"What is the future of the Jewish people? In Arguments for the Sake of Heaven, first published in 1991, Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks explores the contemporary issues that influence Judaism and the controversies that affect its destiny. If the Jewish world is to be mended, Rabbi Sacks contends, Jews must move beyond sectional thinking and recognize alternatives within Judaism. The tradition of argument requires respect for positions with which one doesn't agree; rabbinic texts imply more than one legitimate stance. It is in this spirit of healing that Jewish unity will be achieved, and 'to see this is already to have begun the transition from Torah as the faith of some Jews to Torah as the constitution of the whole Jewish people."-- Provided by publisher.

An account of Ulysses S. Grant's hotly contested Civil War decision to expel Jewish citizens from the territory under his command evaluates the reverberations of his decision on his career, the nascent Jewish-American community, and the nation's political process.

The discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls in Qumran, Palestine, in 1947 was one of the greatest archaeological finds of all time. Written in Hebrew, Aramaic and Greek, and hidden in caves by an ancient Jewish sect, these mysterious manuscripts revolutionized our understanding of the Bible, of Judaism and the early Christian world. Geza Vermes is the world's leading Dead Sea Scrolls scholar, whose English translations brought these extraordinary documents to thousands, and whose life has been inextricably interwoven with the scrolls for over sixty years. In this illuminating book he relates the controversial story of their discovery and publication around the world, revealing cover-ups, blunders and academic in-fighting, but also the passion and dedication of many of those involved. He shares what he has learned about the scrolls and, evaluating passages from them, gives his views on their true significance and what they can teach us, as well as those areas where scholarly consensus has not yet been reached. Few scholars have been as closely associated with the Dead Sea Scrolls as Vermes. Writing with candour and unique authority, he has created an ideal introduction to understanding these miraculous documents.

A chilling, fascinating, and nearly forgotten historical figure is resurrected in this riveting work that links the fascism of the last century with the terrorism of our own. Written with vigor and extraordinary access to primary sources in several languages, Icon of Evil is the definitive account of the man who, during World War II, was called "the fuhrer of the Arab world" and whose ugly legacy lives on today. With new and disturbing details, David G. Dalin and John F. Rothmann show how al -Husseini ingratiated himself with his hero, Adolf Hitler, becoming, with his blond hair and blue eyes, an "honorary Aryan" while dreaming of being installed as Nazi leader of the Middle East. Al-Husseini would later recruit more than 100,000 Muslims in Europe to fight in divisions of the Waffen- SS, and obstruct negotiations with the Allies that might have allowed four thousand Jewish children to escape to Palestine. Some believe that al-Husseini even inspired Hitler to implement the Final Solution. At war's end, al-Husseini escaped indictment at Nuremberg and was harbored in France. Icon of Evil chronicles al-Husseini's postwar relationships with such influential Islamic figures as the radical theoretician Sayyid Qutb and Saddam Hussein's powerful uncle General Khairallah Talfah and his crucial mentoring of the young Yasser Ararat. Finally, it provides compelling evidence that al-Husseini's actions and writings serve as inspirations today to the leaders of Hamas, Hezbollah, and other terrorist organizations pledged to destroy Israel and the United States.

A general survey of the history of the Sephardic Jews, from Roman Spain to the independence of the Arab countries and the Jews' emigration to Israel. Pp. 1-144 describe Jewish life in Spain, as well as anti-Jewish persecutions under Visigoth and Spanish kings: antisemitic legislation, forced conversion, discrimination against Conversos, Inquisition tribunals, and expulsions.

The only comprehensive and up-to-date look at Reform Judaism, this book analyzes the forces currently challenging the Reform movement, now the largest Jewish denomination in the United States. To distinguish itself from Orthodox and Conservative Judaism, the Reform movement tries to be an egalitarian, open, and innovative version of the faith true to the spirit of the tradition but nonetheless fully compatible with modern secular life. Promoting itself in this way, Reform Judaism has been tremendously successful in recruiting a variety of people—intermarried families, feminists, gays and lesbians, and interracial families among others—who resist more traditional forms of worship. As an unintended result of this success, the movement now struggles with an identity crisis brought on by its liberal theology, which teaches that each Jew is free to practice Judaism more or less as he or she pleases. In the absence of the authority that comes from a theology based on a commanding, all-powerful God, can Reform Judaism continue to thrive? Can it be broadly inclusive and still be uniquely and authentically Jewish? Taking this question as his point of departure, Dana Evan Kaplan provides a broad overview of the American Reform movement and its history, theology, and politics. He then takes a hard look at the challenges the movement faces as it attempts to reinvent itself in the new millennium. In so doing, Kaplan gives the reader a sense of where Reform Judaism has come from, where it stands on the major issues, and where it may be going. Addressing the issues that have confronted the movement—including the ordination of women, acceptance of homosexuality, the problem of assimilation, the question of rabbinic officiation at intermarriages, the struggle for acceptance in Israel, and Jewish education and others—Kaplan sheds light on the connection between Reform ideology and cultural realities. He unflinchingly, yet optimistically, assesses the movement's future and cautions that stormy weather may be ahead.

A young woman's journey to Palestine in the wake of World War II stands at the center of this compelling novel about the birth of Israel. 25,000 first printing.

Book by Bauer, Yehuda

Bernard Wasserstein offers the first authoritative history of the fraught diplomatic relations surrounding the Holy City of Jerusalem. Jews, Muslims, and Christians have all claimed the city as their own over the centuries—as have a dizzying array of foreign nations. In the period between the founding of the city and its capture by Israelis in 1967, Jerusalem has been conquered at least thirty-seven times. “No other town,” wrote Arthur Koestler in 1948, “has caused such continuous waves of killing, rape, and unholy misery over the centuries as the Holy City.”Today, Jerusalem lies at the core of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. It is the most deeply divided capital city in the world: its Arab and Jewish residents inhabit different districts, speak different languages, attend different schools, read different newspapers, observe different holy days—live, in almost every significant respect, different lives. Against the background of renewed violence in and around Jerusalem, this book explores the complicated origins of the current diplomatic impasse. Why is the question of Jerusalem so intractable? Why has it outlasted almost every other political dispute as a focus for diplomatic wrangling and collective violence? And what are the prospects for resolution?Meticulously researched, and written with humanity and elegance, this book offers an illuminating contribution to the effort to achieve a lasting negotiated settlement of a tragic conflict that affects us all.

Arendt's personal experiences in Nazi Germany in 1933 and in occupied France in the early 1940s drew her attention to the problem of antisemitism and provided her with a sharp insight into the connection between totalitarianism and antisemitism. Her conception of antisemitism was expressed in "The Origins of Totalitarianism." Arendt regarded antisemitism as a political ideology, whose most dangerous form was peculiar to the epoque of supranational, imperialist states (19th-mid-20th centuries). It was an important element of Nazism, and the catalyst for the most horrendous events of the 20th century. She claimed that the Jews also share responsibility for the success of Nazism because of their inability to withstand it politically. Arendt's book "Eichmann in Jerusalem" provoked a long and bitter controversy. The book is not in fact anti-Jewish: Arendt writes on the total moral collapse of society under the Nazi terror. Her turn from the conception of "radical evil" to that of "banality of evil" in the 1960s was not a break in her thought.

But this is just part of the story, a little part of it. For I Sleep in Hitler's Room is also a book about modern anti-Semitism, about hate that refuses to disappear, about a disease that won't get cured and a curse that won't let go. All told in the clearest of style and most amazing of humor. But this is not fiction. From beginning to end "I Sleep in Hitler's Room" is a true tale, a tale about a country that created the Holocaust and a story about a continent that moves in the direction of creating another. The target group, as in the last round, is the same: the "Jews." Why is Europe, the cradle of our civilization, so obsessed with Jews? Read "I Sleep in Hitler's Room" to find the answer. "I Sleep in Hitler's Room" will make you think, make you worry, make you cry, and make you laugh out loud. It is a book you will never forget. Ever. Buy it today. And run to tell all your friends. Traveling across Germany and seeking out that elusive quality that is the German character, playwright and journalist Tuvia Tenenbom wonders whether he has identified it in any one of several striking social phenomena--the proclivity of Germans to join clubs and group activities; how their aptitude for visual design shapes their architecture and their daily life; how their daily life is suffused with soccer and beer, the omnipresent beverage for all occasions; how they proudly self-define themselves by their achievements in precision technology; and, what is most disturbing to this son of Holocaust survivors, how their crushing awareness of their dark history coexists with virulent anti-Semitism and a stubborn obsession with Israel. Tenenbom integrates deep seriousness with the most lighthearted comic touch in this critical but affectionate look at both left and right in contemporary German politics and society. Listen in on his meetings with leaders in German industry and media, including former chancellor Helmut Schmidt, as well as with scores of private citizens whose everyday conversation Tenenbom ponders even as he gently teases them.

A panoramic new history of modern Britain, as told through the story of one extraordinary family, and one groundbreaking company. In the early 1800s, Lehmann Gluckstein and his family escaped the pogroms of Eastern Europe and made their way to Whitechapel in London's East End. There, starting with nothing, they worked tirelessly to pull themselves out of poverty, creating a small tobacco factory that grew to become the largest catering company in the world: J. Lyons. For over a century, Lyons was on every high street, in every home, in every coffee and teacup. It was an ascent from rags to riches in the face of many obstacles: poverty, hatred and anti-Semitism stood between this poor immigrant family and the British Dream. Legacy charts the rise and fall of one of the most influential dynasties in British history through the lives of five astonishing generations. Both sweeping and intimate, it is a story of sacrifice and selflessness, betrayal and personal tragedy, and Empire and its cost. It is also an illuminating new exploration of Britain and its place in the world, from the bestselling author of Hanns and Rudolf and The House by the Lake.

Once upon a time, back in the 1920s and 1930s, in Brooklyn, there lived a breed of men who exist now only in legend and in the memories of a few old men. Their names were Louis Lepke, Abe Reles, Bugsy Siegel, Dutch Schultz, Meyer Lansky, and they were Jewish gangsters: Jews with guns; tough, fearless Jews who roamed the streets in a time when a Jewish boy could fashion a future that was murderous, daring, and wide open.

Evelyn Sert journeys to Tel Aviv, where Jewish refugees from Nazi Germany are determined to forge a modern consciousness in the heart of the Middle East. Her story weaves together national identity, terrorism, love and the art of hairdressing.

"The Holocaust in the Soviet Union is the most complete account to date of the Soviet Jews during World War II and the Holocaust (1941-45). Reports, records, documents, and research previously unavailable in English enable Yitzhak Arad to trace the Holocaust in the German-occupied territories of the Soviet Union through three separate periods in which German political and military goals in the occupied territories dictated the treatment of the Jews."--BOOK JACKET.

The Nazis needed oil. The Arabs wanted the Jews and British out of Iraq. The Mufti of Jerusalem forged a far-ranging alliance with Hitler resulting in the June 1941 Farhud, a Nazi-style pogrom in Baghdad that set the stage for the devastation and expulsion of the Iraqi Jews and ultimately almost a million Jews across the Arab world. The Farhud was the beginning of what became a broad Nazi-Arab alliance in the Holocaust. --publisher.

In the final days of World War II, a band of Jewish partisans makes its way from Russia to Italy, moving toward the ultimate goal of Palestine. Based on a true story, the novel chronicles their adventures as they wage a personal war of revenge against the Nazis: blowing up trains, rescuing the last victims of concentration camps, scoring victories in the face of unspeakable devastation. Primo Levi captures the landscape and the people of Eastern Europe in vivid detail, depicting as well the terrible bleakness of war-ridden Europe. But finally, what he gives us is a tribute to the strength and ingenuity of the human spirit.

"The story of a ragtag unit known as the Arab Section, which was conceived in Palestine during World War II by British spies and Jewish militia leaders, and which eventually became the nucleus of the Mossad, Israel's vaunted intelligence agency."--

Not long ago, everyone knew that Judaism came before Christianity. More recently, scholars have begun to recognize that the historical picture is quite a bit more complicated than that. In the Jewish world of the first century, many sects competed for the name of the true Israel and the true interpreter of the Torah—the Talmud itself speaks of seventy—and the form of Judaism that was to be the seedbed of what eventually became the Christian Church was but one of these many sects. Scholars have come to realize that we can and need to speak of a twin birth of Christianity and Judaism, not a genealogy in which one is parent to the other. In this book, the author develops a revised understanding of the interactions between nascent Christianity and nascent Judaism in late antiquity, interpreting the two "new" religions as intensely and complexly intertwined throughout this period. Although the "officials" of the eventual winners in both communities—the Rabbis in Judaism and the orthodox leaders in Christianity—sought to deny it, until the end of late antiquity many people remained both Christians and Jews. This resulted, among other things, in much shared religious innovation that affected the respective orthodoxies as well. Dying for God aims to establish this model as a realistic one through close and comparative readings of contemporary Christian texts and Talmudic narratives that thematize the connections and differences between Christians and Jews as these emerged around the issue of martyrdom. The author argues that, in the end, the developing discourse of martyrology involved the circulation and exchange of cultural and religious innovations between the two communities as they moved toward sharper self-definition.