Adult Education Blog

This week we are looking at 19-20th century Jewish comedy, particular in the United States of America. 

Jackie Mason brings Borscht Belt Humor all the way to the end of the 20th century

What happened to the Borscht Belt?

An Hour Long Video from the Forward about the "Rise of American Jewish Comedy"

Rabbi Lizz's Notes on Jewish Humor by Rabbi Joseph Telushkin

A Parallel Story: Performing...Read more...

On January 26th we will meet via Zoom at 10:30 am to discuss The Matzah Ball by Jean Meltzer. 

From the author's website: 

Chron­i­cal­ly-ill Rachel Ruben­stein-Gold­blatt is a “nice Jew­ish girl‚” with a secret: she loves Christ­mas. As the best-sell­ing author of over twen­ty Christ­mas romance nov­els, and four made-for-TV movie spin-offs, she’s kept her stel­lar career secret from her...Read more...

Each Sunday afternoon in January, we will be meeting on Zoom to discuss the history, purpose, and stylings of Jewish Humor. Reach out to ekibbitz@nershalomva.org or rabbi@nershalomva.org for the zoom links. 

Steve Allen called American comedy "a Jewish cottage industry", and attempts to define Jewish humor have come up short. Still we will try! Prepare for our first class by checking out some of these links:

My Jewish...Read more...

Due to the Thanksgiving holiday, the November book will actually be discussed on December 1st. We will still meet at 10:30 am on zoom.

This month we are reading The Last Kings of Shanghai by Jonathan Kaufman. From Goodreads:

The Sassoons and the Kadoories--two Jewish families from Baghdad--had long been successful in business, politics, and society. They kept up their intrigues and opium smuggling while helping to rescue...Read more...

On 10/24 we will discuss The Life of Adam and Eve: 

Life of Adam and Eve (ספר אדם וחוה)

Expands on the life of Adam and Eve after the expulsion from Eden, including Eve’s perspective. All known manuscripts date to well after the 2nd Temple period, and different versions have been found in several languages, none of them Hebrew or...Read more...

“Apocrypha” refers to biblical-style books from the Second Temple period that were not included in the canonization of Tanakh, including historical works, didactic wisdom literature, and apocalyptic texts, among others. Traditional Jewish approaches to these works have varied throughout the ages, but they are generally viewed as helpful sources of information and literature without much religious significance....Read more...

The entire process of canonization is murky. Scholars are simply unsure how certain books ultimately became authoritative and others did not. In these 5 one-hour sessions we will explore some theories on how canonization came to be and what was left out.

A Rough Timeline of Biblical Writing and Canonization

Apocrypha are books outside the Hebrew Bible canon, not considered divinely inspired but regarded as worthy of study by...Read more...

Our next book club meeting will happen on Zoom at 10:30 am on September 29.

We will be discussing Esau's Blessing: How the Bible Embraces Those with Special Needs by Dr. Ora Horn Prouser.

This week we'll be writing our own Midrashim!

You may pick any piece of Tanakh you wish for your jumping off point, but since the Tanakh is a voluminous text, here are a few offerings to start off with:

Adult Ed Returns with a unit on Midrash! Join us on Zoom April 18th, April 25th, May 2nd, and May 9th at 1 pm for four classes about Midrash. Don't worry if you can't join all four, just jump in where you can.

For this week, we will be discussing the building blocks of Midrash:

What is Midrash?

Methods of Midrash

Basic Outline of the Encyclopedia Judaica article on Midrash

It's Tanakh FanFiction

The next two Sundays (2/14 and 2/21) at 1 pm we will employ the PaRDeS sacred reading technique to engage with a Biblical verse picked at random.

PaRDeS stands for:

Peshat - the contextual, surface level, or literal meaning of the verse

Remez - the hints in the text at deeper meaning, the sparks of understanding that flicker at you from the text

Drash - your own interpretation or explanation

Sod - the...Read more...

The Book of Ecclesiastes/Kohelet

Kohelet Summary

About Kohelet

Kohelet: Torah for the 21st Century

Bimbam's Kohelet Song

The Jews are Coming! (make sure you turn on your English subtitles with cc option on your own YouTube settings)