Fred Reiss, EdD

Fred Reiss, Ed.D

Fred Reiss is a retired educator and a freelance  writer based in Winchester, California.

His books, available on Amazon, include:

* Public Education in Camden, N.J.: From Inception to Integration

* Reclaiming the Messiah

* Sepher Yetzirah: The Book that Started Kabbalah

* The Comprehensive Jewish and Civil Calendars: 2001-2240.

* The Jewish Calendar: History and Inner Workings

* The Standard Guide to the Jewish and Civil Calendars: A Parallel Jewish and Civil Calendar from 1899 to 2050 With Parashiyyot and Haftarot and Candle-Lighting Times for Selected Cities 

The Hidden Passion and Joy of Psalms Described by Two Rabbis

Most identify the Book of Psalms as a collection of Jewish hymns, prayers, and poems mostly focusing on praising and adoring God. Rabbis Jack Riemer and Elie Spitz, co-authors of Duet on Psalms, with their long careers as pulpit rabbis recognize for too many, reciting psalms is a perfunctory exercise, spoken without passion and devoid of their intrinsic meaning. [Fred Reiss, Ed.D]

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, Fred Reiss, EdD, Jewish Religion

Some Little-Known Jewish Calendar Facts

The Jewish calendar is a lunisolar calendar because the Torah requires Passover to fall in “Hodesh Ha-Aviv,” the month of spring. If the Jewish calendar were not linked to the seasons, ruled by the Sun, the Jewish calendar would retrogress about 11 days a year, or one season every eight years. The calendar achieves this balance by adding thirty-day month 7 times every 19 years, a scheme learned during the Babylonian captivity and taught by the Greeks. Rosh Hashanah falls early or late every year compared to the secular calendar because these “make-up days” are sometimes added two years and sometimes three years apart, rather than annually. [Fred Reiss, Ed.D]

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Fred Reiss, EdD, Jewish History, Jewish Religion

Surveying the Full Range of Jewish Life

The Book of Jewish Knowledge, Rabbi Yanki Tauber, ed., The Rohr Jewish Learning Institute, Brooklyn, NY, ©2022, ISBN 978-1-63668-012-5 p. 432, plus Appendices, $69.75. By Fred Reiss, Ed.D. WINCHESTER, California – Is it feasible to adequately convey the skills, information, and wisdom acquired by the Jewish people who, after nearly 4,000 years of living in

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, Fred Reiss, EdD, Jewish History, Jewish Religion

Book Puts the ‘Land’ in the Land of Israel

Essentials of the Land of Israel, Brandon Marlon, Vallentine Mitchell, London, ©2022, ISBN 978-1-91267-686-6, p. 186, plus biography and index, $69.75. By Fred Reiss, Ed.D. WINCHESTER, California – Anyone perusing the table of contents of Essentials of the Land of Israel by Brandon Marlon, a prolific, award-winning Canadian-Israeli author, would correctly conclude the book’s value

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, Fred Reiss, EdD, Middle East, Travel and Food

‘Jewish Bestiary’ Unpacks the Actual and Mystical Roles Animals Play in Our Lives

“A Jewish Bestiary: Fabulous Creatures from Hebraic Legend & Lore,” by Mark Podwal; The Pennsylvania State University Press, University Park, PA, ©2021; ISBN 9780271091730; 70 pages, plus bibliography; $14.86. By Fred Reiss, Ed.D. WINCHESTER, California – Close contact between animals and humans, according to the Hebrew Bible, happened soon after creation: God brought them before

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, Fred Reiss, EdD, Jewish Religion

Book Provides an Ideological Scaffolding of Jewish Life

“Why Do Jewish? A Manifesto for 21st Century Jewish Peoplehood,” by Zack Bodner; Gefen Publishing, Jerusalem, ©2022; ISBN 978-965-7023-68-6; 196 pages, plus references and index; $18.00. By Fred Reiss, Ed.D. WINCHESTER, California – Prognostication is very difficult, particularly as it pertains to the future. Zack Bodner, having extensive background in Jewish communal life and currently

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, Fred Reiss, EdD, Judaism

Berdichevsky’s Yiddish Stories Collected and Retold in English

Journalist, scholar and author M. Y. Berdichevsky (1865 – 1921) wrote for two different audiences. For the intelligentsia he wrote in Hebrew and German; for unsophisticated Eastern European Jews, he chose Yiddish, the language of the shtetl, small towns comprised mostly of Jews. Raised in Medzhibozh, western Ukraine, by his Hasidic father, the town’s rabbi, he spent his youth immersed in Judaism, but also began reading books produced in the Haskalah, Jewish Enlightenment, whose goals included preservation of Jewish heritage, revival of Hebrew, and integrating Jews into the ambient secular culture. [Fred R. Reiss, Ed.D]

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, Fred Reiss, EdD, International

Jewish Infighting Contributed to Fall of Jerusalem in 70 CE

Intrigue, maneuvering, scheming, plotting, and murder highlight the years from Herod’s reign to the Jewish rebellion against Rome, beginning in 66. Herod, the Great, acting more like the King of the Jews than a Jewish king, ascended to the throne in 37 BCE. His rule lasted forty-one years. [Fred Reiss, Ed.D]

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, Fred Reiss, EdD, International, Jewish History, Middle East

‘Torah IQ’ Provides More Than 1,000 Questions and Answers

The first of the two Torah sections presents twenty questions for each parashah (weekly Torah reading), such as, in parashat Chayei Sarah he asks, “Who in the Torah had 13 children? And in parashat Shoftim, “Which word is an acronym for the four types of leaders in Israel mentioned in parashat Shoftim?” The second of the two Torah sections offers 169 general Torah questions. For example, “Why did Paroh (Hebrew for Pharoah) change Joseph’s name?” and “What is the only birthday party mentioned in the Torah?” [Fred Reiss, Ed.D]

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, Fred Reiss, EdD, Jewish Religion, Trivia, Humor & Satire

Antisemitism and the Courts Probed in New Book

In Courtroom Trials in Jewish History, attorney and Jewish-community activist Esther Zaretsky offers an eclectic collection of stories about Jews who, in a broad sense, have had their day in court, courts representing justice at its worst, verdicts driven by antisemitism and anti-Israeli hatred. The title is somewhat of a misnomer, as there are no depositions or testimonies; no exhibits or closing arguments. Rather, Zaretsky provides the backstory leading up to the trial, the verdict, emphasizing how the “courts fail to affirm society’s most precious values of justice, equality, morality, and the preservation of human rights,” and its aftermath—we get to hear the rest of the story. [Fred Reiss, Ed.D]

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, Fred Reiss, EdD, International, Jewish History, Jewish Religion, Middle East, USA

Extricating Oneself from the Muddy Middle

Each of us hears an internal voice, it talks to us every day. For some, this voice repeats the harmful and disheartening comments made by parents, teachers, siblings, and friends. It reminds us of our failures and insecurities. This voice, according to Rabbi Shimshon Frankel, a clinical psychologist with more than a quarter century of experience, and author of The Wisdom of Getting Unstuck, is your Antagonist, and “when we start to identify ourselves with the negative messages that it delivers, we’re bound to start experiencing a heightened degree of discomfort, emptiness, pain, and tension.” [Fred Reiss, Ed.D]

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, Fred Reiss, EdD, Jewish Religion, Lifestyles

A Modern Look Into the Hebrew Bible

Tanakh, the all-inclusive Hebrew word for the Bible—Torah, Prophets, and Writings—holds many problems and puzzles: What does an infrequently used biblical Hebrew word actually mean? Does the Bible describe true historical fact, or just fantasy? What is the origin of particular prayers? Attorney and independent biblical researcher Mitchell First, in his newest book Links to Our Legacy, continues his mission to find lost meanings and correct inaccurate historical accountings. [Fred Reiss, Ed.D]

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, Fred Reiss, EdD, Jewish Religion

Jewish Folk Remedies from the Pale of Settlement

Wait, it’s not the chicken soup, it’s the herbs that count! Eastern European Jewry, particularly those living in the area known as “The Pale of Settlement,” on the western side of the Dnieper River, in present-day Ukraine, whose history there began in the Middle Ages, have a “long and distinguished canon dedicated to the healing process,” a research area unfortunately ignored, by-and-large, by sociological scholars. Cohen and Siegel, in their joint venture Ashkenazi Herbalism, describe the history and role of plants and herbs employed by Ashkenazi folk-healers, piecing together sparse, fragmented sources, and weaving them into an engaging story. [Fred Reiss, Ed.D]

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, Fred Reiss, EdD, International, Jewish History, Science, Medicine, & Education