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FEBRUARY 2022 PROGRAMS
CSP
The Walnut Street Synagogue is pleased to be a partner congregation of the Orange County Jewish Community Scholar Program!
Leonard Cohen’s Mystical Midrash
Sunday, February 27, 7:00 pm EST
(online in partnership with the Orange County Jewish Community Scholar Program)
In this multimedia program including music, images, video, and close textual comparisons, Seth Rogovoy explores the deep and profound influence of the Jewish background and scriptural roots of the late Leonard Cohen’s life and work. With reference to Cohen’s lyrics, poetry, and interviews, we will see how the legendary rock poet’s familiarity with Torah, Talmud, and Kabbalah infused his creative output with a deep and abiding spirituality. Participants will be encouraged to reflect on and discuss how Cohen can best be seen and appreciated as a Jewish artist.
Seth Rogovoy is a writer, radio commentator, lecturer, and concert and record producer. Termed “American Jewry’s greatest Dylan scholar” by Religion News Service, Seth is the author of Bob Dylan: Prophet Mystic Poet (Scribner, 2009) a full-length analysis of Bob Dylan’s life and work, and The Essential Klezmer: A Music Lover’s Guide to Jewish Roots and Soul Music (Algonquin Books, 2000), the all-time bestselling guide to klezmer music, and which has been translated into Chinese and Korean. For over a quarter century, Seth’s work has appeared in the English-language national Jewish newsweekly, The Forward, to which Seth is a contributing editor. Seth is the recipient of a 2016 Simon Rockower Award from the American Jewish Press Association for excellence in arts and criticism, for his portrait of musician Leonard Cohen published in Hadassah Magazine. Seth is editor and publisher of The Rogovoy Report , an online magazine of cultural and critical news and observations also available in the form of a weekly e-newsletter. Seth also does cultural, editorial, and marketing consulting. He is the programming consultant for the Yiddish Book Center in Amherst, Mass., where he curates the center’s annual YIDSTOCK: Festival of New Yiddish Music, which debuted in summer 2012, and which continues under his artistic direction.
God is Not a Religious Idea: Juxtaposing the American Declaration of Independence and the Ten Commandments
Thursday, February 24, 3:30 pm EST
(online in partnership with the Orange County Jewish Community Scholar Program)
Separation of Church and State is a quintessential principle of American political philosophy. Significantly, this principle may be predicated upon a theological imperative that importantly distinguishes between Church (i.e., religion) and the concept of God. Therefore, it is vital to explore the fundamental forces that gave voice to the American Declaration of Independence, retrace certain crucial theological propositions underlying its conception, and illuminate some striking conceptual similarities between that document and another definitive constitution: the Ten Commandments.
Dr. Zohar Raviv is a recognized Jewish thought-leader and educator who currently serves as the International Vice President of Educational Strategy for Taglit-Birthright Israel. Raviv’s professional experience spans Israel, North America, South America, Europe, South Africa and Australia. He holds a B.A in Land of Israel Studies from Bar-Ilan University, a Joint M.A in Judaic Studies and Jewish Education from Brandeis University, as well as an M.A in Near Eastern Studies and a Ph.D. in Jewish Thought — both from the University of Michigan (Ann Arbor). Raviv plays a central role in shaping Birthright Israel’s educational philosophy, language and pedagogy, and is a leading voice in some of the global paradigm shifts concerning contemporary Jewish identity, Israel-world Jewry relations and the overall mandate of Jewish education in the 21st century. Raviv was the recipient of the 2015 Bernard Reisman Award for Professional Excellence from the Hornstein Jewish Professional Leadership Program at Brandeis University, where he was recognized as “One of the most influential Jewish educators in the world.”
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The Missing Half of the Jewish Bookshelf: Israeli Women Writing Midrash
Wednesday, February 23, 1:00 pm EST
(online in partnership with the Orange County Jewish Community Scholar Program)
Join us to hear Tamar Biala share her story and teach two midrashim. Rabbi Avi Killip will moderate this session. Tamar Biala co-edited the first ever volume of midrash written by Israeli women. This collection, titled Dirshuni, has already taken a place on the Jewish bookshelf and is being cited, taught and argued over in yeshivot, high schools, synagogues, the press alternative batei midrash, universities and even Army educational programs. The Midrashim deal head on with issues of social justice and the treatment of women by Jewish law and rabbinic authority, and offer deep and wide-ranging discussions of Biblical personalities, women’s religious roles, sexuality and fertility, prayer, the meaning of Torah study, and more.
Tamar Biala is engaged with Jewish feminism as a writer and lecturer. She received her BA in Jewish studies and in literature at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, and her MA in Women’s Studies and Jewish Studies at the Schechter Institute. Ms. Biala has taught at IASA, Jerusalem’s high school for gifted students, at the Hartman Institute’s teacher training program, in pluralistic batei midrash in Israel and for the Israel Defense Forces. She also served for several years on the board of Kolech, the Religious Women’s Forum, under whose auspices she developed high school curricula for the empowerment of young women in which she trained teachers, and curricula for sex and family education for both young men and young women. She is the co-editor of Dirshuni: Midrashei Nashim (Yediot Acharonot and the Jewish Agency for Israel, 2009), the first-ever collection of Midrashim written by contemporary Israeli women. Ms. Biala also edited the second volume of Dirshuni, which contains dozens of new Midrashim, written by a wide and changing range of authors.
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Jewish Life in Buenos Aires, “Paris of the South”
Tuesday, February 22, 3:30 pm EST
(online in partnership with the Orange County Jewish Community Scholar Program)
Join us for a conversation between Rabbi Elie Spitz and Rabbi Ale Avruj about the joys and challenges of living a Jewish life in the “Paris of the South”. Buenos Aires is one of Latin America’s most important ports and most populous cities, as well as the national center of commerce, industry, politics, culture, and technology. According to tradition, Spanish colonizer Pedro de Mendoza established the first settlement there, which he named Nuestra Señora Santa María del Buen Aire (“Our Lady St. Mary of the Good Air”). Buenos Aires locals are referred to as porteños (“people of the port”) because so many of the city’s inhabitants historically arrived by boat from Europe. The history of the Jews in Argentina goes back to the early sixteenth century, following the Jewish expulsion from Spain. Sephardi Jews fleeing persecution immigrated with explorers and colonists to settle in what is now Argentina. In addition, many of the Portuguese traders in the Viceroyalty of the Río de la Plata were Jewish. An organized Jewish community, however, did not develop until after Argentina gained independence from Spain in 1816. By mid-century, Jews from France and other parts of Western Europe, fleeing the social and economic disruptions of revolutions, began to settle in Argentina. Reflecting the composition of the later immigration waves, the current Jewish population is 80% Ashkenazi; while Sephardi and Mizrahi are a minority. Argentina has the largest Jewish population of any country in Latin America and the third-largest in the Americas (after that of the United States and Canada), although numerous Jews left during the 1970s and 1980s to escape the repression of the military junta, emigrating to Israel, West Europe (especially Spain), and North America. Today, approximately 180,500 Jews live in Argentina, down from 310,000 in the early 1960s. Most of Argentina’s Jews live in Buenos Aires, Córdoba and Rosario.
Rabbi Alejandro Avruj is currently Rabbi of the Amijai Community, one of the largest Jewish congregations in Buenos Aires. He graduated from the Latin American Rabbinic Seminary in 2002 and earned a Masters Degree in Rabbinic Literature and Jewish Education at the Schechter Institute of Jewish Studies. Rabbi Avruj is the author of Sidur “Et Bazman – A Time within Time” in 2012, whose first edition was presented by Cardinal Jorge Bergoglio (Pope Francis). In 2014, Rabbi Avruj was honored by B´nai Brith Argentina, together with the Catholic priest, Jose Maria “Pepe” di Paola, with a Human Rights Award for his social work in shanty towns. Rabbi Avruj and Father “Pepe” together manage the Shalom charity project, which brings daily meals to hungry children in Buenos Aires. On Rabbi Avruj’s relationship with Pop Francis: “I met Jorge Bergoglio, now Pope Francis, at a shantytown in Buenos Aires. Bergoglio was the boss of my teammate Pepe and he came with us to bring food and recreational activities to the kids.” The future pope participated in a 2012 Kristallnacht commemoration ceremony with Rabbi Avruj, who later invited him to help light the Hanukkah candles at the synagogue where he served. Rabbi Avruj attended Pope Francis’ papal inauguration at the Vatican.
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Secrets of the Torah Revealed: Leviticus/VaYikrah
Monday, February 21, 2:00 pm EST
(online in partnership with the Orange County Jewish Community Scholar Program)
Sacrifices: blood and burning fat, bulls, sheep lambs. Strange diseases, bizarre and seemingly cruel and vengeful ceremonies. The world of Israelite ritual in the Book of Leviticus seems so distant from our own contemporary Judaism as to be an entirely different religion. But was it really? What was inherent within the universe of the Tabernacle, the Priests, and sacrificial religion that remains at the core of everything Jews do and are today.
Winner of the 2015 Jewish Book Award in Visual Arts for Skies of Parchment, Seas of Ink: Jewish Illuminated Manuscripts, Marc Michael Epstein is the product of a mixed marriage between the scions of Slonimer and Lubavitcher Hassidim and Romanian socialists, and grew up, rather confused, but happy, in Brooklyn, New York. He is currently Professor of Religion at Vassar College, where he has been teaching since 1992, and was the first Director of Jewish Studies. He is a graduate of Oberlin College, received the PhD at Yale University, and did much of his graduate research at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. He has written numerous articles and three books on various topics in visual and material culture produced by, for, and about Jews. His book, The Medieval Haggadah: Art, Narrative, and Religious Imagination (Yale, 2011) was selected by the London Times Literary Supplement as one of the best books of 2011. During the 1980s, Epstein was Director of the Hebrew Books and Manuscripts division of Sotheby’s Judaica department. He continues to serve as consultant to various libraries, auction houses, museums and private collectors throughout the world, among them, the Herbert C. and Eileen Bernard Museum at Temple Emanu-El in New York City, for which he curated the inaugural exhibition, and the Fowler Museum at UCLA. He is the Director of Beit Venezia, the home for International Jewish Studies in Venice, Italy.
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The Hidden Roots of American Synagogue Melodies
Sunday, February 20, 3:00 pm EST
(online in partnership with the Orange County Jewish Community Scholar Program)
This lecture may surprise you! We will examine the music sung in modern American synagogues, and attempt to determine where this music came from. Many of the melodies that we assume are traditional “from Sinai” are not older than a century or so, while others hark all the way back to the ancient Near East. We will examine non-Jewish sources as well as Jewish sources from America, Germany, Austria, England and Russia. Illustrated with slides and recordings.
Dr. Joshua R. Jacobson holds a Bachelors degree in Music from Harvard College, a Masters in Choral Conducting from the New England Conservatory, a Doctor of Musical Arts from the University of Cincinnati, and a Doctor of Humane Letters honoris causa from Hebrew College. Before retiring in 2018, Dr. Jacobson served 45 years as Professor of Music and Director of Choral Activities at Northeastern University, including nine years as Music Department Chairman and six years as the Bernard Stotsky Professor of Jewish Cultural Studies. He is also Visiting Professor and Senior Consultant in the School of Jewish Music at Hebrew College. He is also the founder and director of the Zamir Chorale of Boston, a world-renowned ensemble, specializing in Hebrew music. In 1989 he spent four weeks in Yugoslavia as a Distinguished Professor under the auspices of the Fulbright program. In 1994 Hebrew College awarded him the Benjamin Shevach Award for Distinguished Achievement in Jewish Educational Leadership, in 2004 the Cantors Assembly presented him with its prestigious “Kavod Award,” in 2016 Choral Arts New England presented him the Alfred Nash Patterson Lifetime Achievement Award, and in 2018 Chorus America selected him for its Distinguished Service Award.
Jewish Dublin: A Virtual Travel Adventure
Thursday, February 17, 3:30 pm EST
(online in partnership with the Orange County Jewish Community Scholar Program)
Join us as we learn about the Jewish heritage and history of Dublin, Ireland with local guide Peter White. Our virtual adventure, through the eyes of Peter’s grandfather Samuel, takes us through the soul of the city to the heart of ‘Little Jerusalem’ – an area in which thousands of Jews made their home after fleeing from the pogroms of Russia (an in our guide’s case, Lithuania). Born and bred in Dublin, Peter has been a guide for over 10 years country wide but has a particular love of sharing the rich Jewish heritage of Dublin.
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The House is in the Book
Tuesday, February 15, 1:00 pm EST
(online in partnership with the Orange County Jewish Community Scholar Program)
Books are thresholds to unfamiliar worlds and can serve as bridges connecting diverse communities. Even before the age of printing, codices and books were crucial means of communication, and books persist as vehicles for exchanging information, ideas, stories, and emotions across time and space. They serve as platforms for collaboration between authors and readers, writers and their translators, and the creators of texts and images. During the pandemic, when many people were deprived of physical contact, ideas of the book as an intimate and haptic object with the power to open-up vast universes, encompassing both proximity and distance, have resonated in new ways. Join us as artist Andi Arnovitz presents a new collaborative book that she worked on with Lynne Avadenka (USA), and Mirta Kupferminc (Argentina) and that was featured in the most recent Jerusalem Biennale.
Andi LaVine Arnovitz was born in 1959 in Kansas City, Missouri. She graduated with a BFA from Washington University in St. Louis. For many years, Andi worked in advertising as an art director, creating print campaigns and television commercials. She attributes the conceptual ideas behind many of her pieces to this work experience. Andi considers herself a printmaker, a paper-manipulator, a bookmaker and an assemblage artist. Her primary love is working with paper, printing on it, etching with it, drawing, sewing, tearing and repairing. Her pieces often reflect her love of pattern, surface, and thread she has had since she was child wandering through her father’s fabric store in Kansas City. In 1999 Andi and her family moved to Jerusalem, Israel. A two year sabbatical has become a permanent stay and much of her work is informed by the multitudinous differences of living in the Middle East. Of great concern to her are primary issues surrounding the differences between Jews and Arabs, between religious and non-religious, between Jewish law and contemporary society, between men and women, between young and old. Over and over these politics and tensions are explored, examined and dissected in her works. Andi has had numerous solo shows in Jerusalem, and recently one at Brandeis University, and at Yeshiva University Museum in NYC. Her work has been included in many group shows all over the world: in France, Spain, England, Poland, Canada, Israel, the United States, Lithuania, and Finland.
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A Diaspora within a Diaspora: Sephardic Jews in America
Sunday, February 13, 1:00 pm EST
(online in partnership with the Orange County Jewish Community Scholar Program)
As many as fifty thousand Jews from the lands of the former Ottoman Empire came to the United States in the decades surrounding World War I. They constituted a tiny minority within the broader Jewish American community. How did the newly arriving Sephardic Jews adapt to their new country of residence? What became of their language, culture, religious traditions, and connections to their places of birth? How was their experience shaped by interactions with their new neighbors, including Yiddish-speaking Jews? This lecture will explore the trajectories of Sephardic Jews from the Mediterranean world to America during the twentieth century.
Dr. Devin E. Naar is the Isaac Alhadeff Professor in Sephardic Studies, Associate Professor of History, and faculty at the Stroum Center for Jewish Studies in the Jackson School of International Studies at the University of Washington. Born and raised in New Jersey, Dr. Naar graduated summa cum laude from Washington University in St. Louis and received his Ph.D. in History at Stanford University. He has also served as a Fulbright fellow to Greece. His first book, Jewish Salonica: Between the Ottoman Empire and Modern Greece, was published by Stanford University Press in 2016. The book won the 2016 National Jewish Book Award in the category of Research Based on Archival Material and was named a finalist in Sephardic Culture. It also won the 2017 Edmund Keeley Prize for best book in Modern Greek Studies awarded by the Modern Greek Studies Association.
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Contemporary Israeli Literature: Can You Avoid Politics?
Thursday, February 10, 3:30 pm EST
(online in partnership with the Orange County Jewish Community Scholar Program)
Join us as we examine contemporary Israeli fiction and the role of politics within it. Does life in such a politically-charged environment influence the kind of fiction and other art forms created within it? What is the role of authors in such an environment? Are they expected to deal with it, have an obligation to do so? Or perhaps a burden, a monkey on their back that they are not allowed to escape from? Through a series of examples and case studies, from his own and his peers’ work and experience, Assaf Gavron shows how contemporary Israeli writers deal with these and other questions, both in their fiction and beyond it.
Assaf Gavron was born in 1968, and published six novels (Ice, Moving, Almost Dead, Hydromania, The Hilltop and Eighteen Lashes), a collection of short stories (Sex in the cemetery), and a non-fiction collection of Jerusalem falafel-joint reviews (Eating Standing Up). His fiction has been translated into 12 languages. His latest English translation, The Hilltop, was published in 2014 by Scribner. Among the awards he won are the Israeli Prime Minister’s Creative Award for Authors, the Israeli Bernstein Prize for The Hilltop, the DAAD artists-in-Berlin fellowship in Germany, the Buch Fur Die Stadt award in Germany for CrocAttack and the Prix Courrier International award in France for the same novel. His fiction was adapted for the stage in Habima – Israel’s national theatre, and five of his novels were optioned for film or TV by Israeli and international film producers. He teaches creative writing in universities in the US. and in Israel. He is the singer and main songwriter of cult pop group The Foot and Mouth. The group released five albums, six years apart from each other. The next album will be out in 2019. Son of English immigrants, he grew up in a small village near Jerusalem, and currently lives in Tel Aviv, Israel. He lived in the US, UK, Canada and Germany.
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Religion, Mysticism and Gender: Painting with Esther Schneider
Tuesday, February 8, 1:00 pm EST
(online in partnership with the Orange County Jewish Community Scholar Program)
In this session we’ll explore the works of painter and installation artist Esther Schneider. Her unique life story and path of studies in the art world has conjured a fascinating body of works that call for a journey through local Israeli culture, mythology, religious imagery, womanhood and more. The first and main part of the session will be led by Shirel Horovitz taking us through Schneider’s works. Then, we’ll transition into a conversation with the artist herself and end with time for Q&A.
Esther Schneider (Born 1978 in USSR, lives and works in Tel Aviv) earned her B.Des and her MFA at the Bezalel Academy of Arts and Design. Schneider works mainly in painting and installation. Her work is inspired by a multiplicity of cultural arenas, including Jewish mysticism, Persian miniatures, and Russian modernism. Schneider is the recipient of the Ministry of Culture Award in Visual Arts (2019), the Ilana -Bezalel Prize for Excellence in the Arts (2016), the Givon Prize (2012), and the Young Artist Prize by the Israeli Ministry of Culture and Sport (2011). Schneider, represented by Raw Art gallery, has exhibited extensively in local art institutions and in various international venues, including the Tel Aviv Museum of Art, Herzliya Museum of Contemporary Art, Inga Gallery, Triumph Gallery in Moscow, gallery of the American Jewish University in Los Angeles and more. Her works are included in the collections of the Tel Aviv Museum and Ha’aretz, and in private collections in Israel and abroad.
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Digging Deeper: How Archaeology Works
Sunday, February 6, 7:00 pm EST
(online in partnership with the Orange County Jewish Community Scholar Program)
An internationally renowned archaeologist with more than thirty seasons of excavation experience, Prof. Eric H. Cline has conducted fieldwork from Greece and Crete to Egypt, Israel, and Jordan. Drawing on his new book, Digging Deeper (Princeton University Press, 2021), Cline answers questions archaeologists are most frequently asked: How do you know where to dig? How are excavations actually done? How do you know how old something is? This lecture will be filled with insights and practical advice about how archaeology really works.
Prof. Eric H. Cline is the former Chair of the Department of Classical and Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations and current Director of the Capitol Archaeological Institute at The George Washington University. A National Geographic Explorer, NEH Public Scholar, and Fulbright scholar with degrees from Dartmouth, Yale, and the University of Pennsylvania, he is an active field archaeologist with more than 30 seasons of excavation and survey experience in Israel, Egypt, Jordan, Cyprus, Greece, Crete, and the United States, including ten seasons at Megiddo (1994-2014), where he served as co-director before retiring from the project in 2014, and another ten seasons at Tel Kabri, where he currently serves as Co-Director. He is the author or editor of 20 books and nearly 100 articles; translations of his books have appeared in nineteen different languages.
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The Ten Greatest Books in Jewish History
Tuesday, February 1, 3:30 pm EST
(online in partnership with the Orange County Jewish Community Scholar Program)
We will NOT discuss the most critically acclaimed books, nor the best selling Jewish books, but rather the ten Jewish books (not including the Five Books of Moses) that have had the greatest influence on the Jewish people. We will explore the importance of each book and discuss some samples from each one. Finally, we will make some predications about some contemporary books that may become classics. Often described as America’s foremost Jewish genealogist, Arthur Kurzweil’s name has become synonymous with Jewish genealogical research. His highly praised book, From Generation to Generation: How to Trace Your Jewish Genealogy and Family History, has become known as the definitive guidebook to the field. Kurzweil has spoken before hundreds of Jewish groups on a variety of topics related to Jewish genealogy. A co-founder of the very first Jewish Genealogical Society in the 1970’s, today there are nearly 70 Jewish Genealogical Societies throughout the world. Kurzweil has also authored two books in the for Dummies series: Kabbalah for Dummies and The Torah for Dummies. His other books are On the Road with Rabbi Steinsaltz, The Encyclopedia of Jewish Genealogy and My Generations: A Course in Jewish Family History, which is commonly used as a textbook at synagogue schools in the United States. Kurzweil was born in New York City, was raised in East Meadow, New York, earned a Bachelor of Arts degree from New College at Hofstra University in 1971 and a Master of Library Science from Florida State University in 1972.
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