Posted on: April 19th, 2012

Author Irving Langer provides his own look at wine-making as well as the nature of the storage barrels used to age wines for taste perfection. He intersperses the book with Jewish historical facts and figures, a few jokes and photographs, and advice on how to pair wines with specific foods.

Posted on: April 18th, 2012

Unlike formulaic biographies from popular publishing houses in the Orthodox Jewish world, Beyond Politics is not predictable. The vignettes of individual men and women who trekked through Ethiopia and Sudan, flew in from Austria, India, and Algeria, or were born on Israeli soil are gritty, adventurous, and heartwarming.

Posted on: April 15th, 2012

The OU Press has brought out two very significant books on the thought of the Rav, Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik.

Posted on: April 6th, 2012

The book Here Comes Shabbos! is about a family baking, cooking, polishing silver, shining shoes, shopping and cleaning for Shabbos. The activities begin on Friday morning and only conclude shortly before lighting the Shabbos candles. During that time span, it covers everything you need to do in order to get ready for Shabbos.

Posted on: April 6th, 2012

This book is very riveting. It is a comprehensive biography of the Mirrer Rosh Yeshivah, Rabbi Nosson Tzvi Finkel, zt’l. It starts out telling us about the Mirrer Yeshiva escaping to Shanghai from Lithuania during World War II because of the invading Germans. It then describes Rabbi Finkel’s family, and then Rabbi Finkel himself. It is important for young adults to see our gedolim as role models, and Rabbi Teller’s biography provides just that. Also, Rabbi Finkel is a relatable role model, because he grew up as a typical American Jewish kid.

Posted on: March 29th, 2012

Bird’s Head Haggadah Revealed The Medieval Haggadah: Art, Narrative & Religious Imagination By Marc Michael Epstein, Yale University Press, New Haven and London 2011

Posted on: March 29th, 2012

Title: When General Grant Expelled the Jews Author: Jonathan Sarna Publisher: Schocken

Posted on: March 29th, 2012

Title: The Koren Ethiopian Haggada Journey to Freedom: Celebrating Ethiopian Jewish History, Traditions & Customs Editor: Rabbi Menachem Waldman Publisher: Koren Publishing

Posted on: March 20th, 2012

The Hebrew-English haggada provides a wealth of photographic evidence of the lives led by Ethiopian Jews. The pottery, the unembellished homes, school, and synagogues, the gaunt Jews in modest clothing and head coverings portray dedication to Torah values despite harsh political and topographical conditions.

Posted on: February 29th, 2012

Rabbi Norman Lamm wrote and preserved the hundreds of eloquent and inspiring sermons he had delivered as a pulpit rabbi in Manhattan for 25 years prior to becoming president of Yeshiva University,

Posted on: February 15th, 2012

Anyone interested in meticulously researched writings important to the future of Am Yisrael should add 190-page hardcover Torah Tapestries: Shemos to public and private libraries.

Posted on: February 2nd, 2012

Ashira Greenberg is a pretty, talented and articulate young lady who, at the tender of age of seventeen, has just published a book.

Posted on: January 12th, 2012

When Yaakov Avinu knew that he was about to move his family down to Mitzraim, his first priority was to establish a yeshiva. Ever since then, educating our young has continued to be a lifelong challenge and commitment for every Jew.

Posted on: January 11th, 2012

Readers of Clayton’s short stories know that he is not only a master craftsman, but that his stories are inquires into the purpose of life; he is a moral philosopher.

Posted on: November 17th, 2011

There are three kinds of travelers: there are tourists, there are businesspeople, and then there are historians like Ben G. Frank. The last kind doesn’t simply go from here to there. They try to relive history and find the real meaning behind what they experience.

Posted on: October 5th, 2011

God's Favorite Prayers, by Tzvee Zahavy, makes for fascinating reading. It is an intelligent, sometimes amusing, and always highly readable essay addressed first and foremost to those who know "everything" - those so familiar with the prayers that they don't really need a siddur to follow the service.

Posted on: September 21st, 2011

In recent years, the attitude dubbed "orthopraxy", the notion that holds that fulfillments of halakha is sufficient on its own terms without serving, or being subordinate to, any higher purpose , has become fashionable in some circles. Most famously advocated by the late distinguished Israeli scientist Yeshayahu Leibowitz, Orthopraxy - which has become accepted practically if not avowedly by many Orthodox Jews, both in the US and Israel - has found a number of other proponents as well, a disproportionate number of whom are among the intellectual elite.

Posted on: September 7th, 2011

For today's Jew seeking to grow spiritually, there's mussar, and then there is modern psychology. Armed with 20th century research on how behaviors develop and how humans create internal change, today's Jewish do-gooder has an arsenal of tools beyond Pirkei Avos and the mussar masters to work on problems like, say, gossiping or overeating.

Posted on: August 17th, 2011

Every medical school in the world should have this book on the syllabus: once during first-year medical studies and again at residency. Pages 63-67 pretty much sum up the brutality of a given medical staff member's offhand remarks and intentional insensitivity in the presence of patients. They crush the spirits of otherwise valiant people struggling to live. Med students who assume superiority to their needy patients need not have airs. They're not G-d and not about to become His rival, either. Medical interventions have limits. And condescension kills people as much as disease can.

Posted on: August 10th, 2011

The proof will be in your hands: some self-published books are remarkably wonderful. Lisa Aiken's The Family Guide to Touring Israel is a 382-page paperback with essentials even native Israelis need to know.