{"title":"Communites in Israel","description":null,"products":[{"product_id":"tales-of-the-righteous","title":"Tales of the Righteous","description":"\u003cp\u003eTHROUGHOUT THE GENERATIONS, Jews have been inspired and guided by the tales of gedolim, our great masters of piety and wisdom. Simcha Raz’s Tales of the Righteous, newly translated by Rabbi Dov Peretz Elkins, brings the lives of these masters to life. Raz’s pithy vignettes and awe-inspiring tales show that together with their brilliance in Torah study, these rabbis were also paragons of sensitive, ethical behavior. Reviews: MAKE NO MISTAKE, THE TELLING OF THE HASIDIC TALE IS A SPECIAL SKILL and one that Simcha Raz knows well. It is truly a pleasure to observe how he has regenerated and restored legends and tales drawn from the wellspring of Hasidic lore. “Congratulations to the author. He presents us with the fair, literary, and humane countenance of Hasidism. The reader will sail off to the most lofty horizons on a voyage of legend; his whole being will be enthralled. This book contains stories both short and long, sad tales and happy ones; narratives simple and complex.… We who inhabit a world so devoted to its enhancement of the material will find that the reading of Simcha Raz’s book offers us the opportunity to embark on a journey of discovery into another, more sublime world. From the foreword by Eli Wiesel\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Dov Peretz Elkins (translator) and Simcha Raz","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":54336619905334,"sku":"9789652295408","price":24.95,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0993\/2092\/2422\/files\/i97077.36451.jpg?v=1785309642"},{"product_id":"letters-to-an-american-jewish-friend-a-zionists-polemic","title":"Letters to an American Jewish Friend A Zionist’s Polemic","description":"\u003cp\u003eHillel Halkin is an American-born Jew who has cast his personal and historical lot with Israel. The imaginary American Jewish friend to whom Halkin directs his onrush of argument is an equally committed young Jew who, however, upholds the possibility of a viable Jewish life outside of Israel. He has just returned to the United states after his second visit to Israel and written a letter of his impressions, which triggers the present correspondence. The two friends argue about Zionism, Israel, Jewish history and culture, the nature of Jewishness. As the gauntlet is flung back and forth, Halkin elaborates his case that Jewish history and Israeli history are two lines in the process of converging, so that for all practical purposes the struggle for Jewish survival and the struggle for Israel are the same; and that any Jew who chooses, in the absence of extenuating circumstances, not to live in Israel is removing himself to the peripheries of the struggle for Jewish survival and away from the center of Jewish history. Either\/or…sooner or later, today or tomorrow, you will have to decide, Halkin concludes. Reviews: Hillel Halkin is a great contemporary Zionist thinker. A year ago, I reread his Letters to an American Jewish Friend, which decades later stands as one of the smartest, sharpest explorations of the delicate relationship between the committed Diaspora Jew and the Aliyah-making Zionist. As I read the book, one page after another was loosened from the binding, and I thought, “Boy we need a new edition of this book.” I am thrilled to welcome this classic – with a compelling, inspiring new introduction by the author. The issues are remarkably relevant, the writing remains fluid, the passion infectious, the insights profound. New generations of readers will be inspired by this, and older generations of readers will eagerly greet this new edition like an old – and long yearned-for – friend. Gil Troy , author, Moynihan’s Moment: America’s Fight against Zionism as Racism and Why I Am A Zionist Three and a half decades ago, the appearance of Hillel Halkin’s Letters to an American Jewish Friend sent shockwaves through the American Jewish community. The book was what would become known as vintage Halkin – smart, thoughtful, provocative, unsettling. No one who read it put it down untouched or unmoved. That Letters is being reissued now, making it available to a generation that needs it perhaps even more than the generation in which it first appeared, is cause for celebration, hope and gratitude. Daniel Gordis , Shalem College, Jerusalem; winner of the National Jewish Book Award for Saving Israel A book any Jew concerned with Israel and the future of the Jewish people ought to read….a clear, forceful polemic that will drive every reader back to a careful scrutiny of his own preconceptions about Jewish existence. Robert Alter Commentary, August 1977 A polemic, blazing with passion and inventiveness and good humor, a cri de coeur impelled by a fury of conviction. Amos Elon The New York Times, August 1977 American Jews will be disturbed by Halkin's articulate 'letters' from Israel… His arguments are succinct, intriguing, and deserve the serious attention they have already commanded. Bernard Avishai The New York Review of Books, November 1977 With humor, metaphor and passion, Halkin compels a moral confrontation with the alternatives before the Jewish people – ease in a fading Diaspora or unease in Zion. Marie Syrkin The New Republic If there has been a more significant Jewish book published in this decade, I haven't seen it. William Novak Midstream\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Hillel Halkin","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":54336649953590,"sku":"9789652296306","price":18.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0993\/2092\/2422\/files\/i107464.16169.jpg?v=1785310274"},{"product_id":"the-spiritual-revolution-of-rav-kook","title":"The Spiritual Revolution of Rav Kook","description":"\u003cp\u003eDespite Rav Kook (1865–1935) being one of the most influential thinkers in Jewish history, his revolutionary writings are mostly unknown to the general public. This book contains many new and accessible translations, as well as an in-depth spiritual biography. Each chapter is introduced and broken up into a variety of topics, including the individual, Torah, God, teshuvah, prayer, creativity, Zionism, science, and vegetarianism. This book features an entirely new, original, accessible translation of a diverse selection of Rav Kook’s writings. This work offers a surprisingly modern model of religion from the perspective of a spiritual leader who was ahead of his time.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Ari Ze’ev Schwartz","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":54336750944566,"sku":"g913a \/ 913-0","price":21.95,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0993\/2092\/2422\/files\/i22802.031394.jpg?v=1785311756"}],"url":"https:\/\/www.gefenpublishing.com\/collections\/communites-in-israel.oembed","provider":"Gefen Publishing House","version":"1.0","type":"link"}