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“It is obvious that the war which Hitler and his accomplices waged was a war not only against Jewish men, women, and children, but also against Jewish religion, Jewish culture, Jewish tradition, therefore Jewish memory.”
― Elie Wiesel, Night

“If I am not for myself, who will be for me? If I am not for others, what am I? And if not now, when?”
― Rabbi Hillel

“Appeasement as a policy soon failed. The powerful Babylonian empire, desiring the vast treasures stored in Jerusalem’s Temple, conquered the Holy Land in 586 BCE—razing the building to its foundations. The once glorious city of Jerusalem lay in ruins, a physical embodiment of a spiritual collapse. The Babylonians seized not only the Temple’s material wealth but also carted off its human capital, taking the Israelitesâ€� priests, scholars, and skilled elite back to the court in Babylon—where the exiles wept by its rivers.”
― Mohamad Jebara, The Life of the Qur'an: From Eternal Roots to Enduring Legacy

“But if roteness is a danger, it is also the way liturgy works. When you don't have to think all the time about what words you are going to say next, you are free to fully enter into the act of praying; you are free to participate in the life of God.”
― Lauren F. Winner, Mudhouse Sabbath

“Landsman has put a lot of work into the avoidance of having to understand concepts like that of the eruv, but he knows that it's a typical Jewish ritual dodge, a scam run on God, that controlling motherfucker.”
― Michael Chabon, The Yiddish Policemen's Union

“Sure, sometimes it is great when, in prayer, we can express to God just what we feel; but better still when, in the act of praying, our feelings change. Liturgy is not, in the end, open to our emotional whims. it re-points the person praying, taking him somewhere else.”
― Lauren F. Winner, Mudhouse Sabbath

“Fasting is meant to take you, temporarily, out of the realm of the physical and focus your attention heavenward; as one Jewish guide to fasting puts it, 'at the heart of this practice is a desire to shift our attention away from our immediate needs and to focus on more spiritual concerns.”
― Lauren F. Winner, Mudhouse Sabbath

“And yet I feel an uncanny kinship to Moses as the Rabbis imagine him in that story, as I suppose that the Rabbis intended I should. Theirs was a system that made a virtue of ambivalence and built uncertainty into bedrock assertions of faith. No wonder fundamentalists and fascists have hated it so. And why I feel drawn towards it even now and, in the face of everything, find myself oddly determined to carry my own flawed version away from the slope of Sinai where, according to tradition, my soul stood at the time of the original revelation.”
― Jonathan Rosen, The Talmud and the Internet: A Journey between Worlds

“Hanukkah's miracle isn't about the oil lasting 8 days, rather it's about the resilience of light amidst darkness.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Sin Dios Sí Hay Divinidad: The Pastor Who Never Was

“Moses Luzzatto always said to be patient during the hard times, that they would have to endure and make sacrifices while they waited for better times to come. He urged Simone and the other Jewish boys not to provoke the Venetians, saying they should remain separate and focus on their work. He said their traditions were crucial to their identity, just as they were for their fathers before them.”
― Riccardo Bruni

“In the words of Jewish liturgical scholar Lawrence Hoffman, 'Jews do offer freely composed prayers... But overall, it is the fixed order and content of Jewish prayer that gives it its distinctiveness and that demands the personal commitment to prayer as a discipline.”
― Lauren F. Winner, Mudhouse Sabbath

“When you wake up the next morning and see a bag filled with stale pieces of bread, a candle, a wooden spoon, and a feather, you may be wondering what you did last night and weather anyone got hurt [Note: This is some strange Jewish custom].”
― Cantor Matt Axelrod, Your Guide to the Jewish Holidays: From Shofar to Seder

“I cling to this notion now because it is what allows me to feel a connection to a vast body of knowledge of which I am not master, much as I am able to live in a society bursting with information that I will never wholly comprehend. I take comfort from a lesson that seems implicit in the Talmud itself, which is that not knowing Torah is part of the lesson of Torah.”
― Jonathan Rosen, The Talmud and the Internet: A Journey between Worlds

“Hanukkah Sonnet

Hanukkah, Oh Hanukkah, let's light the menorah,
Let's wipe out all divide, even if some call it utopia.
Come one, come all, no matter the culture,
Let's stuff some latkes while we dreidel together.
Worry not about the candles burning low,
Fear not the darkness of hate and narrowness.
So long as we stand as bridges and not walls,
No darkness is match for our uplifting radiance.
The light of the festival doesn't come from candles,
The sweetness in the air doesn't come from treats.
The light and sweetness of these joyful festivities,
Rise from the loving streams of our heartbeats.
Let us burn bright as the gentle epitome of ahava.
Let us live life as a walking and talking menorah.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Giants in Jeans: 100 Sonnets of United Earth

“Hanukkah, Oh Hanukkah, let's light the menorah, let's wipe out all divide, even if some call it utopia. Come one, come all, no matter the culture, let's stuff some latkes while we dreidel together.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Giants in Jeans: 100 Sonnets of United Earth

“Let us burn bright as the gentle epitome of ahava. Let us live life as a walking and talking menorah.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Giants in Jeans: 100 Sonnets of United Earth

“Rituals remind us we're connected to each other â€� to history. We need to honour them. And weddings can be beautiful without being expensive.”
― Gemma Reeves, Victoria Park

“On the one hand, I don’t know a single person who says, “Yay! Purim is my favorite holiday!â€�

On the other hand, if there’s any holiday concept more Jewish than “Here’s the awful story of what happened to your great-great-grandmother. Have a cookie.â€� I don’t know what it is.”
― Arinn Dembo

“The light of the festival doesn't come from candles,
The sweetness in the air doesn't come from treats.
The light and sweetness of these joyful festivities,
Rise from the loving streams of our heartbeats.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Giants in Jeans: 100 Sonnets of United Earth

“You know why most menorahs nowadays have nine branches even though Hanukkah lasts eight days! It is to hold the ninth candle that sacrifices itself to light up the lives of those lamenting in darkness.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Yarasistan: My Wounds, My Crown

“There is no Catholicism or C of E, there is only "Love Thy Neighbor" - there is no Hinduism, there is only Oneness or Advaita - there is no Judaism, there is only Ahava.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Bulletproof Backbone: Injustice Not Allowed on My Watch

“When you lose touch with "love thy neighbor", you end up with christian nationalism - when you lose touch with advaita or nonduality, you end up with hindutva - when you lose touch with ahava, you end up with zionism.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Bulletproof Backbone: Injustice Not Allowed on My Watch

“When you lose touch with "love thy neighbor", you end up with christian nationalism - when you lose touch with advaita or nonduality, you end up with hindutva - when you lose touch with ahava, you end up with zionism.

There is no Catholicism or C of E, there is only "Love Thy Neighbor" - there is no Hinduism, there is only Oneness or Advaita - there is no Judaism, there is only Ahava.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Bulletproof Backbone: Injustice Not Allowed on My Watch

“There is no Catholicism or C of E, there is only "Love Thy Neighbor" - there is no Hinduism, there is only Oneness or Advaita - there is no Judaism, there is only Ahava.

When you lose touch with "love thy neighbor", you end up with christian nationalism - when you lose touch with advaita or nonduality, you end up with hindutva - when you lose touch with ahava, you end up with zionism.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Bulletproof Backbone: Injustice Not Allowed on My Watch

“Jewish mystics who embrace a belief in reincarnation posit that the soul has an independent life, existing before and after the death of the body. The soul, they say, joins the body at an appropriate time, remains with it for a specified period, and then takes leave of the body about the time of death, prepared to assume its next assignment in the physical world. A soul can return again and again in different bodies, and how it conducts itself in each reincarnation determines its ascent or descent in the next visit.”
― Rabbi Ron Isaacs, Ask the Rabbi: The Who, What, When, Where, Why, & How of Being Jewish

“Gehinom, or Gehenna, passed into use as a metaphoric designation for the place of punishment in the hereafter. According to a Talmudic view, the doors of Gehenna close behind apostates, informers, promoters of sin, and tyrants for many generations. According to the mystical holy book, the Zohar, sinners are punished for twelve months, half of the time in fire and half in snow. Among those who do not face Gehenna, a Talmudic passage includes the very poor and diseased. Despite the many differences of opinion as to the meaning of Gehenna, it is nowhere considered to be a dogma or a doctrine of faith that Jews are required to profess. Even those rabbinic sages who delighted in describing the torments of Gehenna and other shadowy places were usually aware that they were permitting their imagination to roam freely.”
― Rabbi Ron Isaacs, Ask the Rabbi: The Who, What, When, Where, Why, & How of Being Jewish

“There are a number of references to Satan in the Jewish Bible. It is doubtful if Jews ever took these references literally. In Judaism, Satan was the mythical figure of all the evil forces in the world. At times, he was identified with the Tempter, the evil impulse, which prompts peo¬ ple to heed the worst side of his nature. But even this notion was never too deeply rooted, for Judaism teaches that God is the Creator of both good and evil, and God’s dominion alone is real. [...] Satan in Jewish lore is most identified with the evil impulse, the lower passions that are a hindrance to man’s pursuit of the nobler things in life.”
― Rabbi Ron Isaacs, Ask the Rabbi: The Who, What, When, Where, Why, & How of Being Jewish