Denying Adorno
I have no idea that at the same time in the United States of America, Theodore Adorno has come out with the sweeping statement that to write poetry after Auschwitz is barbaric. A meaningful, powerful…
Category: Jewish Tradition
Keep Going
He used to say,“It is not your dutyTo complete the work, But neither are you freeTo desist from it…” –Rabbi Tarfon, Pirke Avot, 2.21
Joanie’s Teacher
“Make the impossible possible, the possible easy, the easy elegant.” –Moshe Feldenkrais
State of Emergency, January 2003
Walter Benjamin, Illuminations: Essays and ReflectionsEdited by Hannah ArendtSchocken Books, 1988 The tradition of the oppressed teaches us that “the state of emergency” in which we live is not the exception but the rule. We…
Sholem Aleichem-isms
It should never happen to you! Master of the universe, what have I done to deserve all this? Some people have all the luck! I swear, I wouldn’t wish it on a dog! What happened?…
I’m Assuming That Elie Wiesel and Noam Chomsky Met at Least Once
Recently, the Persian scholar and poetry translator Matt Miller sent me condolences upon the death of one of my teachers, Thich Nhat Hanh. I mentioned to him that the several of the teachers I first…
Poem of the Week by Charles Reznikoff
I went to my grandfather’s to say good-bye:I was going away to a school out West.As I came in,My grandfather turned from the window at which he sat(sick, skin yellow, eyes bleary–but his hair still…
Becoming a Mensch
Alan Morinis, Climbing Jacob’s Ladder: One Man’s Journey to Rediscover a Jewish Spiritual TraditionTrumpeter, 2002 Alan Morinis offers an engaging account of how he came to re-order his life according to the Jewish practice of…
Train Wholeheartedly
Attention [prosoche] is the fundamental Stoic spiritual attitude. It is a continuous vigilance and presence of mind, self consciousness which never sleeps, and a constant tension of the spirit. Thanks to this attitude, the philosopher…
Remembrance of Teachers Past
Elie Wiesel, Somewhere a Master: Further Hasidic Portraits and Legends This is Elie Wiesel’s third of four installments thus far on his favorite Hasidic teachers, the ones whose tales enchanted him in his childhood, the…