This book provides the first English translation of Yechiel Hofer's book, Reb Zalmen. Centering on a particular denizen of the Aleksander Hasidim's shtibl (prayer house), it offers a unique and intimate portrait of the lives of those who went inside to pray, eat, study, and argue there in the early 20th century. It is hard to imagine that Reb Zalmen was not an actual figure - someone the young Yechiel Hofer actually knew and loved - although finding any trace of him today would be a daunti...

A treasure trove of anecdotes that illuminate the lives, humor, and wisdom of Eastern European Jewish communities from the 18th and 19th centuries. A bestseller nearly a century ago in its original Yiddish and now brought to renewed life in translation by Jonathan Boyarin and Jonah Sampson Boyarin, these stories capture the essence of a world where tradition and ingenuity intertwined. From rabbis and scholars to everyday figures, the tales are alternately heartwarming, sharp, and deeply hu...

A vivid novelistic account that details a crucial period in the evolution of Polish Hasidism, translated from Yiddish.Half a century after Hasidism blossomed in Eastern Europe, its members were making deep inroads into the institutional structure of Polish Jewish communities, but some devotees believed that the movement had drifted away from its revolutionary ideals. Menashe Unger's A Fire Burns in Kotsk dramatizes this moment of division among Polish Hasi...

This story of one of the last remaining synagogues in the historic neighborhood and its congregation is "as absorbing as a good cinema verité documentary" ( Booklist).On New York's Lower East Side, a narrow building, wedged into a lot designed for an old-law tenement, is full of clamorous voices—the generations of the dead, who somehow contrive to make their presence known, and the newer generation, keeping the building and its memories a...

An intimate and moving portrait of daily life in New York's oldest institution of traditional rabbinic learningNew York City's Lower East Side has witnessed a severe decline in its Jewish population in recent decades, yet every morning in the big room of the city's oldest yeshiva, students still gather to study the Talmud beneath the great arched windows facing out onto East Broadway. Yeshiva Days is Jonathan Boyarin's uniquely personal account of the year...

Jewish art has always been with us, but so has a broader canvas of Jewish imaginings: in thought, in emotion, in text, and in ritual practice. Imagining the Jewish God was there in the beginning, as it were, engraved and embedded in the ways Jews lived and responded to their God.This book attempts to give voice to these diverse imaginings of the Jewish God, and offers these collected essays and poems as a living text meant to provoke a substantive and nourishing dialogue. A responsive, liv...

Theory, as it’s happened across the humanities, has often been coded as “Jewish.” This collection of essays seeks to move past explanations for this understanding that rely on the self-evident (the historical centrality of Jews to the rise of Critical Theory with the Frankfurt School) or stereotypical (psychoanalysis as the “Jewish Science”) in order to show how certain problematics of modern Jewishness enrich theory.In the range of violence and agency that attend the appellation “...

**LONGLISTED FOR THE NATIONAL BOOK AWARD!A WILLIAM C. MORRIS AWARD WINNER!The Chosen meets Adam Silvera in this irreverent and timely story of worlds colliding in friendship, betrayal, and the hatred that divides us.**Hoodie Rosen's life isn't that bad. Sure, his entire Orthodox Jewish community has just picked up and moved to the quiet, mostly non-Jewish town of Tregaron, but Hoodie's world hasn't changed that much. He's got basketball to play, studies to a...

Filled with princesses and witches, dybbuks and wonder-working rebbes, the two hundred marvelous tales that make up this delightful compendium were gathered during the 1920s and 1930s by ethnographers in the small towns and villages of Eastern Europe. Collected from people of all walks of life, they include parable and allegories about life, luck, and wisdom; tales of magic and wonder; stories about rebbes and their disciples; and tales whose only purpose is to entertain. Long after the cu...

Sooner or later, kids have big questions about God, life, faith and the Bible, especially when their friends start asking them about what they believe. A common one is: How do we know Christianity is really true?Big questions deserve good answers. This pithy, fun and fast-paced book looks at what the Bible says to help 9-13s think through this big question for themselves.It explains why we can trust the Gospels as real historical documents and walks through the evidence for...

"A unique work of art" that captures "the experiences of an important generation of Russian Jews. . . . and an important document of its time." —Gabriella Safran, author of Wandering Soul: The Dybbuk's Creator, S. An-SkyS. An-Sky's novel dramatizes the dilemmas of Jewish young people in late Tsarist Russia as they strive to throw off their traditional religious upbringing to adopt a secular and modern identity. The action unfolds in the town of M. in the ...

For anyone who has ever been touched and inspired by a Chassidic tale, this box set needs no introduction. For anyone who has not yet experienced the warmth and wisdom of Chassidic masters such as the Baal Shem Tov and Rabbi Zusha of Hanipoli—welcome!In these volumes you'll find stories that will give you a new appreciation for the Jewish holidays, as well as the Jewish people's ability to remain joyous and optimistic even during the darkest times. By journey's end, hopefully you t...