Books, Poetry & Short Stories

From Torah to rabbinic Judaism

Rabbi Drazin’s newest book sets out to prove that the Judaism that everyone observes today is a relatively later historical development. Judaism continues to undergo endlessly new permutations. This observation applies no less to Conservative, Reform, Reconstructionist, Renewal, even some of the vestigial practices of so-called “secular Jews,” which to a certain degree follow variations of rabbinical Judaism. Yet, as the author noted, “The term Orthodox did not exist before the 19th century” (p. 175). [Rabbi Dr. Michael Leo Samuel]

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, Israel Drazin-Rabbi Dr., Jewish Religion, Michael Leo Samuel-Rabbi

Congratulations Encinitas City Council, JFS & Leichtag Foundation

I think we all should congratulate Mayor Catherine Blakespear and three other members of the Encinitas City Council who voted their hearts, and not their fears, in the recent battle over providing safe overnight parking spaces to 25 homeless families who are forced to sleep in their cars. [Donald H. Harrison]

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, Donald H. Harrison, International, Jewish Religion, Middle East, Music, Dance, and Visual Arts, San Diego County, USA

1945 Holocaust memoir rediscovered

Identical books with different titles and different covers introduce bookish mystery and confusion. Such is the case of No Place to Lay One’s Head and A Bookshop in Berlin by Françoise Frenkel which first appeared in 1945 as Rien où poser sa tête. The revival of an overlooked book has a special attraction. Publishers appeal to sensibilities of prospective readers through alluring titles and cover art. [Oliver B. Pollak, PhD]

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, International, Jewish History, Oliver Pollak

‘Lost Book of Adana Moreau’ a Jewish story

“To answer your email, yes, my new novel does deal directly with the Jewish experience pre- and post-Russian Revolution, in Chicago during the Great Depression, and through the lens of an Israeli-American raised in Chicago decades later,” Zapata told me. “My mother’s family is Ashkenazi, originally from Lithuania, and my father’s family is from Ecuador.” [Dan Bloom]

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories

Auschwitz memoir revived for 75th anniversary

As we approach the 75th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz, many books, documentaries and articles are appearing about “history’s darkest chapter.” The book Last Stop Auschwitz: My Story of Survival From Within the Camp, set for release momentarily, will certainly become one of the more defining accounts of the horrors and inhumanities perpetrated by the Nazis during the Holocaust. [Dorian De Wind]

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, Dorian de Wind, International, Jewish History

Fictional weather-maker faces religious controversy

“The story goes like this,” Schwartz told me in a recent update to his earlier emails. “The main character, Neil Stephenson, is a TV meteorologist and a rising star in the Baltimore area. During a snowstorm that isn’t producing as much snow as predicted, Neil discovers his gift: that he can actually make the snow increase or decrease, and make it rain or stop raining.” That’s some superpower, as readers of the recently-published novel will find out. [Dan Bloom]

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, The World We Share

Jews, Christians, Muslims to join in MLK salute

San Diegans of various faiths will gather at 8:30 a.m. Monday, Jan. 20, at the Marston House in Balboa Park, at 3525 Seventh Avenue (corner of Upas) to honor the legacy of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. on what would have been five days past his 91st birthday. [Donald H. Harrison]

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, Donald H. Harrison, Obituaries & memorials, San Diego County, USA

Posthumous Holocaust memoir a family affair

Mendek Rubin was born in 1924 in Jaworzno, Poland, a town with over 2,000 Jews, about 15 miles from Auschwitz. He died in Carmel in 2012. When his daughter Myra was putting his papers in order she came across a manuscript In Quest of the Eternal Sunshine. It was a surprise and not a surprise. It was a surprise to find it, but she had already helped her father edit it decades earlier. She worked on the manuscript for a few days but the task was incompatible with raising her two children. And, “in the intervening years” she had “completely forgotten it existed.” [Oliver B. Pollak]

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, International, Jewish History, Oliver Pollak

No one is listening!

Last July, I wrote an article, “Wanted: listeners, not interrupters” for this publication.  I received several revealing responses from friends and others, each with the same opening sentence,” I am guilty of being a poor listener.”   Frankly, their confessions were not surprising, as poor listening is endemic.  Even after I met with the same friends later there was little change in their behavior.   No one is listening! [Cantor Sheldon Foster Merel]

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, Cantor Sheldon Foster Merel, z"l, Lifestyles

German’s diary tells of opposition to Hitler

For the first time, I read the courageous secret diary of a man and wife who did what they could to record what they saw, they heard, and they felt living in Nazi Germany.  They had been denounced.  They had barely escaped the concentration camps, the Gestapo, and probable death for being in opposition to Hitler.  They knew what they had to do, what they could still do, even if they could not shape the present.  They hoped their diary might shape the future when another Hitler could arise somewhere in the world in another vaunted high cultured and “free” society.  The diary, a series of volumes that remained hidden long after the war had ended, eventually ran to almost 1,000 pages. [Jerry Klinger]

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, International, Jerry Klinger, Jewish History

Eureka! Koren Tanakh best Bible commentary ever

The Koren Tanakh of the Land of Israel is without doubt the best Bible commentary in English. I say this after using over a hundred such books while writing my own books on the Bible, such as my many volumes on the differences between the Hebrew Bible and its Aramaic translation called Onkelos. [Rabbi Dr. Israel Drazin]

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, Israel Drazin-Rabbi Dr., Jewish History, Jewish Religion

SDSU wins plaudits for blocking anti-Semitic speaker

StandWithUs, a national organization combating anti-Semitism on American college campuses, has congratulated San Diego State University for blocking a speaking invitation to Ava Muhammad, who is a spokeswoman for Nation of Islam Minister Louis Farrakhan. [Donald H. Harrison]

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, Donald H. Harrison, International, Jewish History, Middle East, Music, Dance, and Visual Arts, San Diego County, Science, Medicine, & Education, Theatre, Film & Broadcast, USA

Jewish poets reflect on their parents

Lorraine Fisher, Jan Gist, and Joel Guadarrama will be the three local writers featured at the second evening of the current series of Jewish Poets—Jewish Voices.  The free program will take place in the Astor Judaica Library, Lawrence Family JCC at 7 p.m.,  Tuesday, January 21. The first of the series, last December 17, featured poets Lucy Lehman, Adam Greenfield and Anna Abraham Gasaway. Their poetry was spellbinding. Below are samples of their talent. [Eileen Wingard]

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, Eileen Wingard, San Diego County

Poems to light the Jewish world

Poems are part and parcel of Judaism, arguably beginning with Miriam at the Red Sea, continuing with the Psalms and into present-day liturgy. Chaya Lester, Jerusalem-based psychotherapist, Jewish educator, and spiritual guide, calls on the metaphor of a lit candle and the multiple meanings of the word lit – the literature of poetry, intoxication of experiences, and “being lit up” in the sense of being alive and amazed – as her muse. The motivations for writing these poems are the twin themes of Jewish apathy and assimilation, whose panacea she perceives to be celebration, “the Jewish world needs to get lit…Jewishly lit.” [Fred Reiss, Ed.D]

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, Fred Reiss, EdD