Celia Gurevitch Jewish Community Library

We open our summer filmclub with a ten year old Welsh movie titles Solomon and Gaenor. It is bittersweet romantic love story between a young, Jewish man and a Welsh woman, set in 1991′s Wales. You can watch an extended musical trailer of the movie to get a feel for the lush scenery and the atmosphere of the movie.

The free viewing starts at 7:30 PM on Wednesday, August 5 in the synagogue’s multi-purpose room. As usual, free, organic popocorn will be served.

The rest of the August program is shown here.

A six minute excerpt from Maggie Anton’s lecture at our shul October 29, 2008

Lehrhaus Judaica and Berkeley Hillel are proud to display the vivid photographic record of one Jewish woman’s heroic struggle against the Nazis. An acclaimed exhibit, produced by the Jewish Partisan Educational Foundation, with the support of the Taube Foundation for Jewish Life and Culture, will grace our home in the Reutlinger Center, 2736 Brancroft Way, Berkeley from February 25 – March 25, 2009.

From the movie “For your Consideration,” which we have on DVD for you to borrow.

Happy Purim!

Joheved

Wednesday our book discussion group will talk about the first volume of Maggie Anton‘s Rashi’s daughters trilogy: Joheved. I am happy to report that Ms. Anton will join us via telephone. Our meeting starts at 10 o’clock and she will call in at 10:30 so we’d have some time to gather our thoughts and prepare our comments and questions.

I wrote a blog entry last October introducing the Secret Scholar volume of the series. Last May, when we got the the second volume, on Miriam, I wrote about that too.  Now, that we will talk about it in two days it is time to establish the first item of the series, the one on Rashi’s oldest daughter Joheved. Here is the official description from the book’s website:

In 1068, the scholar Salomon ben Isaac, today known as “Rashi,” returns home to Troyes, France to take over the family winemaking business and embark on a path that will indelibly influence the Jewish world—writing the first Talmud commentary, and secretly teaching these intricate discussions of Jewish law to his daughters.

Joheved, the eldest of his three girls, finds her mind and spirit awakened by religious study, but knowing the risk, she must keep her passion for learning and prayer hidden. When she becomes betrothed to Meir ben Samuel, she is forced to choose between marital happiness and being true to her love of the Talmud.

Join us Wednesday 10 AM to talk about this exciting historical fiction.

Rabbi Benjamin J. Segal is an author and as you can see from his brief bibliography at the end of this post has served the Jewish community in many functions throughout his life. His latest book, a translation and commentary on Shir haShirim, titled “The Song of Songs: A Woman in Love” will be published in March. Rabbi Segal will be with us the whole weekend as our scholar-in-residence.

• Friday evening he will give the drash titled “Must Israel Do T’Shuvah-Morality While Living with Terror” (Services start at 7:30 PM)
• Shabbat morning we will have “Lunch and Learn” session with him on the topic of “Politics and Peace–After the Election.” (Services start at 9:30 AM, potluck lunch around 12:30.)
• Sunday morning at 11 AM Rabbi Segal will give a book talk and we will have a chance to talk with him about the book.

His book can be purchased on Sunday or ordered on Saturday and picked up on Sunday.

The official description of his book from the publisher’s site (Gefen) reads:

A love poem as old as the Bible, as contemporary as today…
One love poem–the Bible’s Song of Songs – continues to be read and to inspire after thousands of years. Using the best of biblical scholarship and sharp literary analysis, Benjamin Segal’s new translation and commentary reveal a picture of ideal love so appealing that it became for centuries the monotheistic model of human-divine attachment. Here one also finds a rare ancient effort to capture the female voice. Segal’s literary analysis captures the pulsating rhythm of the poem, and allows the reader to confront its ever-contemporary and challenging view of love.

Information on Rabbi Segal:

Benjamin J. Segal is the past President of Melitz, the Centers for Jewish and Zionist Education, in Jerusalem, and most recently has created within that context the major Jewish learning festival of Sukkot in Jerusalem, “Gateways.” A past President of the Schechter Institute of Jewish Studies, the academic and educational center of Masorti Judaism in Israel, he previously served for nineteen years as the Director of the Ramah Programs in Israel, He is former Chairman of the Masorti Movement in Israel and, for many years, served on the Expanded Executive of the World Zionist Organization. He is the chairman of the Executive of the Meimad Political Party in Israel, and serves on the boards of several non-profit enterprises.

In addition to authoring the book, Returning: The Land of Israel as Focus in Jewish History, he is the author of two study texts: Missionary at the Door: Our Uniqueness and Midrash: The Quest for a Contemporary Past. His translation and commentary, The Song of Songs: A Woman in Love, is now being published. He has also published various articles on biblical, educational and Zionist issues, including the (Hebrew) booklet, “A People and its Land,” an ideological statement on the Jews and Israel. Recent articles include: “The Liberated Woman of Valor”, “The Land of Israel in the Torah” (an appendix to the new Torah commentary, Etz Hayim), “Terms of Endearment: Toward a Clearer Horizon for Israeli Masorti Judaism,” “Psalm 126: Of Dreams, Prayer and Fulfillment” and “Anger and Old Age: An Appreciation of Psalm 90.” He was a member of the committee which wrote “Emet Ve’Emunah,” the ideological statement of the Conservative Movement.

Rabbi Segal was ordained at the Jewish Theological Seminary of America, in 1969, and served as a pulpit rabbi in Congregation Kol Emeth, Palo Alto, California for four years. He made aliyah in 1973, and now lives in Jerusalem with his wife Judy and their family. Since moving to Jerusalem, Rabbi Segal has served as scholar in residence and visiting rabbi (high holidays) for numbers of congregations abroad. The Segals have five children and 11 grandchildren.

Sunday we had another successful breakfast at the library despite the weather. Because of the heavy rain we set up our table inside, instead of outside as we did in warmer months. We also slightly overestimated the demand and had some leftover bagels at the end. But I am sure if it were sunnier more people would have joined us. On the other hand it was a good idea to put our several boxes of our used books, because we sold a few items.

• Thank you for those who came, hope you had a good time.
• Thank you for those who donated to our collection box or bought books and supported us that way.
• Finally, I would like to thank Ruth and Ira Rosenberg for providing us with the breakfast and their time.

Absolute Music presents a Chamber Music Concert not to be missed!

On Sunday, February 15 at 2 p.m. at the Friedman Center in Santa Rosa, String Circle, fine and talented classical string artists Katie Kyme and Lisa Weiss, violins; Anthony Martin, viola; and Thalia Moore and Robert Howard, cellos will perform:

• Haydn‘s Sunrise Quartet (Opus 76, No.4)
• Schubert‘s Quintet in C Major

Please come and support our efforts to bring great artists and great music to our community at affordable prices. Tickets at the door are $18. Students are free.

Greg Mortenson, the author of Three Cups of Tea, the book our discussion group will talk about in April, will be speaking at Marin Civic Auditorium on Thursday, February 19 at 8:00. There is a reception (a fundraiser for the Marin County Library Foundation) prior to his presentation. Tickets for the presentation are sold out, but there are some tickets available for the reception+presentation ($125 per person). If you’re interested, let me know and I can get you in touch with a board member of the foundation to get your ticket.

Tomorrow, Wednesday, morning at 10 AM we will gather again to discuss an interesting book. This time we will dissect Moacyr Scliar‘s “The Centaur in the Garden.” The book is listed by The National Yiddish Book Center as one of the 100 Greatest Works of Modern Jewish Literature. Instead of me trying to create a short review, let me quote the opening of an essay by Judith Bolton-Fasman.

Moacyr Scliar’s fabulist novel, The Centaur in the Garden , is an extended Midrash replete with biblical references and mystical allusions. The book is narrated by the droll Guedali Tartakovsky, a Jewish centaur whose Russian immigrant parents are the only Jews homesteading in Rio Grande de Sul, Brazil. The family arrives there under the sponsorship of a wealthy European Jew. But rather than settle into their new life, the Tartakovskys are more like the ten spies who come back from the Promised Land with reports of doom and gloom. They act like tourists – too tentative to assume ownership of the land and therefore setting themselves up as perennial outsiders.

I recommend the page I quoted above from the The National Yiddish Book Center, because it has additional resources related to the book such as an interview with the author and questions to discuss. Who knows we might touch upon them tomorrow. Come and join us even if you didn’t read the book.