Customer Reviews

Moments of Transcendence: Inspirational Readings for Rosh Hashanah

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This is an extremely uplifting, enlightening book for anyone who wishes to delve more deeply into the High Holidays. The breadth and depth in which Elkins gathers his material is amazing. Well done! I highly recommend this book to anyone who is looking for something to read during the ten days between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, it certainly keeps your mind focused on the menaing of those special days.

As other reviewers pointed out, this review contains hundreds of little snippets which the author hoped would be inspirational. Some are; some would be if they were in a shorter book; some are just liberal pieties.

I personally was a bit bored after the first 100-150 pages; telling people what they already know in their hearts is a wonderful thing if done briefly, but is much harder to do well for 300 pages.

Having buried this book, let me praise it. There are certainly a few gems here, such as:

*one rabbi's statement that "A fool is one who never changes his mind."
*the story about Mordecai Kaplan (in which a student parrots Kaplan's speech from a few days earlier, and instead of praising him, Kaplan responds: "Young man, I have grown since then.")
*Robert Gordis's comparison of teshuva to laundry- just as clothes get dirty even after being scrubbed regularly, souls do as well.
*Louis Jacobs' explanation of the cliche that the shofar "confuses Satan." This does not mean that the ancient rabbis literally believed in a confusable angel or devil; rather, "Satan is identified frequently with the evil inclination in man . . . by repeatedly sounding the shofar, we are moved to control the darker forces in our nature."

This book has hundreds of short stories and probverbs that remind you of the important things in life. It's like "chicken soup" for the Jewish soul.