever imagined.

A Torah Giant

A Torah Giant
Author: Shmuly Yanklowitz
Publisher: Ktav Publishing House
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2018
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 9789655242713

"Discover the breadth of wisdom provided by this generation's giant of Torah: Rabbi Irving "Yitz" Greenberg. His legacy is discussed at length by those who have been impacted by his inclusive model of contemporary Judaism, erudition, and commitment to fostering meaningful interfaith dialogue"--