People & Places » Jewish Ideas Daily

Kibbutz, Gush Etzion, 1945

The Romance of Gush Etzion

The modern return of the Jewish people to their homeland succeeded thanks to the extraordinary tenacity of pioneering individuals who, in a dangerous environment, created new communities from scratch. One such community, or rather series of communities, is the Etzion district—in Hebrew, Gush Etzion—located along the ancient mountain route between Jerusalem and Hebron. The first three communities built by Jewish settlers were completely destroyed by Arabs. The fourth still stands today.

The Death and Rebirth of Kfar Etzion Yair Sheleg, Haaretz. A (Hebrew-language) book attempts to come to grips with the story of the orphaned children of Etzion Village. SAVE

An Ideal Leader Alan Brill, Edah Journal. Aharon Lichtenstein's essays offer a consistent vision of life reflecting their author's lifelong dedication to Torah study as an expression of the Divine. SAVE

Remembering the Catastrophe Aljazeera Magazine. International peacemakers speak of including parts of the Gush Etzion settlement bloc in an agreement, but the Arab press routinely brands all settlers and settlements as illegal. SAVE

Tashlich, Kate Chester

Repentance = Freedom?

In the thick of the month of Ellul, nearing Rosh Hashanah, penitence is or should be in the air. Also recently marked was the 75th yahrzeit of the great mystic, jurist, and theologian Abraham Isaac Kook (1865-1935). As it turns out, Kook's teachings on the meaning of repentance are among his most striking, stamped with his distinctive mix of piety and audacity. In his eyes, teshuvah, generally translated as "repentance" but literally and more powerfully "return," signifies not only a deepened and renewed commitment to religion and commandments but, paradoxically, nothing less than a new birth of freedom.

A Healthy Soul in a Healthy Body Abraham Isaac Kook, Emet. Two passages from Orot Hateshuvah, translated by Alter Metzger, clarify the physical—and the paradoxical—nature of repentance. SAVE

Rav Kook, in His Time and Ours Torah MiTzion. A series of lectures by rabbis and teachers on the 75th anniversary of Kook's death. (Video.) SAVE

When the Rav Met the Rav Jeffrey Saks, Tradition. In 1935, two philosophers of repentance, the young Soloveitchik and the elderly and ailing Kook, met in the land of Israel.

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Yossi Vassa

It Sounds Better in Amharic

In his one-man play, It Sounds Better in Amharic, the Ethiopian-born Israeli actor Yossi Vassa humorously contrasts life in the old world and the new, mulling over the differences between traditional and modern ways of dating and the respective virtues of traveling by donkey or Lamborghini. He also narrates his family's 400-mile journey from Ethiopia to Sudan—from where, in 1984, the Israeli air force flew 8,000 Ethiopian Jews to Israel. Vassa's family covered the 400 miles on foot, in three months. "Not to brag," he comments, "but it took the children of Israel 40 years."

Operation Moses Edward Alexander, Commentary. The rescue of the starving and impoverished Ethiopian Jews was high drama; the welcome they received in Israel was equally dramatic, as well as generous and enthusiastic. SAVE

It Sounds Better in Amharic Yossi Vassa, Nephesh Theatre. Selected scenes from a one-man play. (Video; introduction in Hebrew) SAVE

Ras Deshen YouTube. Abatte Barihun and Yitzhak Yedid combine the ancient feel of Ethiopian music with the modern spirit of free jazz. (Video.) SAVE

Digging King Herod

King Herod was a Jew of doubtful origin who ruled Israel in the years 40-4 B.C.E. During this same period, the Roman republic was being replaced by the Roman Empire with its vast expansionist aims. Relying on Roman support for his power, Herod was, in effect, Israel's little Roman emperor. And he played the part, bringing administrative order and economic prosperity to the country and creating hugely ambitious architectural projects. In the Roman way, he was also cruel, paranoid, and thorough, killing his wife, three sons, and an assortment of other relatives and confidants.

Herod Inspires New Controversy Samuel Sockol, Washington Post. The discovery of Herod's tomb stirs up a hornet's nest of political passions. SAVE

Herod Revealed Tom Mueller, National Geographic. Israelis are reckoning with the questions raised by Herod's life and architectural achievements. SAVE

Insight & Analysis

Rededication Jonah Mandel. Jerusalem Post. The reopening of the Óbuda Synagogue in Budapest, built in 1820, marks another step in the slow resurgence of Jewish life in Hungary. SAVE

A Good Nation is Hard to Find Sam Siegel. Commentary. A new critique of chosenness ignores all the ways in which two nations that claim exceptionalism—America, Israel—are, in fact, exceptional. SAVE

A Synagogue Reborn Photoblog. In Mainz, Germany, a synagogue destroyed during Kristallnacht in November 1938 has been rebuilt and now rededicated. SAVE

Focus on Yemen Aymenn Jawad. Hudson New York. The situation in Yemen, scene of a proxy war between Saudi Arabia and Iran, is of far greater consequence than the Israel-Palestinian conflict, and requires urgent attention. SAVE

American Gentility and the Mosque at Ground Zero Daniel Gordis. Jerusalem Post. Americans have yet to learn that the first step to defending yourself is to acknowledge that someone is out to destroy you. SAVE

The Hate that Dares Speak its Name John Hinderaker. PowerLine. To the European Union's trade commissioner, anti-Semitism is "fundamentally against European values." If so, why has he maligned the Jews?. SAVE

All Too Human Ron Rosenbaum. Tablet. According to his latest biographer, Nazi hunter Simon Wiesenthal wasn't perfect. So what?. SAVE

Q & A

Left in Zion: A Conversation with Elhanan Yakira

Elhanan Yakira, professor of philosophy at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, has all the credentials of a man of the Israeli Left: born and raised in Tel Aviv as a Zionist and socialist , a lifelong secular Jew, an opponent of West Bank settlements, an advocate of government intervention in economic policy. Yet many of his colleagues on the Left denounce him as a right-winger and a traitor.

Continue Reading "Left in Zion" Elliot Jager, Jewish Ideas Daily. A philosopher who did not set out to be a Zionist polemicist stirs anger and debate. SAVE

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Jerusalem Letter

Poets and Warriors

Aryeh Tepper

Hayim Nahman Bialik (1873–1934) was the poet of Jewish national rebirth and a leading light of cultural Zionism. To be more precise, he was a power station. Composing poems, writing essays, founding journals, raising up the sparks of Israel's past, Bialik became an essential source of energy for Jewish cultural revival.

Continue Reading "Poets and Warriors" Aryeh Tepper, Jewish Ideas Daily. SAVE

Grand Things to Write a Poem On Hillel Halkin, Gefen. An "autobiography" of Shmuel Hanagid in 64 poems, translated and introduced. SAVE

Shmuel Hanagid Peter Cole, Princeton University Press. Selected poems, including the lines cited above, in translation. SAVE

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On Books

Abraham Sutzkever: In Memoriam

Ruth R. Wisse

It was bound to happen. Abraham Sutzkever, born July 15, 1913, in Smorgon, Lithuania, one of the great poets of the twentieth century and the last towering figure of modern Yiddish literature, died this Wednesday, January 20, in Tel Aviv, where he had lived since 1947. A descendant of rabbis, Sutzkever applied to the writing of poetry the standards of refinement that his ancestors had practiced in obedience to Jewish religious law. During World War II, when he was herded into the ghetto with the rest of Vilna Jewry, he determinedly continued composing, persuaded that "the angel of poetry" protects the creator of timeless—but only of truly timeless—work.

Continue Reading "Abraham Sutzkever: In Memoriam" Ruth R. Wisse, Jewish Ideas Daily. SAVE

Selected Poetry and Prose Abraham Sutzkever, California. SAVE

Siberia Abraham Sutzkever, Marc Chagall, Abelard-Schuman. SAVE

The Fiddle Rose Abraham Sutzkever, Wayne State. SAVE

The Poet Reads Abraham Sutzkever, Smithsonian Folkways (Yiddish). SAVE

A Vogn Shikh (A Cartload of Shoes) Abraham Sutzkever, YouTube (Yiddish). SAVE

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Audio/Visual

Hava Nagila

Probably the most famous and universally beloved Jewish song of the modern era was written to a hasidic melody by Abraham Zvi Idelsohn (1882-1938). A prolific musicologist, composer, and cantor, Idelsohn wrote the song to celebrate the 1917 Balfour Declaration. In 1922, he recorded it with a Berlin men’s choir in a startlingly slow (to today’s ears) tempo. Since then it has been performed, effervescently, by Jews and non-Jews in countless arrangements and settings.

A. Z. Idelsohn SAVE

Hava Nagila Berlin 1922 SAVE

Hava Nagila Iranian-Style SAVE

Hava Nagila in Royal Albert Hall SAVE

Hava Nagila Texas-Style SAVE

SAVE "Hava Nagila"