Category: Jewish Tradition
Share the Wealth: Writing with Yael
#1Last Night’s Email from Jessica Flier I write, becauseFirst and foremost, I must!But also – because,Of you.To take the broken heart and expose itbring the carefully concealed underbelly to the surfaceresisting the urge to hide…
“Observe What’s Vivid”
1.“There is a story in the Jewish tradition about a student going to see a great rabbi, not principally to study Torah or Talmud, but to watch how the rabbi ties his shoes.”–Eboo Patel 2. “I…
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…
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…