Thoughtful, piercing, and sincere, Why Be Jewish? is Edgar Bronfman's passionate testimonial to his own personal Jewish journey and the story of the Jewish people.This is the late Edgar Bronfman's clarion call to a generation of secular, disaffected and unaffiliated Jews, addressing the most critical question confronting Judaism worldwide.Completed in December 2013, just weeks before he passed away, Why Be Jewish? expresses Canadian billiona...

Edgar M. Bronfman's clarion call to a generation of secular, disaffected, and unaffiliated Jews, this book addresses the most critical question confronting Judaism worldwide.Completed in December 2013, just weeks before he passed away, Why Be Jewish? expresses Edgar Bronfman's awe, respect, and deep love for his faith and heritage. Bronfman walks readers through the major tenets and ideas in Jewish life, fleshing out their meaning and offering proof texts ...

Shortlisted for the Scotiabank Giller Prize and nominated for the Governor-General's Award for Literature, a hilarious, swashbuckling yet powerful tale of pirates, buried treasure and a search for the Fountain of Youth, told in the ribald, philosophical voice of a 500-year-old Jewish parrot.Set in the years around 1492, Yiddish for Pirates recounts the compelling story of Moishe, a Bar Mitzvah boy who leaves home to join a ship's crew, where he meets Aaron...

“Larson is a marvelous writer...superb at creating characters with a few short strokes.”—New York Times Book ReviewErik Larson has been widely acclaimed as a master of narrative non-fiction, and in his new book, the bestselling author of Devil in the White City turns his hand to a remarkable story set during Hitler’s rise to power.The time is 1933, the place, Berlin, when William E. Dodd becomes America’s first ambassador to Hitler’s Germa...

A REESE'S BOOK CLUB PICKA #1 New York Times bestseller, Wall Street Journal Best Book of the Year, and soon to be a major motion picture, this unforgettable novel of love and strength in the face of war has enthralled a generation.With courage, grace, and powerful insight, bestselling author Kristin Hannah captures the epic panorama of World War II and illuminates an intimate part of history seldom seen: the women's war.

According to Wikipedia, ""The Guide for the Perplexed is one of the major works of Rabbi Moshe ben Maimon, better known as Maimonides or "the Rambam". It was written in the 12th century in the form of a three-volume letter to his student, Rabbi Joseph ben Judah of Ceuta, the son of Rabbi Judah, and is the main source of the Rambam's philosophical views, as opposed to his opinions on Jewish law... Moses Maimonides (March 30, 1135 Cordoba, Spain ? December 13, 1204 Fostat, Egypt), was a rabb...

A riveting scientific detective story crossed with a provocative and controversial re-examination of the meaning of race, ethnicity, and religion.Could our sense of who we are really turn on a sliver of DNA? In our multiethnic world, questions of individual identity are becoming increasingly unclear. Now in Abraham's Children bestselling author Jon Entine vividly brings to life the profound human implications of the Age of Genetics while illuminating one of...

'Magisterial and eloquent' SUNDAY TELEGRAPHIn this critically acclaimed book, Paul Johnson delves deep into the 4,000-year history of the Jews: a race of awe-inspiring endurance, steadfast homogeneity and loyalty and, above all, the belief that history has a purpose and humanity a destiny.With exacting precision and enthusiasm, Paul Johnson has mapped the lives of these people from their early ancestors in the House of David, through great periods of creati...

A magisterial history, ranging from antiquity to the present, that reveals anti-Judaism to be a mode of thought deeply embedded in the Western tradition.There is a widespread tendency to regard anti-Judaism – whether expressed in a casual remark or implemented through pogrom or extermination campaign – as somehow exceptional: an unfortunate indicator of personal prejudice or the shocking outcome of an extremist ideology married to power.But, as David Nirenberg argues in thi...

A groundbreaking — and terrifying — examination of the widespread resurgence of antisemitism in the 21st century, by the prize-winning and #1 internationally bestselling author of Hitler's Willing Executioners.Antisemitism never went away, but since the turn of the century it has multiplied beyond what anyone would have predicted. It is openly spread by intellectuals, politicians and religious leaders in Europe, Asia, the ...

A colorful memoir of Jewish life in China during the first half of the twentieth century.Dolly Beil spent the first part of her life in the Chinese cities of Tsingtao (Qingdao), Mukden (Shenyang), Harbin, and Tientsin (Tianjin). Her father, owner of a jewellery store and a businessman, descended from the prominent family of Solomon Guterman, who owned an estate in Irkutsk, Russia. Her mother was one of three daughters of Grigory Lazarovich Gershevich, who ...

You're no idiot, of course. You know that Judaism began with Abraham and that Moses led the children out of slavery in Egypt. But when it comes to knowing who Elijah, Esther, and Judah Maccabee were, and their significance to Judaism, you feel like you've been wandering in the desert for 40 years. Don't feel Jewish guilt just yet! The Complete Idiot's Guide® to Jewish History and Culture provides you with a complete, authoritative account of the Jewish people—from Abraham, Moses, ...