Judaism

New CD Commemorates Kristallnacht and Reimagines Hebrew Melodies

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When composer Eugene Marlow had the inspired idea to include a track on his upcoming CD, “Mosaica,” to commemorate Kristallnacht’s 76th anniversary, the first person he thought of was his Aunt Ruth Rack in Australia.

Now in her mid-80’s, she was a 9-year-old in Leipzig, Germany when she witnessed the 1938 event, also known as “The Night of Broken Glass.” “I decided I had to have her narrate this,” said Marlow. The result is “Zikkaron (Remembrance)/ Kristallnacht,” an original composition that opens with the sound of Goebbels’ harsh voice and then fades to Ruth’s memories of that awful night.

The quasi-classical/Hebraic melody, according to the CD liner notes, represents Ruth’s mother’s resolute calm against the surreal, destructive aggression by the Nazis. Repetitive, single piano notes bring to mind the shattering of glass. The marching rhythm of the brass and percussion evokes a dark terror and brutality.

Marlow sent Ruth a rough mix of the track. “She liked it very much,” he said, adding that he also included an instrumental- only version on the ninetrack CD.

Pianist Marlow founded “The Heritage Ensemble,” a quintet dedicated to performing and recording his original compositions and arrangements of Hebraic melodies in various jazz, Afro-Cuban, Brazilian and classical styles. Other members are of Puerto Rican, Lebanese and Eastern European descent. Marlow’s family background is Russian, Polish, German and British.

“I am a third or fourth generation musician/composer,” Marlow said. “This is my passion,” he added, jokingly, “If you open up one of my veins, little quarter notes will jump out.”

“Mosaica” is the ensemble’s fourth album and the first to include a vocalist, Cantor Shira Lissek. “I heard her sing and loved her voice. She and I chose specific melodies,” Marlow said, adding that Lissek was concerned that as a classically trained cantor, she lacked a strong background in jazz. ”I told her, ‘You sing it straight. We’ll do the jazz around you.’” The result is a stunning collection of songs that simultaneously feel familiar and brand new. “Eliyahu Hanavi (Elijah the Prophet)” is an exciting combination of moving vocals and silky jazz accompaniment, while “Mah Nishtanah Halaylah Haze (Passover’s Four Questions)” is a bright, lively rendition of the traditional Passover melody.

Marlow, who holds a Ph.D. in Media Studies, an MBA, an M.S. and B.S. in music composition and a B.A. in English, is a professor at New York City’s Baruch College in the department of journalism and writing. He didn’t get serious about music until he was in his 20’s and didn’t start studying composing formally until he was in his 50’s.

He plans a spring 2015 release of a DVD visualizing the “Kristallnacht” track with vintage photographs from Austria and Germany to coincide with Holocaust Remembrance Day, and a fall 2015 release of original Brazilian-inspired compositions.

“I have accelerated my music output in the last five years,” Marlow said. “With ‘Mosaica,’ in particular, I made it a mission to do something different than our previous albums.”

To purchase the CD, go to cdbaby.com/cd/eugenemarlow6.

A Communal Rosh Hashanah Resolution

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A well-known greeting used in the days preceding Rosh Hashanah is “Tichleh shannah v’killeloteha, tachel shannah uvirchoteha.” It means, “Bring an end to the year and all its curses, and begin the New Year and all its blessings.”


The words come from a Hebrew poem written in 13th century Spain, but the sentiment is most applicable to the end of 5774 and our hopes for 5775.

5774 was a difficult year, one we’d rather forget. It opened with the controversial findings of the Pew Report, “A Portrait of American Jews,” in early October and the U.S.-sponsored negotiations between Israel and Palestinians that took many from cautious hope to despair. Next came the kidnapping and murder of three Israeli teens and the calls for and acts of revenge for those murders. The growth of anti-Semitism around the globe has everyone on edge.

Hamas missiles fell on Israeli towns while Jews in our own communities were divided about Israel and Zionism. “Operation Protective Edge” and the death and destruction in its wake have left us with much uncertainty. Bring an end to the year and all its curses, indeed!

The High Holidays traditionally mark a period of 10 days during which we engage in heshbon hanefesh (deep introspection), mostly as individuals. But soul-searching is something that is incumbent upon us as a community as well. Could we have done anything to make the past year a better one? Can we do anything to make a difference in the year ahead?

The Jewish world faces many challenges that can have an impact on both Jewish life and Jewish lives (as well as the lives of others). Too often our community is unable to engage in meaningful conversation about perilous issues. The Jewish world has become averse to internal conflict, often preferring the anodyne voices of the echo chamber. One must ask: if we cannot talk among our own people, how can we ever expect to come to a peaceful resolution with others?

We should consider a communal Rosh Hashanah resolution: to learn to listen to those with whom we may disagree with open minds and hearts, and to learn to disagree agreeably.

This originally appeared in the Jewish Journal on September 25, 2014.

Peace of Mind

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September 11, 2001 marked a day of fear, disorientation and profound sadness for all Americans. Life as we knew it was suddenly altered. Since then, we have learned to live with its aftermath: color-coded terror alerts, heightened airport security and increased surveillance camera presence. We have become accustomed to the new post-9/11 “normal.” We may not be our pre-9/11 complacent selves but neither are we perpetually on the brink of panic. We take precautions, but we carry on.


September 11, 2014 presents similar challenges for Jews everywhere in the world. A wave of anti-Semitism and anti-Israel demonstrations has swept across every European country, Canada, the United Kingdom and the United States since the start of Operation Protective Edge on July 8. Daily reports of violence and defamation against Jews and Jewish property are impossible to ignore. The head of the Israeli-Jewish Congress, Vladimir Sloutzer, warned, “Never before since the Holocaust have we seen such a situation as today.” Such pronouncements are unnerving.

World Jewry is on edge, with good reason. This is not paranoia; to be anxious about the scope of this toxic hostility makes sense. There is a real and present danger in this anti-Semitic trend, and the relentless media coverage only increases our unease. Furthermore, there is the added complication of Israeli policies, politics and tactics with which not all Jews agree. However, disagreements with the policies of the Israeli government does not make us any more or less vulnerable to anti-Semitic attacks.

How can we American Jews avoid being consumed by feelings of helplessness and victimization? How do we maintain inner calm and peace of mind in this turbulent time of vandalism and desecration?

The answers are as different as the individuals asking the questions. For some, engagement, action and protest lighten the weight. Many seek the support of community and discussion and the outlet of action. For others, turning a hopeful eye inward works.

We must find ways to cope as individuals and as a global community with this new fear, disorientation and sadness. If we let the enemy destroy our peace of mind, then they will have truly won.

This originally appeared in the Jewish Journal on September 11, 2014.

A Living Chain of Tikkun Olam in Chelsea

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CHELSEA — Aweis Hussein tends his family’s vegetables in a community garden located at Chelsea’s Temple Emmanuel. He grows okra, tomatoes and corn, staples in his native Somalia.

Eleven years ago, Hussein and many from his current Chelsea Somali Bantu community lived in a Kenyan refugee camp. He arrived at the camp in 1991 at the age of 14, in need of protection and sanctuary from the relentless persecution and discrimination the minority Bantus suffered in their homeland.

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Aweis Hussein

Today, ten years after arriving in Chelsea, he is the community organizer and leader of the SCA (Shanbaro Community Association). The SCA operates under the umbrella of the Chelsea Collaborative, an organization founded in 1988 to enhance the social, economic and environmental health of the Chelsea community and its people. The SCA’s mission is to support the 400+ Somali Bantu refugees living in the greater Boston area as they forge community relationships and adjust to their new surroundings.

“I was lucky to go to refugee school in Kenya,” Hussein told the Journal by phone. He learned to read and speak English. He learned what to expect in America. Most of his Chelsea community members weren’t as fortunate. “They have never been to school. They have never been to a big village. They were mainly farmers in Somalia. They did not know about flushing toilets and lights and grocery stores.” His leadership role is his way of giving back to his people and using his special knowledge to ease their transition.

Ellen Rovner, of Brookline, is a member of the boards of directors of Chelsea’s Temple Emmanuel and the Chelsea Collaborative. She has a Ph.D. in cultural anthropology and an academic passion for food. She also has a keen interest in Chelsea’s immigrant community and in bettering the world through tikkun olam.

The idea for the community garden at Temple Emmanuel came to Rovner five years ago, when she was doing field work for her doctoral thesis, “It’s Just Like Coming Home: Food, Gender and Memory in a Jewish Community,” at Temple Emmanuel. She reached out to Roseann Bongiovanni, associate executive director of the Chelsea Collaborative and director of Chelsea Green Space.

“Ellen and I started to talk several years back about making deeper connections between the established Jewish community and the newer immigrant population in Chelsea,” said Bongiovanni, who has worked at the Collaborative for 19 years. “At the same time, Aweis’ group was looking for a place in Chelsea.”

“Roseann contacted me and said, ‘Listen, we have a community of people who are coming out of refugee camps in Kenya, many of whom have spent almost a generation there. They are farmers and they need a place to gather,’” Rovner told the Journal. Hussein pulled together some interested families and Rovner contacted Sara Lee Callahan, Temple Emmanuel president. The temple board members decided to loan the families space in its side yard to grow a community garden.

According to Rovner, Marlene Demko is the person who really made the garden happen. Demko, a lifelong Chelsea resident and a member of Temple Emmanuel since she was a child, sits on its board and acted as liaison between the temple and the Collaborative.

Bongiovanni explained that the first three garden plots were built with donated labor from the NE Carpenters Union. The Union members worked with teens from the Collaborative’s Chelsea Summer Youth Employment Initiative. Teens from YouthBuild, a Cambridge organization, came in recently to expand the garden with three additional beds. They cleared overgrown brush and provided significant landscaping work as well.

Demko worked with them to create a vibrant vegetable garden in the temple’s side yard.

“It has been great to see kids from many different backgrounds in Chelsea get excited about bettering their community at the same time a group of Somali Bantu families is becoming more integrated into the community and growing some of their own food on a property owned by a synagogue,” Rovner shared. “Given what’s going on in the world today, that a group of Somali Bantu refugees can find some solace growing food on the temple’s property is fabulous.”

Demko was thrilled to offer the Journal a personal tour of Temple Emmanuel and its community garden. She proudly pointed out the many yahrzeit (remembrance) boards lining the temple’s sanctuary walls, explaining that as the number of Chelsea’s active synagogues dwindled from almost twenty to one, Temple Emmanuel wanted to be sure the Jewish community would always have a place to say kaddish. “We do tikkun olam in so many ways because we’re so grateful that we can do these things and give back,” she explained. The temple has been holding full Passover seders for over ten years for over 130 people, enabling many who might find it otherwise difficult to gather their extended families to celebrate this important holiday.

The Somali Bantu community vegetable garden has inspired Demko to plan several enhancements for congregants, including a temple peace garden and biblical herb garden on some of the rest of the yard. She also envisions a “walk of honor” with stones engraved with donors’ names. With the help of other temple volunteers, she hopes to start this project next spring.

“This will be my mitzvah,” she beams, eyes filling with tears.” I want there to be a peaceful place for the rabbi and congregants to come outside and reflect, even during a service.” The garden will have benches and five gorgeous new trees, donated by the Department of Conservation and Recreation through a grant with the city of Chelsea, the Chelsea Collaborative and the Department of Energy.

Sara Lee Callahan, of Swampscott, has served as president of Temple Emmanuel for ten years. She is proud of the part her temple plays in helping to better the world. “Temple Emmanuel was founded in 1929 and in recent years has experienced a miraculous rejuvenation. Many temple members living all over the United States maintain a connection to this area through the immigrant generations who brought them here. As Temple Emmanuel looks forward to its bright future, and in the spirit of gratitude, we want to create a living chain of tikkun olam. The Somali Bantu’s community garden reflects this concept.”

Aweis Hussein is grateful that Temple Emmanuel has given his community the space to gather and farm together, growing healthy fresh food that is not easily accessible or affordable. More than that, however, he is grateful to meet people who understand what it means to be a persecuted minority and to live in a diaspora. “Many of the temple members are older. We try to talk about our history, to share our histories. It is helping us, this new relationship. I hope it continues,” he said.

Pictured at top: Fatuma plants her garden. (Melissa Shook)

The Gift of Elul

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Elul, the lunar month that precedes Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, marks a distinctive time in the Jewish calendar. By tradition, we begin the monthlong process of reflection and introspection that will culminate in the High Holy Days. We sound the shofar almost daily to awaken our souls and remind us of the special tasks that lie ahead. Much as we clean our earthly homes to prepare for Passover, we use this month to prepare our spiritual homes to welcome a new year.


We take stock of our relationships with ourselves, with others and with God, with the goal of making better choices to make the world a better place. It is a private, internal and personal task.

The process of looking inward is always challenging, but this year it is especially so. External events demand our attention. With Israel at risk and global anti-Semitism surging, self-reflection may feel self-indulgent. Too much danger looms, and too many need our support, to sit idly thinking about ourselves.

And yet, heeding the call of the shofar may be exactly what we need. Hearing the sound is meant to encourage us to search our souls and acknowledge our weaknesses, with the goal of becoming more compassionate towards each other and more reverent towards God. It is a time to celebrate life, an opportunity to resensitize ourselves and to renew our commitments. We are reminded that our individual choices matter and that every day we are given the opportunity to choose anew.

These times of large-scale political upheaval can make us feel frustrated and hopeless about our ability to improve the world. After all, others, much more politically powerful than us, are the decisionmakers. The month of Elul reminds us that each individual matters, that “tikkun olam” (repairing the world) depends on each of us doing our best. Quiet self-assessment and reflection may be a great place to start.

This originally appeared in the Jewish Journal on August 28, 2014.

A Trip Down Memory Lane with Bill Marx

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The Marx Brothers created the kind of universally appealing comedy that transcends time and trend. Chico, Groucho and Harpo (and occasionally Zeppo) had worked on stage, screen and radio for nearly 50 years when their last film, “Love Happy,” premiered in 1949. They left behind a treasure trove of comedic classics, including “Cocoanuts” (1929), “Animal Crackers” (1930), “Horse Feathers” (1932) and “Duck Soup” (1933).

By the time television burst on the cultural scene in the 1950’s, the vaudeville-era stars were middle-aged and the transition to the new medium gave them the largest audience they ever had. The kinescope technology available then created poor quality recordings, but the development of film allowed preservation of such later classics as Harpo’s famous 1955 recreation of the “Duck Soup” mirror scene on the “I Love Lucy” show. This episode has rerun in syndication for decades and has been seen by millions.

Most of the Marx Brothers’ television performances were as guests on TV variety shows such as The Jack Benny Program, The Colgate Comedy Hour, and The Red Skelton Hour. Although they all forged careers as individuals on the smaller screen, only Groucho was successful with his long-running “You Bet Your Life.”

Thanks to the teamwork of Harpo’s curator son, Bill Marx, and Marxophile producer Robert S. Bader, a new three-disc DVD set, “The Marx Brothers TV Collection,” is now available from Shout! Factory with ten hours of shows, home movies, outtakes, commercials and interviews from their golden television years.

The Journal spoke by phone with Bill Marx about this project and about his memories of growing up as a member of such a famous family.

“The Marx Brothers embraced every facet of the industry,” Marx began. “Although you can see all their movies on the internet, this DVD set is kind of special because it’s all TV. In a way, it’s good they haven’t been overexposed. This compilation of their life’s work is a positive thing for Marx Brothers fans, especially the youth who can see these for the first time.”

He and Bader wanted to highlight segments not available anywhere else, which is why they did not include the famous Lucy episode in their collection.

Marx enthusiastically talked about his religious upbringing. His father Harpo (born Arthur) always felt Jewish growing up, although Harpo’s parents never had much time for embracing the outward traditions of being a Jew. “They were too busy trying to survive in turn of the century New York City. The only time they experienced being Jewish was when they had to defend it.”

Harpo, whose will donated two harps to the state of Israel, was heavily involved in United Jewish Appeal and other Jewish causes. His first trip to Israel was in 1961. When he came home, he shared his experience with his son.

“Dad was probably 72 or 73 at the time,” said Marx, who is 77. “He told me it was the first time he ever really felt his Jewishness without having to defend it. He was very moved by being in a place where Jews were not a minority. It was a real epiphany for him.”

The brothers rarely got together socially with their families. “They would see each other every day at a country club they belonged to for lunch. They were sick of each other,” he chuckled. He remains close to his cousins Bob (Gummo Marx’s son) and Miriam (Groucho’s eldest daughter).

Like his two brothers and sister, Bill Marx was adopted. His desire to pay tribute to his dad inspired him to create the website, harposplace.com, and to undertake this latest project. “I am the luckiest guy in the world to have ended up accidentally in the orbit of the Marx Brothers,” he said. “I don’t know how to repay anybody except by producing this kind of homage to them and to my dad, who was such a unique and special person.”

Although he never embraced a traditional Jewish journey, Marx observes Yizkor, lighting yahrzeit candles for his parents. “I don’t appear in temple all that much,” he said, “but Yizkor is the one Jewish observance I set aside.”

On a closing note, Marx revealed his thoughts about Israel. “I am one of those incurably optimistic kind of guys when it comes to Israel. I think they will somehow or another weather this. They certainly know how to take care of themselves.”

Visit harposplace.com for more information. The Marx Brothers TV Collection is available from Shout!Factory.com and amazon.com.

Unjust Rule of Law: Jewish Lawyers Under the Reich

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Throughout their long diaspora, Jews have flourished when treated fairly and allowed to compete. Such was the case in Germany with the creation of the German Empire in 1871. Suddenly, Jews enjoyed full citizenship rights. At the same time, they gained access to a previously unavailable livelihood when the practice of law was delinked from the civil service. A private, independent legal profession swiftly emerged, and with their tradition of Talmudic discussions and analysis, Jews quickly found a new niche.

Up until the 1920s, the number of Jewish lawyers increased continuously and included women in their ranks. Subsequent generations took over the private practices of their fathers or started their own. In the big cities, the share of Jewish lawyers was higher than in smaller towns with a court. In Berlin, for example, on January 1, 1933 more than half of the 3,400 lawyers were of Jewish origin.

However, they did not identify as Jewish lawyers: they were German, lawyers and Jews, in that order. Many of them had been soldiers during the First World War; others had renounced their Jewish faith and some had even been baptized. In the area of jurisprudence, they contributed to the development of renowned legal journals and to the establishment of professional organizations.

All that came to an abrupt halt with the rise of Hitler and the dissolution of the democratic state. Overnight, Jews were excluded from all areas of social life. In March 1933, a decree was issued which refused all Jewish judges, public prosecutors and lawyers entry to the courts starting the very next day.

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The public is advised “Don’t go to Jewish lawyers” in 1933 Munich.

From 1933 until 1938, the National Socialists chipped away at Jewish access to the law. Finally, in 1938 all except a very few were banned altogether from practicing their profession. Those few could only act as “legal consultants” for Jewish clients. Essentially, there were no more Jewish lawyers in Germany. The Nazis had achieved their goal of making the legal profession “entjudet” (free of Jews).

“Lawyers Without Rights: Jewish Lawyers in Germany Under the Third Reich” is a sparse, densely informative exhibit jointly sponsored by the German Federal Bar and the American Bar Association. Since the fall of 2012, it has toured all over the world. With the support of the Vilna Shul, it is on display in the John Joseph Moakley Courthouse lobby through September 30.

Most of the show’s panels are devoted to the stories of individuals who lost their livelihoods, and in many cases their lives, during those darkest of times. These intimate portraits, and the fragile accompanying photographs and documents, are the heart and soul of the exhibit.

Margarete Berent’s story is one of perseverence. The 1914 dissertation on family law that she wrote to complete her law studies actually served as the 1958 model for the legal reform of inheritance and property laws in the Federal Republic of Germany. Berent was unable to practice law until 1919, when women were first allowed to take the bar exam. By 1925, as the first Prussian female lawyer, she had a thriving practice in Berlin. By 1939, she had fled to Chile, and by 1940 she was living in New York as a housemaid and postal worker. Undaunted, she went to New York University Law School at night and began working as a lawyer again in 1950, at age 63.

If the exhibit sounds dry and factual, that’s because it is. There is little excitement generated by posters on easels and trifold office wall mounts. Excitement, however, is not the point; contemplation and solemnity are. We mourn anew the senseless loss of our fellow Jews and reflect about a time when a nation completely abandoned individual rights and the rule of law. To do so in the lobby of a United States courthouse is all the more moving.

It may be a coincidence that Berent’s easel stands beside an inlaid panel of Daniel Webster’s famous quote, “Justice is the great interest of man on Earth. It is the ligament which holds civilized nations together.” Then again, it may not.

Go to lawyerswithoutrights.com for more information.

Pictured at top: Jewish lawyer Dr. Michael Siegel was forced to march through Munich barefoot after complaining to the police. 

In Their Own Words

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Every summer, hundreds of American teenagers travel to Israel under the auspices of programs such as the Lappin Foundation’s Youth to Israel. Y2I, a “rite de passage” for many North Shore Jewish teens, is intended as a life-changing Israel experience. 2014’s trip was uniquely so.

As their plane landed at Ben Gurion Airport, news broke that the fate of three kidnapped boys was clear: their murdered bodies had been found. Within days, Hamas rockets sequestered the Y2I group in northern Israel, precluding visits to Tel Aviv, Jerusalem, the Dead Sea and Masada. It was simply unsafe to proceed with the trip “as usual.”

The teens wrote post-trip essays about their experience and, with the permission of the Lappin Foundation, we share passages from many of them, joined together into a single voice.

“This trip taught me the true definition of being Jewish. It was not until I was actually in Israel, with the rockets and fighting, that I understood how strong we are. Israel is an amazing and resilient country and we were lucky enough to witness it firsthand.

The Israeli kids told me how important it was to just go through your day with a smile, and make the best of a dim situation. I will take that piece of advice with me and use it for the rest of my life. I never thought one trip could teach me such a big lesson.

What I admire most about Israel is her strength and heart. Israel and the Jewish people have always faced adversity. But even when times get tough, even when other people and other countries knock us down and try to belittle us or hurt us or say we are not good enough, we always get up.

I feel it is part of my responsibility to let people know about the real struggles in Israel, not the fake rumors. This is extremely important to me, and Y21 gave me the ability to understand it better.”

During this wrenching time for Israel and Jews everywhere, it is easy to get caught in the web of relentless media coverage, political polemics and sharp-tongued rhetoric. How fortunate we are that we can also tune into the voices of those with the most at stake: our children, who will live in a future we will not see.

This originally appeared in the Jewish Journal on July 31, 2014.

On Film, Faith and Family

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Zach Braff should be as exhausted as he looks. On his day off from his eightshow- a-week lead role in “Bullets Over Broadway,” Woody Allen’s musical comedy that opened in April, he is not relaxing and renewing. Instead, he was in Boston on a publicity blitz of interviews and appearances in support of his favorite thing in life: his filmmaking.

“Wish I Was Here,” which opens in Boston on July 18, is his second time both behind and in front of the camera. It has been 10 years since his indie film, “Garden State,” which he also directed, wrote and starred in, blazed its way from the Sundance Film Festival to cult favorite, picking up a Grammy for best soundtrack along the way. Braff is passionate about this project, his newest film, which he funded through a Kickstarter campaign. He deflected the criticism he attracted from those who felt that celebrities should bankroll their own projects. “You can’t make a movie these days about Jews,” he stated. “We’re 2% of the population and shrinking, and none of the studios want to make a movie for or about us. Part of the crowd-funding was to be able to tell an honest story about a Jewish family.”

In this new film, which he co-wrote with his older brother Adam, Braff stars as Aidan Bloom, a 30-something secular Jew whose kids attend Yeshiva (paid for by their observant

grandfather, Gabe (played by the always captivating Mandy Patinkin), and whose wife works a job she hates to support his “career” of auditioning for acting jobs he never gets. When Gabe is diagnosed with terminal cancer, Adam is forced to transition from child to parent, from cared for to caregiver. Along the way, he taps into his own spirituality and reconciles with his father and his faith.

The plot, however, is secondary to Braff’s real purpose in making the film.

“This film is about people who are searching for their spirituality and haven’t found it yet,” Braff stated. “I identify with the cultural aspects of Judaism. I grew up with stories of the Holocaust. I relate to the stories of Jews being persecuted and forever being killed and chased from wherever they lived. You can’t help thinking, ‘Wow, I am descended from these people that nobody wanted to be on this earth.’ I want to protect that.”

The three Braff brothers (older brother Joshua is also a writer) were raised in New Jersey in a strictly Orthodox home. Although Zach and Adam scripted the film, Joshua collaborated on developing Aidan’s character.

“My brother and I wanted to write about our faith and we wanted to write about growing up Jewish. Because we’re 10 years apart, our father raised us differently. Adam went to an Orthodox, very strict yeshiva and it pushed him away from Judaism. It had the opposite effect my father had hoped for,” Braff explained.

“By the time I was going to school, we were conservative and kosher, but I was going to secular school and Hebrew school three times a week instead of yeshiva,” he continued. “We knew we could approach the subject of a secular man’s search for spirituality because we were raised from two different stances.”

“We were a great yin and yang for each other,” he shared.

Braff’s father, who welcomes Shabbat every Friday with prayers and dinner, was concerned that his sons might be taking digs at organized religion in general, and Judaism in particular. “I made it clear to him that this movie isn’t about condemning Orthodoxy at all,” Braff said.

Rather, it is about the yearnings of a young man to tap into something which he knows is there but which he has yet to experience.

Two characters in the film, an old man and a young rabbi, illustrate Braff’s point. “The old rabbi isn’t surviving well in a modern world, let alone trying to enroll a secular man in faith. Then there is the opposite with the young rabbi, who goes out of his way to tap into the spirituality that Aidan has. He untangles him from needing the exact right words of Judaism and instead focuses in on exactly where he is.”

He smiles broadly. “This was the dream rabbi my brother and I always hoped for, but never met, and so we created him. My father cries his eyes out every time he sees it.”

For his soundtrack, Braff again enlisted bands he loved to create original content for the film (“Garden State” launched The Shins from the indie to mainstream realms). The playlist includes songs by Bon Iver, Cat Power, Coldplay and The Shins.

A Trivial Pursuit tidbit about Braff is that he is related to Mitt Romney, whom he met when flying to Utah last fall. When asked if his mother is really Romney’s ninth cousin, he laughed. “It’s a very bizarre fact, but it’s true. The research was done by a genealogist who clearly has too much time on his hands.”

He paused and then leaned forward, blue eyes thoughtful and somber. “I fought hard to keep this a Jewish movie with a Jewish star and I hope the Jews of Boston and Massachusetts will go see it. I’d like to make more films about my Jewish experience.”

Pikuach Nefesh — Saving a Life

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Pikuach Nefesh, the obligation to save a life in jeopardy, is as old as the Torah from which it comes. Valuing human life over all else is a basic tenet of Judaism. Its purpose, according to Maimonides, is to encourage compassion, loving-kindness and peace in the world.


Israel showed the world that this moral obligation is constant, as applicable in times of war as in times of peace, when it traded POW Gilad Shalit for 1,027 imprisoned terrorists in 2011. Israelis supported their government’s action by a 6 to 1 margin, according to a Jerusalem Post poll published the next day.

Contrast that to recent events at home. When the Taliban exchanged U.S. Army Sergeant Bowe Bergdahl for five prisoners held in the U.S. Guantanamo prison, a Pew Research Center and USA Today poll indicated that only 34% of those questioned thought it was the right thing to do. The cover of Time magazine ran a picture of Bergdahl with the oversized caption, “Was He Worth It?”

Israel and the United States both have their share of political infighting and finger pointing. Polarization of right and left, ultra-this and ultra-that, are equally prevalent. Yet the way each country responded to its government’s deal to bring home its citizen prisoners of war couldn’t be more different. Or more revealing.

Both soldiers faced criticism of their conduct after they were freed. Both governments came under fire for negotiating with terrorists. In the U.S., the conversation about whether the swap was “worth it” focuses on public examination and criticism of Bergdahl’s character. Allegations and political jockeying have been swift, eclipsing all else.

In Israel, although there was an undercurrent questioning whether Shalit could have avoided captivity, his homecoming was celebrated. Despite the lopsided nature of the exchange, the public did not attack Shalit or his family personally. In Israel, a Jewish life is unconditionally sacred. Gilad Shalit needed to be brought home. Period.

Politics aside, the plurality of U.S. citizens could learn a valuable lesson from Israel and reconsider their reaction to Bowe Bergdahl’s release. Jews everywhere should look in our collective Jewish mirror, remember that which binds us as a unique people, and celebrate what we see.

This editorial originally appeared in the Jewish Journal on June 19, 2014.