Product Description
From the lens of world-renowned photographer George Kalinsky comes this look at one hundred leading and influential rabbis of the twenty-first century. Through lush and brilliant photographs and essays by the rabbis in their own words we see the multifaceted people they are: leaders, teachers, preachers, scholars, spiritual innovators, chaplains, as well as fathers, mothers, avid hobbyists, and professionals.

Rabbis: The Many Faces of Judaism is an extraordinary book about modern Judaism. It features one hundred portraits of rabbis that span the globe and the ideological spectrum, from youthful Orthodox communal leaders to pillars of contemporary Reform Judaism, portraying today's Jewish leaders, and Judaism itself, in its diversity and dimensions. Keepers of the flame of Judaism, these are people who are working in the twenty-first century but are deeply aware of their religious legacy.

Some of the rabbis included in the book are: Rabbi Eric Yoffie, who was named the number one Jewish leader in America in The Forward in November 2001; Rabbi Eugene Borowitz, a well-known political activist and founder of a popular New York synagogue; Shmuley Boteach, author of Kosher Sex and a fixture on talk shows and in the media; Norman Lamm, outgoing president of Yeshiva University; Ismar Schorsch, chancellor of the Jewish Theological Seminary; David Wolpe, author of Making Loss Matter: Creating Meaning in Difficult Times, and other books; Laura Geller, Senior rabbi, Temple Emanuel, Beverly Hills, Calif.; Irving "Yitz" Greenberg, theologian and former chair of the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Council, and Harold Kushner, author of When Bad Things Happen to Good People. The book also includes Rabbi Sally Priesand, America's first woman rabbi, and Rabbi Yosef Hadana, the first Ethiopian rabbi.

Chosen for the rabbis' wide range of beliefs and interests, the people here represent the rabbinate as the rich, hard-to-define, impossible-to-categorize world that it is. Their life stories, which describe their coming to grips with their religion, are brilliantly articulated, filling the book with inspirational messages and spiritual guidance for all people-- not only for members of the Jewish faith but for people of all faiths and beliefs.

The photographs were taken by George Kalinsky, the official photographer at Madison Square Garden for more than thirty years. He has authored seven books, and his photos have appeared in numerous publications including Time, Life, People, Esquire, New York, Sports Illustrated, and Newsweek.
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Customer Reviews (7)

A Great Coffee Table Book!!!
Every right hand page has a great photograph of a different rabbi complemented by an insightful biography on the facing page. Their stories are interesting as the rabbis run the gamut from Chasidim to converts from other religions, from learned men and women who have devoted their entire lives to religion to a hippie just off a commune. No matter what your faith, this book will hold your interest.

The one-rabbi-to-a-page format makes for a wonderful book for coffee table browsers.

An interesting conception
I like the format of this work. The personal statement of the rabbi in regard to his own calling, along with the 'photo- portrait' gives a real sense of who each of these people is. I do not particularly like however the 'comprehensiveness' of the volume, and my own personal feeling is that it includes many who I would be reluctant indeed to call 'rabbis'.
But the work is built on a interesting conception, and there is much to learn from it.

5 *,but 1 Rabbi from Philly is holding Torah upside-down!
Excellent photos and essays covering the full gamut of Rabbinic life; while we all may wonder why this or that Rabbi was not included, we understand that decisions on balance, etc. needed to have been made to list 'only' 100 individuals. The essays are somewhat uneven, although they had an editor, but most of them are poignant, instructive, and often, quite moving. Wonderful idea for a book.

Modern Judaism ? All religions are stuck in the Stone Age.
Spiritual Transcendentalism in the New Millennium is a transcendental philosophy by enlightened spiritualists who apply pure logic and reasoning to support the philosophy of the existence of a superior progressive unified spiritual intelligence (God/Allah) instead of interpreting their inspirations with minds that have been predisposed to subconscious conditioning of a Spiritual Existence that necessitates a dominant spiritual presence. Spiritual Transcendentalists have a goal of bringing rationality, logic and common sense into present day religious beliefs.

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Kitsch
There are some serious people portrayed in this collection.And some of these rabbis are both well known and rightfully respected.But the emphasis in this tasteless and pretentious coffee-table production is on the off-beat, the publicity-seeking, the "with-it."The photographs are posed productions-- not a grab-shot in the book.More often than not these portraits convey much more megalomania and narcissism than sirituality.Sorry. ... Read more

Product Description
This digital document is an article from The Register-Guard (Eugene, OR), published by Thomson Gale on January 11, 2008. The length of the article is 1006 words. The page length shown above is based on a typical 300-word page. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Digital Locker immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.

Citation Details
Title: Thurston grad goes from filmmaker to facilitator.(Ticket)(After some early directorial efforts of his own, Aaron Douglas finds his niche as a film producer)
Author: Gale Reference Team
Publication: The Register-Guard (Eugene, OR) (Newspaper)
Date: January 11, 2008
Publisher: Thomson Gale
Page: E43

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"...This is an insider's view that blows the lid off of the inner workings of school districts and the board that controls them." ... Read more