Rabbi Jonathan Sacks is the former chief rabbi of the British Commonwealth and the author of over two dozen works. His latest is “Not in God’s Name: Confronting Religious Violence.”
What books are currently on your nightstand?
My teacher Rabbi Nachum Rabinovitch’s Mesillot Bilvavam (“In Whose Hearts Are the Paths”) – his wonderful recent book on Judaism, the individual, and society; Moses Maimonides and his Practice of Medicine, edited by Kenneth Collins, Samuel Kottek, and Fred Rosner – a reminder of how the greatest Jewish mind of the Middle Ages was also engaged with the science and technology of his age; The Rise of the Robots by Martin Ford; Reclaiming Conversation by Sherry Turkle; The Upside of Stress by Kelly McGonigal; Bargaining with the Devil: When to Negotiate, When to Fight by Robert Mnookin; Wiser by Cass Sunstein and Reid Hastie; and Black Box Thinking by Matthew Syed.
Truth is, I need a strong nightstand. I’m not very good at sleeping.
What’s the best book on Judaism you’ve ever read?
I’ve been greatly influenced by the writings, of among others, Rav Kook, R. Samson Raphael Hirsch, and R. Soloveitchik, but as a young man beginning my journey I was inspired by the rhapsodic prose – always on the verge of poetry – of R. Abraham Joshua Heschel. I loved his God in Search of Man.
What kind of reader were you as a child? Your favorite books and authors?
I wasn’t a very good reader, or an interesting one. I read the usual kinds of children’s books. It took me a long time to realize what magic there is in words. I came to reading and writing relatively late. The first book that really made me sit up and listen to the music of language was Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar.
If you had to name one book that made you who you are today, what would it be?
I’ve spent pretty much the whole of my adult life in dialogue with Tanach. There is nothing in history remotely like the love affair between the Jewish people and the Book of Books. For a thousand years they wrote the library we call Tanach – essentially a series of commentaries to the Mosaic books. They spent the next thousand years writing commentaries to the commentaries: midrash, halachah and aggadah. They then spent the next thousand years writing commentaries to the commentaries to the commentaries.
The Jewish people is a community of readers held together by a text. It made us what we are, and to me, being a Jew means being in conversation with the Divine word, in the company of all those others who are in conversation with it.
If you could require Jewish leaders to read one book, what would it be?
The book that inspired and challenged me was Ron Heifetz and Marty Linsky’s Leadership on the Line, one of the most profound of all leadership books. I wrote a book called Future Tense, specifically for Jewish leaders, setting out what I see as the main challenges confronting the Jewish people in the twenty-first century. More recently, I wrote one called Lessons in Leadership, on how the Torah gives us insight into what it is to lead. But the truth is, I would not advise Jewish leaders to read one book. I would advise them to read many books and keep reading. Reading is to the mind what exercise is to the body, and it needs to be done daily.
Hidden gems: Which Jewish book or author should be widely known but isn’t?
Just a few months ago a Jewish thinker who ought to be better known died. His name was Michael Wyschogrod, and his book, The Body of Faith, is one of the greatest works of Jewish theology in my lifetime. It’s challenging, controversial, profound at many different levels – and sadly it’s very little known.
Years ago, many rabbis argued that novels were a waste of time and should be avoided. Do you agree? Do you read novels?
Not as many as I should, but for me the novels of Jane Austen, Dickens, George Eliot, and Tolstoy were deeply life-enhancing. I have not yet got round to Dostoevsky, partly because he did not like Jews very much, and I find that troubling in a great writer.
As an author, do you force yourself to write a certain number of words every day or do you wait for inspiration to call?
No serious writer waits for inspiration to call. I spent 20 years – between the age of 20 and 40 – trying to write my first book and failing. Then I read George Bernard Shaw’s preface to Plays Unpleasant, where he says that if you are going to write a book, do it by the time you are 40 or else give up. That was the push I needed. At 40 I wrote my first book, and I’ve written one a year ever since.
What books might people be surprised to find on your bookshelves?
Gerald Durrell, My Family and Other Animals – the most joyous, sun-filled book I know.
What book hasn’t been written that you’d like to read?
The most important is one on Torah min ha’shamayim, “Torah from heaven,” an absolutely fundamental Jewish belief on which no great book has been written. I’ve read almost everything written on the subject, including a spate of books in the last few years, and none, sadly, says what needs to be said.
What books are you embarrassed not to have read yet?
R. Moshe Hayyim Luzzatto, Mesillat Yesharim, “The Path of the Upright.” It’s one of the classics of Jewish ethics, but my journey took a different path.
What do you plan to read next?
I’m waiting for volume 2 of Simon Schama’s The Story of the Jews. Judging by the television series, it will be a great work.