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Looking for some ways to fill your time? Here are a few suggestions.

Ruth Wisse, Martin Peretz professor of Yiddish Literature and Professor of Comparative Literature emerita at Harvard has a series of podcasts and webinars produced by the Tikvah Fund. While you may or may not agree with the organization’s politics, Professor Wisse’s lectures are well worth listening to.

Have you read the books on her list of books to read during the pandemic?

            Daniel Deronda by George Eliot

            Tevye the Dairyman by Sholem Aleichem

            In the Heart of the Seas by S.Y. Agnon

            The Wall by John Hersey

            My Quarrel with Hersh Rasseyner by Chaim Grade

The Jewish Book Council has three webinars about Latin America beginning with Pas­tra­mi Tacos and oth­er Latin Amer­i­can Jew­ish Foods with Pati Jinich and Ilan Stavans  on Friday October 16 at 12:30. 

On Monday, October 19 at 6:30, the Jewish Federations in New Jersey will hold a Senatorial Candidates Virtual Forum with candidates Cory Booker and Dr. Ric Mehta. Find information on the JFED website.

Be’chol Lashon was founded in 2000 as a response to a “Study of Racial & Ethnic Diversity of the American Jewish Community,” which found that 20% of America’s 6 million Jews or 1,200,000 are African American, Latino/Hispanic, Asian, mixed race, Sephardic, and Mizrahi.  The organization "gives voice to the racial, ethnic and cultural diversity of Jewish identity and experience.” The organization offers classes and experiences. Past events are archived. Visit here.

The Streicker Center of Temple Emanuel is presenting Amy-Jill Levine, Vanderbilt University Professor of New Testament and Jewish Studies and Mary Jane Werthan Professor of Jewish Studies at Vanderbilt (Divinity and A&S); she is also Affiliated Professor, Woolf Institute: Centre for Jewish-Christian Relations, Cambridge. Professor Levine is cogent and well organized. Her lectures on Agreeing to Disagree: how Jews and Christians read Scripture differently will fascinate and elucidate. Lectures are recorded so you can view them at any time. Free.

Books to read

            Wisse, Ruth  No Joke: making Jewish humor

                                    Jews and Power

                                    The Modern Jewish Canon: a journey through language and culture

            Stavans          The Seventh Heaven: travels through Jewish Latin America

                                    El Iluminado

                                    On Borrowed Words

Levine            The Bible with and without Jesus: how Jews and Christians read the same stories differently