Celia Gurevitch Jewish Community Library

The brand new Contemporary Jewish Museum in San Francisco will have an interesting event this Thursday, titled: Google’s Talmud: The Web, Jewish Culture, and the Power of Associative Thinking. Here is part of the description:

During this presentation, three cutting-edge thinkers - Rabbi Lawrence Kushner, Paul Haahr and Howard Rheingold - will discuss the connections between art, technology and Jewish culture, as seen through the new social, intellectual and spiritual implications of the idea of “search.” This will be followed by a discussion with Dan Schifrin, Museum’s Director of Public Programs and Writer in Residence.

If you are one of those people who cannot make it to the event, like me, I recommend a book that relates to the topic. The publisher describes Marc-Alain Ouaknin’s The burnt book; Reading the Talmud in a way that I believe connects its theme to that of the event,

In a profound look at what it means for new generations to read and interpret ancient religious texts, rabbi and philosopher Marc-Alain Ouaknin offers a postmodern reading of the Talmud, one of the first of its kind. Combining traditional learning and contemporary thought, Ouaknin dovetails discussions of spirituality and religious practice with such concepts as deconstruction, intertextuality, undecidability, multiple voicing, and eroticism in the Talmud. On a broader level, he establishes a dialogue between Hebrew tradition and the social sciences, which draws, for example, on the works of Lévinas, Blanchot, and Jabès as well as Derrida. The Burnt Book represents the innovative thinking that has come to be associated with a school of French Jewish studies, headed by Lévinas and dedicated to new readings of traditional texts, which is fast gaining influence in the United States.

This Saturday the library will have a table (#31) at the Sonoma County Book Festival. The festival will be open and free of charge downtown Santa Rosa from 10 AM till 5 PM at the Old Courthouse Square. We will have our bookmarks, bibliographies, flyers for upcoming events and kosher lollipops. Being Shabbat we will not sell anything.

Check us, the hundreds of other exhibitors and the dozens of presenters and authors out. To learn more about the event go to its website: socobookfest.org .

In preparation for Saturday’s Sonoma County Book Festival I reformatted a bibliography on thought-provoking books published from 1990 to present related to women and Judaism. It was originally put together two years ago by Susanne Batzdorff. In order to fit onto two pages and in order to avoid having to use smaller font than 10 point I had to remove a few books from the list. Later, I will re-add them and even more books to make the whole list a six or eight page booklet. But for now let me present this double sided, two page version (PDF, 200 kb). I hope you and the visitors on Saturday will find it useful.

Sunday I had the opportunity to read a story about Rosh Hashanah to two classes of the religious school. They all seemed to have enjoyed talking about cakes and birthday. Barbara Diamond Goldin’s The world’s birthday is exactly what it sounds: a heartwarming story about a young boy who organizes a birthday party for the world, with the help of the local baker, a grandfather rabbi despite his older sister’s objections. The 20 (unnumbered) pages can be read aloud in 20 minutes, including showing the pictures and asking the children about their own memories and wishes for birthdays. I recommend reading it to your own little ones. We have two copies of the book for you to borrow.

Gersonides was one of the names I have heard of as a famous rabbi from the Middle Ages, but never had a chance to learn more of/from him. But we recently got a copy of his “Commentary on Song of Songs” that includes an excellent introduction by the person who translated the commentaries from Hebrew: Menachem Kellner. As an appetizer to learn more read the publisher’s (Yale University Press) blurb of the book:

Gersonides (Rabbi Levi ben Gershom, 1288-1344), one of medieval Judaism’s most interesting figures, was not only a philosopher, exegete, and halakhist but was also known for his contributions in the fields of astronomy and mathematics. In this new translation of Gersonides’ Commentary on Song of Songs, Menachem Kellner brings to English-language readers a work that draws together many important strands and elements of Gersonides’ thought: philosophical theology, philosophy of science, biblical exegesis, and Aristotle/Averroes commentary. With an informative introduction and thorough annotations, this volume focuses fresh attention on an important example of medieval Jewish biblical commentary and medieval philosophical thought.

Gersonides stood at the intersection of three worlds: he was a learned and devout Jew whose major philosophic and scientific teachers were Muslims and whose scientific colleagues were Christians. Applying his learning and brilliance to the Judaism he had inherited, Gersonides transformed it and passed along to his own students a Judaism that bore the stamp of his unique personality and of the Jewish-Muslim-Christian symbiosis he both represented and helped create. His philosophical commentary on Song of Songs reveals his belief that this poem is the only book in the Bible written to teach the ultimate truths of the universe to the elite while being of no outward benefit to the masses.

At our last committee meeting Mark Rosen suggested something I should have thought of myself: having a shelf to display the new arrivals. This could help those patrons, who visit the library regularly in finding what’s new. However the library is rather short on space, so I could not easily fit in a new shelf for this purpose. Therefore I decided to take down the computer (more specifically the monitor/mouse and keyboard combo) that has been dedicated to be used by visitors, but in reality got very little usage.

From now on, when you enter the library, you will find the new materials right in the center. They are divided to two and half sections. On the left you will find the new novels. This is closest to the door, because these books are the most often sought, so I wanted to make it easy to find them. Then in the center you have the new non-fictions books we got. Finally on the other side you can find all the DVDs we have. This includes new and older items as well. We currently have 22 DVDs, most of them are feature films, and all listed on our DVD page with a link to their respective internet movie database (IMDB) page, release year, length, rating and if available linking to our blog entry on the book or to its trailer on YouTube.

Today is September 11, the seventh anniversary of the attack in 2001. But terrorism is not a new phenomenon. In memory of the victims I would like to point your attention to a 1981 volume we have from Claire Sterling: The terror network: The secret war of international terrorism. The main thesis of the book is that the USSR was the source and funder for most, if not all terrorist networks around the world. This was a controversial suggestion at the time, and some of her points might have been disproven since then. Nevertheless it gives us an early peak into the organizations that were behind the 9/11 attacks.

Two of the books chapters deal with Palestinian terrorism. The first, titled “the Palestinians come to Europe” describes how the PFLP recruited in the Old World in the late 1960’s and early 1970’s. The second, “The Palestinian resistance” describes its development in Middle East itself. If nothing else these two chapters can be still relevant to us, but they need to e read with an evaluative eye.

About ten days ago I received an email from local woman offering book donation from her husband’s late grandfather’s collection. By the time I managed to go to her she only had 5 boxes left form the original twenty. I picked more than a dozen volumes, see the list below, to be added to the library’s collection. As I learned these all belonged to Rabbi Israel H. Weisfeld, who was a conservative rabbi in Dallas, and Los Angeles and River Forest, Illinois. He was also the author of one of the books we received: David the King. His grandson’s wife is an artist who designed the bookplate, shown below, that I inserted into all of these books.

The books.

• Judaism and psychology, by Amsel, Abraham (1969)
• Contemporary Israeli literature, by Anderson, Elliott (1977)
• A history of the contemporary Jews, by Grayzel, Solomon (1977)
• Israel Passover Haggadah, by Kasher, Menahem M., (ed) (1950)
• The book of Jewish lists, by Landau, Ron (1982)
• Gateway to happiness A practical guide to happinness, by Pliskin, Zelig (1983)
• Gateway to self-knowledge A practical guide to s, by Pliskin, Zelig (1986.)
• Women and Jewish divorce, by Riskin, Shlomo (1989)
• Jewish bioethics, by Rosner, Fred (ed) (1979)
• The Jews of Toronto A history to 1937, by Speisman, Stephen A (1979)
• Three worlds A Jewish odyssey, by Tabak, Israel (1988)
• The Jewish directory and almanac, by Tillem, Ivan L (1984)
• David the King, by Weisfeld, Israel H (1983)
• Israel Its captivity and restoration, by White, Ellen Gould Harmon (1988)

There are still more books, mostly old haggadot and individual Talmud volumes. Let me know if you are interested and I will connect you with our donor.

Eli Cohen and Elizabeth Boyd donated a book to the library recently that I wanted to read for a while. It is Pearl Abraham’s The seventh beggar. I was interested in it, because I heard that it incorporates elements from Kabbalah. Now that I had a chance to examine the book and learn more about it I know that it is centered on the writings of Rabbi Nachman of Bratslav, one of my favorite 19th century Hasidic rabbis. Here is the partial description of the book from the author’s website itself,

A novel about the possibilities-and perils-of storytelling and creation, The Seventh Beggar takes us from the contemporary life of a Hasidic teenager to Nachman’s past world of lost writings and courtly ritual, from a religious community in upstate New York to the scientific halls of M.I.T., from New York to Palestine to the Ukraine, all the while breaking literary conventions and boundaries.

Instead of revealing more from the story let me provide a quote, so you would get to know the style of the author. Hopefully it is to your liking.

The Berditchever took out of his pocket a book of Psalms, which went with him everywhere. At thirteen he’d set himself the task of a complete reading a day, which with some effort was possible then, though often he’d stayed up late to finish. These days he made do with one or two readings a week. His reward for so much prayer: complete lines of poetry came to him at various times of day, poetry in response to life’s snares and snarls. If necessary, he could recite the psalms from memory. Without thinking about it, he often found himself reciting while walking from the study house and back. It had become habitual. This gift of prayer had come from his dear mother. Even near death, she’d insisted that he leave her bedside to attend services. He’d hurry to the nearest synagogue and then race back, afraid she wouldn’t be there on his return. He’d sprint through the streets, mumbling the few psalms he knew then, repeating the same line when he was stuck for the next one, his heart pounding not as a result of the physical exertion but in fear. He’d begun reciting psalms to save his mother, but in the end the psalms had come to his own aid. One morning, she was no longer there. It was said that in the Russian gulag the Jews who remained sane were those who knew enough psalms and prayers to recite them from memory. The Berditchever had recommended the psalms to all his children, but none had made reciting a habit, and it seemed Joel wouldn’t, either. A fine scholar and avid reader, he had no patience for mere reciting. He needed to read and know.

This weekend, from Friday 5PM till Sunday 1PM, the Bay Area Jewish Healing Center is organizing “a weekend retreat for bereaved families and individuals” titled “Grief and Growing”. It will be in Camp Tawonga, near Yosemite. For more information and registration go to their website: jewishhealingcenter.org.

Let me use this occasion to share a bibliography. Susanne Batzdorff, while running the library pepared, many excellent bibliographies. For example she had put together “The Shadowed Valley: a booklist on Jewish customs relating to death and grief.” Recently I updated her list with a few new books and slightly reformatted the page. So without further due here is the list (PDF) of the best books we have on this topic, each with short description annotation. I hope this will help you find the right book in the hard times when you may need it.