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Sept. 5, 2008

Rabbi Abraham J. Twerski: What does 'doing the right thing' entail?

Caroline B. Glick: The master strategist

Sept. 4, 2008

Ron Kampeas: Biden, Palin take lead in clash on Mideast issues

Bruce Dancis: With humor as their weapon, the Three Stooges took on Hitler

Sept. 3, 2008

Rabbi S. Binyomin Ginsberg: Productive school years don't just happen

The Kosher Gourmet by Linda Gassenheimer: Quick lamb stew serves up flavors of India

Sept. 2, 2008

The Jewish Ethicist by Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir: Costly Advice

Caroline B. Glick: Calling Israel's bluff

JWisdom: Wandering in Wonder by Rabbi Mordechai Becher

August 29, 2008

Rabbi Berel Wein: 20/20 sightlessness

Caroline B. Glick: When history is not repeated

JWisdom: Blessed or Cursed: It's Really Up to You by Rabbi Sroy Levitansky

August 28, 2008

Steve Lipman: A Comeback for the 'Jewish Jordan'

Jeffrey Weiss: Researcher reports 'intriguing' diabetes breakthrough

August 27, 2008

Rabbi Zecharya Greenwald: Removing the perfectionist's mask

The Kosher Gourmet by Emily Nunn: Summer harvest linguine

JWisdom:: The Missing Link in Spiritual Life by Rabbi David Aaron

August 26, 2008

Yaffa Ganz: Grandma gets lessons in staying cool

Frank J. Gaffney, Jr.: The Dems' 'soft' jihadist

JWisdom:: Today: Holocaust in the Perspective of Faith by Rabbi Nosson Scherman: Plague of indifference

August 25, 2008

The Jewish Ethicist by Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir: Q: A friend is bearing a silly grudge from a supposed wrong. What recourse do I have?

Daniel Pipes: Barack Obama through Muslim Eyes

JWisdom:: The knowledge you need to overcome your insecurities by Malka Schulman

August 22, 2008

Rabbi Berel Wein: Life's essential ingredient

Caroline B. Glick: Dominos anyone?

JWisdom:: Actually, Do Sweat the Small Stuff! by Rabbi Sroy Levitansky

August 21, 2008

Today in Biblical History by Rabbi Yonason Goldson: Popularization of Kabbalah: 20 Menachem-Av 1558 CE

Jonathan Rosenblum: Lessons from the Beyond

JWisdom: : The Olympian within is rooting for you -- yes, you! –- to go for the gold

August 20, 2008

Jonathan Tobin: Misleading Platform Platitudes

The Kosher Gourmet by Linda Gassenheimer: Chicken Salad with Asian Dressing

JWisdom: The Holocaust in the Perspective of Faith: America's Defense of the Jews --- Until WWII by Rabbi Nosson Scherman

August 19, 2008

Dennis Prager: If the Almighty doesn't exist

Frank J. Gaffney, Jr.: Obama's Islamist problem has nothing to do with his upbringing

JWisdom: Think your life is messed up? by Rabbi David Aaron

August 18, 2008

The Jewish Ethicist by Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir: Business with Friends

Diana West: Roars About Russia, Bare Whispers About Islam

JWisdom: Relationship agony: The real cause by Malka Schulman

August 15, 2008

Rabbi Abraham J. Twerski: To love the Divine

Caroline B. Glick: Georgia, Israel, and the nature of man

JWisdom: The Truly Righteous Don't Demand Entitlements by Rabbi Sroy Levitansky

August 14, 2008

Rabbi Yonason Goldson: Confessions of broken spirit

Libby Lazewnik: The Numbers Game

JWisdom: Six Questions You'll Be Asked in Heaven? - Uh - Let's Just Take One for Now! by Gavriel Aryeh Sanders

August 13, 2008

Jonathan Tobin: Georgia should be on their minds

The Kosher Gourmet by Linda Gassenheimer: Go Greek: Pair flavorful lamb kebabs with a hearty salad

JWisdom: Human hybrids aren't science fiction by Rabbi David Aaron

August 12, 2008

Rabbi Avi Shafran: Bless us

Daniel Pipes: The West's Islamist Infiltrators

JWisdom: From Sadness to Gladness: The Route from Tisha b'Av to Rosh Hashana by Rabbi Mordechai Becher

August 11, 2008

The Jewish Ethicist by Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir: A Jewish view on fair pricing

Caroline B. Glick: Ignoring failure in Gaza

JWisdom: 'Communication' Is Not The Answer! by Malka Schulman

August 7, 2008

Rabbi David Gutterman: A Continuing Story With a Sustaining Goal

Rabbi Berel Wein: Mourning and morning

JWisdom: Yes, we are still in exile by Rabbi Sroy Levitansky

August 6, 2008

David Ashenfelter: Government made military engineer's life a living hell because of his faith, Defense Department report documents

Jonathan Tobin: Speak the Truth; Defeat the Lies

JWisdom: Jewish Spirituality: Fusion or Confusion? by Rabbi David Aaron

August 5, 2008

Chris Leppek: Church/state wall beginning to crumble?

Paul Greenberg: Exit Olmert (no encore, please)

JWisdom: Serenity: Make the commitment by Rabbi Zelig Pliskin (Read by Gavriel Sanders)

August 4, 2008

The Jewish Ethicist by Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir: Am I taking advantage of another's psychological quirk?

Andrew Silow-Carroll: A black and a Jew walk into the White House…

JWisdom: The Holocaust in the Perspective of Faith: Edward R. Morrow visits the ‘living dead’ by Rabbi Nosson Scherman

March 22, 2007

J-Rhythms with Avraham Rosenblum: JWR's cutting-edge music program showcasing performers -- singers, song writers, musicians, and bands -- who learn and live the Torah lifestyle (OUR NEWEST IGODCAST !)

Oct. 29, 2003
Mortimer B. Zuckerman: Graffiti On History's Walls (MUST-READ!)

Jewish World Review Oct. 29, 2003 / 3 Tishrei, 5764

We can't live fully without books

By Bill Tammeus


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http://www.jewishworldreview.com | WASHINGTON — When author Pat Conroy addressed the opening session of the recent National Book Festival here, he offered two reasons for the central role books play in creating a civilized society.

The first has to do with the way books can be a vehicle for the transmission of love. When he was a boy, Conroy said, his mother read books to him every night. Now when he writes, "it is still my mother's voice that I hear." He has carried that expression of his mother's love with him for decades.

The second has to do with the way books can help transmit values. Conroy told the story of a woman who read "The Diary of Anne Frank" to her children. When she finished the book, she told her kids this: "I want to raise a family that will hide Jews." When a Jewish family moved in next door to that family, one of the children went over and announced to the new neighbors: "I will hide you."

From my earliest childhood, I have loved books. But I've never given much systematic thought to why they are so crucial to the kind of world most of us want to live in - one that values each human being, that frees people to reach their potential, that cares for the most vulnerable.

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The National Book Festival and my concurrent visit to the special Anne Frank exhibition at the Holocaust Museum here provided the occasion to think about the role books play in our lives.

Even in this time of technological change - when packets of zipped-up information blaze around the planet at the speed of light and land on our computer screens - nothing has come close to replacing books. They are culture's building blocks, so essential to the shape of our world that it is nearly impossible to imagine how different and impoverished life would be without them.

Think just of Conroy's first point about books as a means of love.

When I sit now with my 16-month-old granddaughter and read books to her, their content is of only secondary importance. Oh, yes, she's learning that "A" is for apple and that Olivia the pig has four aunts. But she's learning something much more important - that someone besides her parents loves her and wants to spend time with her.

Each time we read, she's discovering a little more about who she is but also who her grandfather is and why I love to read to her. She will understand the concept of love and family more quickly because we spend time together with books.

Conroy's other point about books as transmitters of values is more complicated but no less crucial. The reason it's a less-simple concept is that ideas can be both constructive and destructive. Imagine the values that might be transmitted, for instance, if the books adults read to children were mostly propaganda supporting the moronic ideas of white supremacy.

Some books contain ideas that, if adopted and implemented, will lead to disaster. So because books can transmit both good and evil notions, they must be understood as morally neutral carriers of ideas. They are fire, which can either destroy or give light. How we use them is up to us.

Conroy didn't say this, but books also are important agents of democratic ideals. It is no accident that when tyrants want to control people, they ban or burn books. Books provide the means for the nearly the whole population - not just the elite - to be educated and empowered to think critically. A large middle class was impossible before Johannes Gutenberg invented moveable type.

It was, of course, theologically important that Gutenberg's work made the Bible available to the masses. That contributed to the Reformation. But it was perhaps more important for the creation of our modern (or now post-modern) world that Gutenberg's work allowed the whole garden of human ideas to be harvested by those masses.

When first lady Laura Bush opened the National Book Festival, she said a "good book is like an unreachable itch. You just can't leave it alone."

However inelegant her way of putting it, that's true. But her focus in the remark was too narrow. Books indeed can absorb us and take us away. But they are far more than items of personal escape.

When I think of my own book, a collection of columns called "A Gift of Meaning," I like to imagine that in a small way, I have joined my voice with the huge chorus of voices that books let us hear. I tell myself immodestly I am helping to undergird civilization. That's the job of all writers. Our job as readers is to discern gold from fool's gold and to celebrate our fortune to live when books are so widely available.

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© 2003, All rights reserved Reprinted by permission, The Kansas City Star