Once Upon a Time, I Was Going to be Something

Eleven years ago, I was poised to be a Judaic studies scholar. It was my dream, and I was willing to do just about anything to make it happen. After graduating with my bachelor of journalism, I went to The Washington Post for an internship after which I got hired on as a full-time employee. I was miserable in DC, and I started working on chasing my real dream: a master's in Judaic studies followed by a PhD followed by a prolific career as an academic, professor, and writer.

Instead, I ended up moving to Chicago, living with a guy I thought was my forever, working for a Nobel-prize-winning economist, and only a year later heading to graduate school. Just a few years after that I was married, divorced, and quitting a program at NYU where I was attempting a second and third master's degree.

Now? Well, life is different now. I don't have time for books or papers or pursuing all those fascinating topics that were going to keep me happy and sane and on the chase. So what did my dreams look like? This. And, I'll point out, I was going to be the scholar to blow up the Ulysses S. Grant history, not Jonathan Sarna. When I interviewed at Brandeis in 2009/10, I mentioned the fascinating issue to Professor Sarna. Then, in 2012 he released his book.

Coulda been me. Here's a letter I sent with my application to the University of Chicago. Maybe, someday, I'll get back on this track.

Does the world really need another Jewish studies scholar? There are truckloads of academics in pursuit of answers from the Holocaust or the perplexing makeup of American Jewry and the Diaspora. But what about the uncharted grounds of Jewish history and thought? What about, for example, Ulysses S. Grant and his expulsion of the Jews in 1862? A piece of U.S. history you won’t likely find in most history books, this is just one of the complicated, uncultivated avenues on which I plan to tread in pursuit of a career in Jewish studies. 

During my junior year, while pursuing a journalism degree and minor in Judaic studies, I took an ethnopolitical conflict class – nicknamed the “genocide class” – which I was told by those who had taken the course that it would either break me down or change my course of study. The class, taught by Prof. Patrice McMahon, was centered on a single ethnic conflict research paper written in three parts throughout the semester. I knew instantly that I would research Grant’s infamous action, which I had heard about from a rabbi visiting my synagogue as part of the celebration of 350 years of Judaism in America. Unfortunately, the rabbi couldn’t tell me much about the event, thus piquing my interest. 

I spent weeks in the library scouring the school’s collection of Civil War, Grant and Jewish histories. It turned out that few people had heard about the incident and even fewer had written extensively on the topic. It was clear that I had my work cut out for me, which only wrapped me up more in the research. My research focused on what motivated Grant to issue the order, including the effects of war, economics and other generals on his decision. My research turned up a rabbi and professor, both of whom had detailed accounts and assessments of the incident. My shock of the unexplored event turned into excitement. Could I chart a new path or cover new ground on an anti-Jewish and anti-Semitic act sanctioned by the U.S. government? I set out to advance the study of General Order No. 11. 

The result of my semester-long effort was a comprehensive look at what led Grant to issue the antiSemitic order in a paper, “Ulysses S. Grant and the Jews: A Mighty Order and a Blemish on U.S. history.” At the end of the semester, in presenting the research to classmates, the expression of surprise on the faces of the 30 or so students was the most rewarding aspect of the venture. When detailing this seemingly veiled incident with others, friends were hesitant to believe and fellow scholars were shocked to know they were unaware of such a significant instance of antiSemitism in U.S. history. It was then that I staked my claim as a scholar, researcher and educator. Ralph Waldo Emerson said it best: “Passion … is a powerful spring.”

I hope to expand my undergraduate research on Grant to explore aspects of the incident beyond the motive. Few have focused on the lasting effects of the order or how Grant managed to carry the Jewish vote in both of his bids for president. Additionally, I would like to explore how such a significant event has managed to go unmentioned in textbooks and whether similar orders were issued during the Civil War or during other U.S.-inclusive wars. In a way, Grant has helped me find my raison d’etre.
But my interests reach much further than Grant and U.S. Jewry. My passion for Jewish studies spans American-Jewish fiction and authors such as Tova Mirvis, Jonathan Safran Foer and Cynthia Ozick; biblical Judaism; Jewish printing of the Middle Ages; and Jewish, Christian and Muslim relations. I hope to explore Rashi, his daughters, and whether his encouragement of their Talmud study was widely explored or purely rejected. I’m also fascinated with Emma Lazarus, whose outward effort to connect to the Jewish people seems hypocritical and insincere; I’m drawn to her understanding of Jewishness. Perhaps the most interesting avenue of research I’ve pursued and hope to look at further involves Jewish television and the rise of the sitcom, which spanned “Brooklyn Bridge” and “Bonanza.” 

My passion for Jewish languages has made me desperate to learn Ladino in order to study the Jews of Salonika, which I know so little about and yet am constantly reading about. My knowledge of Hebrew is limited, having taken only one semester of biblical Hebrew with Prof. Stephen Burnett late in my undergrad. Although my undergraduate university lacked regular Hebrew courses, my liturgical Hebrew is strong, and I am constantly working toward a fluent understanding of Modern Hebrew, in addition to biblical Hebrew.

I have to stress that this field of study is as much an academic endeavor as it is personal. The pursuit of a master’s degree will serve as another spring on a path to teaching, writing and researching, whether through a PhD and professoring or, as my rabbi has suggested, through rabbinical school. My work with Grant and the Jews proved to me that there are a bounty of uncultivated avenues in Jewish studies begging to be examined and shared by curious, burgeoning scholars such as myself.

The University of Chicago has a history and reputation of excellence, brought forth by the presence of passionate scholars – both students and professors – who are searching for answers to some of history’s and society’s most significant puzzles. While researching the scholars of the Committee on Jewish Studies, I found professors who I know will be beneficial to work and study with. I only hope that my passion for Judaic studies is apparent and that I can continue my studies and work toward a career in teaching Jewish history, religion and philosophy with the help of the Jewish Studies department at the University of Chicago.

Oh Academics, You Slay Me!

I'm busying struggling to catch up on reading and preparations for two papers and comp exams. After all, I have merely 6.5 weeks until my semester is up, and part of that will be eaten up by Pesach, so yeah. Madness is what we're looking at. I've got a binder full of about 215 pages worth of documents that cover basically all of the great academics of their subject and period (from ancient to modern and social Jewish studies) and how they felt about what, as well as another binder full of texts about Medieval versions of Tobit and a few texts on Herman the Jew (still developing this idea, concerned it's going nowhere), not to mention a binder in progress on am ha'aretz, which, let's be honest, I haven't really started on.

Heaping spoonful of sigh.



The upside is that there are lots of little amusing morsels of academic wisdom (or ridiculousness) that I get to share with my interested readership. You see, academics are hilarious. They're sarcastic and snotty and snarky at every turn, and it makes me giggle. I get it. I get the jabs, and I get the sneaky scripted way they present them. The over-arching statements that poke at revisionists or classicists ... they're beautiful. Here's a gem, from William Dever, from "The Crisis in Historiography" from John Collins The Bible After Babel.

But what if ancient Israel was "invented by Jews living much later, and the biblical literature is therefore nothing but pious propaganda? If that is the case, as some revisionist historians now loudly proclaim, then there was no ancient Israel. ... The story of Israel in the Hebrew Bible would have to be considered a monstrous literary hoax, one that has cruelly deceived countless millions of people until its recent exposure by a few courageous scholars. And now, at last, thanks to these social revolutionaries, we sophisticated modern secularists can be "liberated" from the biblical myths, free to venture into a Brave New World unencumbered by the biblical baggage with which we grew up. (p. 40-41)

Oh that was good. Do you feel the knives and jagged edges in those words? Look out revisionists, you just got your tush handed to you on a platter by Dever.

And then there's this, which is less sarcastic than it is a brilliant approach to this question of historiography. This comes from the mouths of Iain Provan, V. Phillips Long, and Tremper Longman III, again in Collins "The Crisis in Historiography."

"Why," they ask, "should verification be a prerequisite for our acceptance of a tradition as valuable in respect of historical reality? Why should not ancient historical texts rather be given the benefit of the doubt in regard to their statements about the past unless good reasons exist to consider them unreliable in these statements? ... Why should we adopt a verification instead of a falsification principle? 

I tend to agree with these guys when it comes to the idea of revisionists that it's all a bunch of ballyhoo. I also am a big fan of the benefit of the doubt theory, because more often than not academics assume that absence automatically suggests non-existence. This, of course, is ridiculous. However, I think their statement fails in one way, because who is to say what a "good" reason really is when it comes to deciding what is reliable and what isn't.

Anyhow, those are my gems for now. Eat them up, swallow 'em down, and get your brain all juicy with smart-stuff goodness.

The Road Diverges, Where's Chavi Going?

I'm worried that I've lost hope in the future (or the present) of mankind. All it took was a small stack of exams given to me to grade, and I was scratching my head, shaking my head, opening my mouth in utter surprise. All I could think was, "This isn't rocket science, folks," as I marked down points that would make even a regular ole D student cry. I mean, these exams? They're bad. They're really bad. And as I scribbled notes into the margins -- the same idea about 20 times, that is -- I began to wonder, to really wonder, if I could handle being a professor, knowing that the words that I might speak on a daily basis would be sucked into ears, processed in some absolutely mindless filter, only to be regurgitated out on paper like this.

Ever since I returned from Middlebury, I've been thinking, reconsidering, where I'm going. My desire to teach hasn't changed, don't get me wrong, but I am trying to figure out what's practical and possible for me at this point in my academic journey. I started out thinking modern, after all, my big-time term paper in my undergrad was on Ulysses S. Grant and the Jews. I slowly moved backward, thinking about Rashi and his daughters, considering Medieval Jewry. I read books and more books and the text that discusses the rabbi who decreed that if you're yawning in shul you better cover your mouth had me delighted. And then I came here to Connecticut and I found myself drifting even further back, to the Talmud, the rabbis, and the Second Temple Period as we know it today. But as the past year showed me, I'm so far behind it might take me years to catch up. In a perfect world, I'd be reading-fluent in Aramaic, Greek, French, German, and of course Biblical Hebrew. I'd read the texts in their originals, because that's what a scholar does. I vowed after realizing that the author of Rashi's Daughters didn't do any of her own legwork that I wouldn't be like that -- I'd work from scratch forward. But the reality? It might take me years.

I keep telling myself that I have all the time in the world. Tuvia has granted me that time, knowing that I want to follow my heart and really throw myself into that which I am passionate about. He's patient and kind like that. And in reality, I could probably toil away at school for the rest of my life studying those languages and working the texts until I'm blue in the face. Even if I don't pursue academic Talmudic work or what have you, I'll still do that in the outside world -- after all, my inquiring mind doesn't let me sit still on the sidelines when it comes to my Orthodox Judaism. I seek, read, and learn.

But the reality of the situation is that I'm reconsidering my situation. Life is a series of reconsiderations, you know. And after Middlebury, and even before, I was considering a future in Hebrew language. My time in Middlebury allowed me to gain a fluency I couldn't have dreamed of. But it was just a start, and much like my hungry neshama, my hungry brain wants more. Speaking Hebrew feeds my mind, my heart, and my soul. It's like I'm speaking in the voice of generations past and future. It empowers me and it makes me happy and excited.

And for all intents and purposes, it's practical and doable. At least, I think so.

So I sent an email off to my morah (teacher) from the summer, to see what she thinks and whether she has any advice. I would continue on with a PhD, but it would be in language -- Hebrew language. I'd rehash all the grammar rules I've forgotten (from English, that is; who can tell me what a past participle is!?). I hate to say it but although I've got mad editing skills, when it comes to the vocab and the nitty gritty, even the best editors are lacking. I want to perfect my language skills so that I can take what I know to a university or day school level and INSPIRE people. Inspire them to use and love the living language of the Jewish people. And furthermore, at least with a language, there are rules and measures and styles and words that mean exactly what they mean. I don't have to explain themes or devices to students. Language is like mathematics -- 99 percent of the time, there is really one right answer.

And maybe, once I've got that under wraps, I'll turn back to my dreams of being a Talmud chacham.

Of course, I want to be a mother, too. A mother, a wife, a community member, a shul member. A friend and a confidant. There are many things I want to be, and I find that as time goes on, my desires change along with my needs. What the soul needs to be comforted changes as new people come into our lives and also when we realize we need to reassess a situation. Unfortunately for Tuvia, being Morah Chavi the Hebrew teacher might not be exceedingly lucrative, but if there's one thing my father taught me, it's to do what makes me happy.

I've learned that, in life, you can't waste your time on the things that don't excite you. If it isn't one of the first things you think about when you wake up and when you go to sleep -- positively, with absolute excitement and eagerness -- then maybe you should reconsider where you are and where you're going. Life's to short to waste your time and energy. As Qohelet tells us,

So enjoy what you have. (Note: Many read Qohelet/Ecclesiastes as a text about the futility of life. I do not read it this way. I read Qohelet as an old man, full of wisdom, relating to us how to live one's life in order to gain the most from it. To seek happiness in all things and to not toil over that which is wasteful or futile. Rather, seek happiness in all that you do, here, in this life!)

I am a Writer, Am I a Writer?

For the first time in my A-student, excellency-first life, I handed in a crap paper. It was nine pages of writing that I knew wasn't up to Chavi Quality Standards (CQS), but I handed it in anyway. In the past, I've done this, but it was only that "I rushed, it probably isn't so great, but I'll do well" sentiment, and I always managed to fly by with As on such papers. But this paper? I knew when I was writing it that it was disjointed, unfocused, miserable in form, idea, and execution. And when I gave it to the professor, I said about 30 times "please let me know if this isn't what you're looking for."

I knew it wasn't. I knew it was crap. And I handed it in anyway.

So I wasn't surprised when I got the email this morning. My alarm went off, I grabbed my Blackberry, I opened GMail, and there it was, the first email sitting in my inbox. Let's meet, it said. What a horrible way to start an otherwise (might-have-been) good day. So now, my long day -- where I go from 10 a.m. until 6 p.m. without room to breathe -- is clouded by this meeting I have in an hour, where surely I will be told "you're really bright, but ..." And I know I deserve every criticism.

I'm a good writer. At least, that's what people tell me and I need to prove to myself that I am a good writer. As a copy editor, I know what good writing is meant to look like. I know how the words should flow, how even in academic papers the prose and flow is important. Words should not feel harsh or disconnected; they should have a rhythm and be fluid. I read too many academic papers that read like math textbooks, and I refuse to be one of those academics. I want to be a writer. A good writer. An amazing writer who people read and say "Damn, I wish I could write that well!" But most importantly, I need to feel like I am a good writer. Being a good writer in other people's eyes is worthless when you can't love your own stuff.

This blog, this entire ridiculous volume of ether that I have spewed for nearly three years, is my baby. It's what made me feel good about my writing. It's what said, you aren't just an editor, you're a writer! Go for it! And so here I am, writing, again, venting, stressing, wishing I could crawl into a whole and delete that damn paper. It was a literature review, papers on the validity of the Bible, scholars who say it's a Hellenistic composition, the historicity of the stories of the Bible and how it all isn't just novel-y crap. And that's fascinating to me. It's important and big and special. It's my area of study. And I just pushed out nine pages of crap.

So maybe this is what I needed. I've felt completely out of time, out of focus this semester. I feel like I'm not doing enough, but always doing too much. So maybe I needed to be knocked off the confidence pedestal. I found out earlier this month that I had two papers accepted to a conference in April, and I found out this week that I was accepted to the Middlebury Language School's Hebrew summer Ulpan-style program. These are two massive, important achievements, and I've been riding on their high for a while now. Now? I'm deflated. Disappointed. Wondering if I'm really cut out for all of this. So maybe this is what I needed to really put it all in perspective.

Note to self: You start too many sentences with "So..."

Delicious, Nutritious Brain Food!

I've spent the better part of the past six hours in the UConn library studying Hebrew, reading up on incredibly amusing and varying accounts of the "historical" life of Hillel, and reading over some things I'd read on Shabbos and wanted to make note of while the texts were still (sort of) fresh in my mind. So, as always, I have to share some interesting reads with the audience since, well, it's what I do. I have a running list of things that are blowing my mind that I will -- well, probably better hope -- to research and write on. So among this note-taking, I've come across some amusing and thought-provoking things.

This first excerpt is from "The Bible and the Ancient Near East" by Gordon and Rendsburg. I read this on Shabbos and immediately was laughing out loud. I read the passage to Tuvia, who found it equally amusing. It seems that so very little has changed in the past 3,000+ years. From Chapter 8, The Patriarchal Age, we read about a series of texts found in the town of Nuzu in northeastern Mesopotamia, dating from the 15th and 14th centuries BCE.

Among the Nuzu texts is a series of tablets recording the lawsuit filed by the citizens against the mayor, who was guilty of complicity with a kidnaping [sic] ring, of accepting bribes, and stealing wood and misappropriating workers from public projects for his own purposes, and of shady dealings with a woman of the community.

I can think of at least a half-dozen ongoing cases that this sounds like. It is amazing how people never change, and everything we do is a copy of something that has happened before. And we're not talking about Rome or something here, we're talking about the Ancient Near East. Thousands of years ago!

The second little bit is not so much funny as it is interesting, and it comes from the same chapter.

The Patriarchs represent a microcosm of Israel. Gd's intervention in their personal lives is akin to the role He plays in the life of Israel. Moreover, Israel is not a powerful nation like Egypt or Babylonia; instead it is a "barren" country, and a "younger son" among the nations of the world. Gd has made Israel prolific and He has made it His firstborn (Exodus 4:22), ideas reflected in the Patriarchal narratives.

This, of course, is referring to the common theme in the Hebrew bible of the younger son outdoing the older son -- Isaac/Ishmael, Jacob/Esau, Joseph/his brothers. It's an interesting motif that characterizes just what Israel is.

I've become curious about the role/idea of "Titans" in the Ancient Near East and perhaps, though I'm guessing there's nothing on it, in Judaism. I have found a book by someone who suggests that the Greeks borrowed for their Titans myth from the Ancient Near East, but I have yet to leave my little office to go scavenge for the book. The only reason I find myself intrigued about this is because in "Stories from Ancient Canaan" by Coogan, there is a passage about the Canaanite gods being "larger than life. They travel by giant strides -- 'a thousand fields, ten thousand acres at each step' -- and their control over human destiny is absolute." I read that and immediately thought "the Titans of Greek myths!"

It's funny how, the more I study the ancient texts of Judaism and the Ancient Near East, words simply pop out lyrically as echoes of one another. For example, when reading the Akkadian Atrahasis (a photo of which is to the right) the words describing a terrorizing storm echo the words in the Hebrew bible in reference to the plague of darkness (of the parshah just a few weeks ago!) -- the Atrahasis epic states that "One person did not see another, They could not recognize each other in the catastrophe" (iii, 13-14) and from Exodus 10:23: "People could not see one another, and for three days no one could get up from where he was."

The similarities between the texts of the Ancient Near East are endless and offer a wealth of information about just WHO we the Israelites were and are. I find it all really fascinating ... and I guess I sort of hope my readers do, too!

A Quick Ditty.

A quick quip: I walked to the Student Union tonight in 38 degree weather to pick up a few beverages since I was Jonesing for some liquid, and on my way back, while admiring the brisk, cool, clear weather that so defines my happiness, I started singing in my poetic, lyrical way, words of my own: "I'm just trying to live wholly ..." and then stopped myself and thought "wait, did I mean wholly or holy?" And then I realized that both were applicable, and the interesting thing about it was that to live wholly, I need to live holy. Oh the things we say and the wisdom we can impart upon ourselves without even knowing it.

In other news, I'm pretty sure I'm settled on both paper topics for class.

+ For Bible class (an undergrad course in which I'm taking three tests with the rest of 'em, but am required to write a paper on a topic of my choosing about anything at all from Hebrew Bible or Christian Bible): The Golden Calf, was it meant to represent/replace Moses or G-d? An idol or cultic object? And perhaps maybe my topic might evolve if I find out more about this tradition of concealment in 2nd century BCE synagogues in Israel.

Nicolas Poussan's "The Adoration of the Golden Calf" 

+ For Biblical interpretation (the philosophy course that blew my mind in the beginning that I've settled comfortably into): Qohelet as philosophy or theology, how is it read and by whom (I need to zero in on whether I want to do Medieval or maybe modern scholars), and tie this into whether there is even such a thing as Jewish philosophy (thank you Paul Mendes-Flohr and the long ago piece I read "Jewish Philosophy and Theology.").

The holidays have really created an awkward setup with my research and studying though, and it's frustrating. Luckily I have all day tomorrow, and all next weekend to thrust myself into research. I want to be able to create solid theses for both papers so that I feel and look more put together than I am. Then, my plan is to trek to Chicago during the first half (at least) of Thanksgiving Break maybe and devote myself to writing my papers. The idea of filling a suitcase full of books is thrilling. But who knows if that will happen. At some point I have to start writing SOMETHING. I'm a last-minute writer -- someone who sits down at the last minute, composes 15-20 pages in one sitting (no breaks) and then turns it in before reading it. That, folks, is how I roll.

On that note, I still need to compose an email to my undergraduate professor whose class prepared me for all of this (even though I can't bring myself to write an outline) ... Ethnopolitical Conflict. Man alive, that class developed the paper that got me into graduate school (here, Brandeis, U of Michigan), and it also taught me what it meant to write a literature review in the form of a paper. Several ideas on a single topic, how they approach it, and finally my take on their analyses -- a combination of thoughts or a breakdown or a completely independent assumption of the facts. That's probably how my Golden Calf paper will roll, but not my Biblical Interpretation paper. Why? Not sure. Maybe it will. Who knows.

Academia rules. Now if I could just teach myself to focus ... this lack of regiment is difficult for me.

Bookworms (and Bibliophiles) Unite!

Books. We all have them (or at least we should) and most of us have way too many of them. Academics in particular tend to collect them -- even ones they have and may never read. I've moved around a lot in the past 2.5 years and this has resulted in a lot of book purging. Luckily, I've kept a massive list that's off to the right there of all books I've owned or once owned and for the most part what I've read. Of course, this list compilation started just last year, so anything I owned before that and sold or donated or passed along is unfortunately not there. My policy is that, the books I chuck or donate I can just buy again. Books, you see, are going nowhere.And, might I add, as an Academic, I intend to hoard them.

So no matter what way you paint it, books are our lifeblood. The great books -- the Torah (or Bible), War and Peace, Catcher in the Rye, The Great Gatsby, Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (note: there's no THE in the actual title), The Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter? -- are known, if only by title, to just about everyone. And we know books by the way they feel and smell and the cover(s) that adorn them. We don't know books by their .pdf incarnation via the Sony Readers or Kindles (though, you know, I really want one). We crave the hard copy, the beautiful, physical page-turning experience that is the book.

I currently have three Tanakhs and two chumashes. It was pointed out that all of the books I brought to school with me are Judaica (and they are, except for one Vonnegut), and most of the books I have back home are Judaica, with the exception of Salinger, Diamant, Vonnegut, Joyce, and others. In the past two weeks at school, I have recalled one book from a different campus, in addition to checking out three other books -- one required and the other two simply books I picked up while perusing the stacks (one on Shabbos stories and the other by an author who broke down the Documentary Hypothesis and essentially recomposed Torah). You see, I can't leave the library without picking up a new book. Even if I never get to it, books -- I must be surrounded by books.

I recently finished Chaim Potok's "Davita's Harp," while also spending plenty of time reading "Cool Jew," while also starting and finishing (and needing to review) "The Search Committee" by Rabbi Marc D. Angel, in addition to (yes, this is the last one), starting and almost finishing Nahum Sarna's book on "Genesis" (the Torah book, not the band).

You see, I am a bookworm in anticipation of becoming a bibliophile.

So I take with great comfort the calming words I recently wrote to a friend who is applying to graduate school for a library sciences degree about the future of books (no, they're not going anywhere). I also was excited to hear that my good friend Jon finally decided to start a blog on what he calls "Fringe-Lit," the books that you wouldn't hear about outside of a college classroom or a university or small press. His blog, Up the Broken Trail, is now live and in his first post he explains how it is that he discoveres new, interesting authors that might not otherwise break the big Borders wall of awesome (read: Stephen King, ugh) books. By the way, I have to add that Jon, a brilliant writer and an amazing person and friend, has already written his own book (it's on Nebraska football, if you're interested), which I think is pretty impressive.

And then there's another blog that I have to pass along as a lover of books, and that's the Jew Wishes blog. Jew Wishes is "an avid first edition book collector," who reads anywhere between three and five books a week, along with newspapers and periodicals. Essentially, Jew Wishes is well read and provides readers with a rundown of the books getting the read-through. The most recent post by Jew Wishes is about the book "The Talmud and the Internet" by Jonathan Rosen -- a book I've been meaning to pick up for some time now.

I'm sure there are loads of other book-friendly blogs out there, but these are the two on my radar that I think YOU should most definitely check out. As for me, I still have a book review of "The Search Committee," which just came out officially on September 1, and that will likely come Saturday, so stay tuned. Until then?

Well, you see, I'm finishing up the book on "Genesis," starting Sarna's other book "Exploring Exodus," and I've already started reading the book that sort of resorts out the Torah, and the Shabbos stories book will probably be a reference more than a read. What else? Well, there's also all that other class reading ... I have about four books on Qohelet that I need to pore over, not to mention regular Torah study and ...

Books. They're what's for dinner. And breakfast, lunch, long walks to the dining hall, bus rides, plane rides, short bathroom visits ...

Note: There is a difference between a bookworm and a bibliophile! As your editor in residence, I want to clarify the difference. A bookworm is a lover of books for their content and loves reading in general. A bibliophile, on the other hand, is more of a lover of books who strives to collect books and appreciates them  for their format and purpose. I'm a little bit of both, but since my collection isn't so fast (what with all the movie and such), I'm more of just a bookworm for now.