Product Description: This study demonstrates that, for all the admitted emphasis on peoplehood in the Jewish religious tradition, there are equally strong individualistic tendencies within Judaism. Dr. Jacobs maintains that in any balanced view of Judaism it must be shown that what the individual does with his life has eternal significance for that same individual, not only for the Jewish people as a whole...read more

Product Description: This book attempts to uncover the basic form and structure of the Babylonian Talmud, a centrally important text in Jewish studies. The novel contribution made by Dr. Jacobs to the study of the Talmud consists in his concentration on the literary principles employed in its composition, and he presents a clear study indicating the manner in which earlier material was reworked in order to make each component, or sugya, into a carefully structured and self-consistent unit...read more

Product Description: Very Good - no marks on text - remainder mark on bottom edge - Next or Same-Day Shipping - Tracking number - Ships from Ohio - 18-E-40

Product Description: In the traditional Talmudic methodologies, the subjects of Talmudic logic and methodology are generally treated together. With a few notable exceptions, there has been little attempt at a systematic presentation of such matters as the structure of the Talmudic arguments, the division of the sugya into its component parts, the methods of Talmudic reasoning, and the literary style and character of the Amoraic debates...read more

Rabbi Aaron Horowitz is generally acknowledged to be the most outstanding systematic exponent of the profound Habad theory of Hasidism. One of the most striking features of the book is the way it demonstrates that there is a close affinity between Habad thought and Far Eastern spirituality. Dr Jacobs has succeeded in bringing a vanished world to life for the modern reader.

Product Description: Dobh Bear of Lubavitch (1773-1827), the author of Tract on Ecstasy, assumed the leadership of the Hasidic sect of Habad on the death of its founder, Schneor Zalman of Liady. The tract is in the form of a letter, sent by Dobh Baer to his followers, advising them on the role of ecstasy in the religious life...read more

Product Description: Addresses some of the most burning questions but also provides surveys of contemporary Jewish religious life in the various communities and of the attitudes of Jewish thinkers to other religious faiths. For the first time a comprehensive account of Halakhic attitudes towards Christianity is presented...read more

Product Description: Provides four detailed understandings of the nature and scope of the Babylonian Talmud, outlining the state-of-the-art studies of the subject as well as some problems still awaiting solution, such as who were the actual editors of the Bavli and how they went about their work...read more

Product Description: Rabbi Jacobs, with sixty years' experience of pulpit work to his credit, provides a number of homilies for each weekly portion of the modern sermon and for the chapters of Ethics of the Fathers. The text for the modern sermon is usually the sidra, the weekly portion, or, in the summer months the Talmudic book known universally as Ethics of the Fathers...read more

Product Description: More than forty years have passed since Louis Jacobs first put forward the argument that traditionally observant Jews have no reason to take issue with the findings of the historical critics in their investigations of the Bible. In his numerous works on Jewish theology, Jacobs has argued that the traditional doctrine which claims that 'the Torah is from Heaven' can and should be maintained-provided that the word 'from' is understood in a non-fundamentalist way to denote that there is a human as well as a divine element in the Torah: God revealing His will not only to but through the Jewish people in their historical experiences as they reached out to Him...read more

Product Description: Sheds light on obscure corners of the Hasidic movement and the lives of the Rebbes. After a brief account of the history and rise of Hasidism in the eighteenth century to its restoration in the New World after the Holocaust, novel developments, some of them startling, are examined...read more

Product Description: This book examines the basic beliefs of Judaism in light of modern thought. Its shape is traditional but not fundamentalist. This book, the main cause of the 'Jacobs Affair' in which the author's appointment to an Orthodox Rabbinic position was vetoed, suggests that the doctrine Torah Min Ha-Shamayyin (The Torah is from Heaven) needs to be reinterpreted so as not to be in conflict with modern knowledge...read more

Product Description: The central thesis of A Tree of Life, now revised and expanded, is that social, economic, theological, and even political factors have always played a part in framing of Jewish law, as has consideration of the wider ideals of Judaism...read more (view table of contents, read Amazon.com's description)

Product Description: The 'Ask the Rabbi' column in the Jewish Chronicle was an extremely popular weekly feature of the paper. During more than 25 years, over 1,000 lively questions and answers accumulated, of which this book is a selection arranged according to various themes...read more

Product Description: The 'Ask the Rabbi' column in the Jewish Chronicle was an extremely popular weekly feature of the paper. During more than 25 years, over 1,000 lively questions and answers accumulated, of which this book is a selection arranged according to various themes...read more

Ranging from biblical times to the present day, a collection by Jewish mystics features accounts of religious experiences, ecstatic prayers, and more

Turn Aside from Evil and Do Good was written by Zevi Hirsch Eichenstein (1763-1831), a hasidic master and renowned adept in Lurianic kabbalah. He wrote it with the intention of providing a guide to would-be hasidic kabbalists on how to live a holy life. Eichenstein was unusual in the hasidic world in that as well as being a kabbalist he was a competent talmudist and was also acquainted both with the science of his day and with medieval Jewish philosophy. His views differ from those of other hasidic masters, principally in the importance he attributes to studying the kabbalah, which he considers an important antidote to unbelief, and in his more positive attitude to the enjoyment of sexual activity and to business activity; he is concerned to show how both can be integrated in a holy life. This lively translation by Louis Jacobs of the second edition (1850), which includes the notes of R. Zevi Elimelekh of Dynow, gives the reader an insight into a highly unconventional hasidic master and the basic ideas of Lurianic kabbalah as he perceived them. Through hundreds of scholarly annotations, printed at the foot of each page for ease of reference, Louis Jacobs helps the reader to understand the kabbalistic ideas and imagery and other opaque terms, and clarifies the sources to which the author alludes. Turn Aside from Evil and Do Good conveys the full flavour of an original hasidic approach to kabbalism. Immensely readable, it will be of interest to anyone interested in hasidism and Jewish mysticism or the religious way and its social history. Louis Jacobs has added a very accessible introduction to explain the Lurianic system of kabbalah; he also provides biographical details of Eichenstein and his school, and a full bibliography. Louis Jacobs, founding rabbi of the New London Synagogue, was a renowned scholar with an international reputation as a lecturer. He is the author of The Jewish Religion: A Companion (1995) and of many other distinguished books, several of them published by the Littman Library, including Beyond Reasonable Doubt (1999) and Hasidic Prayer (paperback 1993), Theology in the Responsa (paperback 2005), and A Tree of Life: Diversity, Flexibility, and Creativity in Jewish Law (second edition 2000). He died in 2006.

Ranging from biblical times to the present day, an inspirational collection by Jewish mystics features accounts of religious experiences, ecstatic prayers, and more, from Ezekiel's dramatic vision to Abraham Roth's 'Agitation of the Soul.' 10,000 first printing.

An encyclopedia of Judaica from Biblical times to the present contains hundreds of entries covering innumerable aspects of Jewish belief and practice, wisdom and culture, history and tradition, including biographies of great Jewish figures and thinkers. UP.

This first systematic study in English of the methods of prayer of the Hasidic mystical community includes the first translations of much of the source material.