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January 16, 2003

A Writer, A Rabbi and a Connection

Sandee Brawarsky January 16, 2003

Some synagogues want a rabbi who\’s a good sermonizer, others want a scholar; some want someone who relates well to their teenagers, others want a rabbi they can call by first name and play tennis or basketball with; some want an individual well known in the larger community, others want a rabbi who knows them well; some go for formality, others for lots of hugging. Some want it all.

In \”The New Rabbi: A Congregation Searches for Its Leader,\” investigative reporter Stephen Fried gets inside the congregational mindset the way no other writer has. He intensely follows the process of finding a replacement for Rabbi Gerald Wolpe, when he steps down after leading a Main Line Philadelphia synagogue, Har Zion, for 30 years. But the compelling book is as much about Judaism in America and the role of the rabbi, as it\’s about Har Zion. And it\’s as much about Fried\’s return to synagogue life as it\’s about Wolpe\’s departure.

Solomon’s Choice

Naomi Pfefferman January 16, 2003

The first images of Ed Solomon\’s thought-provoking film, \”Levity,\” came to the writer-director while tutoring in a maximum-security youth prison in Calabasas two decades ago. \”One inmate kept a photograph of the boy he had shot, and he kept touching it, fingering it,\” he said, speaking quietly and intensely in a Santa Monica cafe on a recent afternoon. \”He was struggling to understand that it was a human life he had taken, but he was only 17 and serving the first year of a life sentence. And that haunted me. I began wondering, \’What would he be like as an adult? Where would he go if he were let out of prison and what would he do with the photograph?\’\”\n\n

Memory Through Music

Naomi Pfefferman January 16, 2003

When Andrzej Szpilman was 12, he furtively rummaged through a chest high on a shelf of a closed wardrobe in his Warsaw home. Inside the closet, he found 10 copies of a book and, recognizing his father as the author, hid one in his third-story bedroom. \”I read it and received a shock,\” said Andrzej Szpilman, 46, a dentist and record producer who immigrated to Germany in 1983.\n\nThe book was \”Death of a City,\” his father, Wladyslaw\’s, grittily brutal, dispassionate 1946 memoir of hiding in and around the Warsaw Ghetto. Since Roman Polanski turned the book into a searing film, \”The Pianist\” — which won four National Society of Film Critics Awards and is up for two Golden Globes on Sunday — Szpilman has become one of the best-known Holocaust survivors in history.

Vouchers for Life

Norman Ciment January 16, 2003

\”Murderous explosion at Sbarros\”

\”Three dead in fatal drive-by shooting\”For me, like for most American Jews, reading the morning newspaper is an event that fills me with dread. Over the last two years I have conditioned myself to hope for the best. But, after reading and hearing about so many horrific events, deep down it seems that I have come to expect the worst.

Remembering King in an Age of Terrorism

Rabbi Marc Schneier January 16, 2003

This weekend we remember Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and the life he dedicated to the struggle for civil rights. As we still reel from the savage assault wrought upon our nation on Sept. 11, 2001, and as the people of Israel endure terror on an almost daily basis, the significance of King\’s life should be recognized anew. Under his leadership, the civil rights movement transcended political, theological and ideological differences. So, too, must our fight against terrorism.

The Vegetarian Holiday

Richard Schwartz January 16, 2003

Tu B\’Shevat is arguably the most vegetarian of Jewish holidays, because of its many connections to vegetarian themes and concepts.

7 Days In Arts

Jewish Journal January 16, 2003

7 days in the Arts, around Los Angeles.

Off the Market

J.D. Smith January 16, 2003

Hello again. I\’ve been away for a while. For those of you who actually follow this space (Hi Mom!), thanks for your kind words — I\’ve missed you, too.

Nothing personal, but I\’ve been busy, OK? For one thing, I started a new business and it takes a lot of my time. (Let me tell you, going straight ain\’t all it\’s cracked up to be. This \”work\” stuff is way overrated.)

Secondly, I\’ve been busy seeing my girlfriend, Alison, for one year. The other day, as part of my new job, I had to fill out a form at the bank, and, as I have done all my life, for \”marital status,\” I checked \”single\”; the other choices were \”married,\” \”divorced\” and \”widowed.\” I think they ought to have another box marked \”other,\” or \”off the market,\” for people like me.

Alison and I are not married, but, in some ways, we might as well be.

Jump!

Rabbi Ed Feinstein January 16, 2003

It is the Torah\’s most exciting, most cinematic story. The Israelites, newly freed from slavery, were camped at the shores of the sea when suddenly the sounds Pharaoh\’s approaching chariots filled the air. Realizing they were trapped, the ex-slaves cried bitterly to Moses, \”Were there too few graves in Egypt, that you brought us to die here?\” (Exodus 14:11) Moses prayed for deliverance, and was commanded: \”Tell the Israelites to go forward. And you lift up the rod and hold out your arm over the sea and split it.\” (Exodus 14:15-16)

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