The Ultimate in Jewish Nightmares
I was sitting outside at RISE with a young Irish-Jewish American friend who asked me, when I showed her a particular chapter in Dear Layla Welcome to Palestine, “Who is Abbie Hoffman?” It was a pleasure…
Category: Jewish Tradition
A Nobody with Whom You Should Get Acquainted
Dear Shimmelstoy After our conversation yesterday afternoon I wrote the following lines Thanks for your encouragement If you want to pass it on To some of your students Go right ahead Bella Levenshteyn He…
Burning Children and the Duty to Resist
In May 1968 Jesuit priest Daniel Berrigan wrote a statement on behalf of the Catonsville Nine as to why they were performing an act of civil disobedience in protest of the Vietnam War. It reads,…
I Should Have Read This before Finishing “Dear Layla Welcome to Palestine”
“There’s just one request I have, Pan: please don’t stick me in any of your books. And if that’s too much to ask, do me a favor and at least leave my name out.” —…
Troublemakers (The Prophetic/2)
The major activity of the prophets was interference Remonstrating about wrongs inflicted on other people Meddling in affairs which were seemingly neither their concern Nor their responsibility A prudent woman is she who minds her…
Episodes/1 (The Prophetic)
To us a single act of injustice (Cheating in business, exploitation of the poor) Is slight To the prophets A disaster To us injustice is injurious to the welfare of the people To the prophets…
Reasons of State Or Reasons of Memory
First published in The Ecumenist, 1997. Edward T. Linenthal, Preserving Memory: The Struggle to Create America’s Holocaust Museum. New York: Penguin USA, 1995. $27.95, U.S.A; $36.99, Canada. Throughout this spring, there have been several…
The Way of the World/2
In 1974 Rabbi Yitz Greenberg averred No statement theological or otherwise Is credible unless it’s credible In the presence of burning children The U.S. government cares passionately Rhetorically about the burning children Victimized by our…
Primacy
“[Shoshani] didn’t teach piety; he taught the texts. The texts are more fundamental—and vaster—than piety. “ –Emmanuel Levinas
Elie Wiesel and the Question of Palestine
This essay was first published in Tikkun, November-December 2002. In his 1986 Nobel lecture, Elie Wiesel spoke with characteristic gravity on any attempt to reckon with the Holocaust: “There are no theological answers, there are no…