New Book Release -- Flames

Flames by Kehot Publication Society

What's In a Flame? The Chanukah discourse Ki Atah Neri from Shaarei Orah employs the multiple images of the lamp, the oil, the wick and the different hues of the flame in order to express profound guidance in the divine service of every individual.

The popular Chasidic Heritage Series aims to present Chasidut to the reader in a truly user-friendly format. It's the text of choice for Shiurim, and a great English companion to the text for any time use.

Includes the first ever English biography of the Mitteler Rebbe.

New Book Release: Handy Science

The Handy Science Answer Book by the Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh

Science is everywhere, and it affects everything! DNA and CRISPR. Artificial sweeteners. Sea level changes caused by melting glaciers. Gravitational waves. Bees in a colony. The human body. Microplastics. The largest active volcano. Designer dog breeds. Molecules. The length of the Grand Canyon. Viruses and a retroviruses. The weight of a cloud. Forces, motion, energy, and inertia. It can often seem complex and complicated, but it need not be so difficult to understand. Celebrating it’s twenty-fifth year and with over one million copies sold, the newly updated and completely revised fifth edition of The Handy Science Answer Book makes science and its impact on the world fun and easy to understand.

Clear, concise, and straightforward, this informative primer covers hundreds of intriguing topics, from the basics of math, physics, and chemistry to the discoveries being made about the human body, stars, outer space, rivers, mountains, and our entire planet. It covers plants, animals, computers, planes, trains, and cars. This friendly resource answers more than 1,600 of the most frequently asked, most interesting, and most unusual science questions, including ...

When was a symbol for the concept of zero first used?

How large is a google?

Why do golf balls have dimples?

What is a chemical bond?

What is a light year?

What was the grand finale of the Cassini mission?

How many exoplanets have been discovered?

Where is the deepest cave in the United States?

How long is the Grand Canyon?

What is the difference between weather and climate?

What causes a red tide?

What is cell cloning and how is it used in scientific research?

How did humans evolve?

Do pine trees keep their needles forever?

What is the most abundant group of organisms?

How do insects survive the winter in cold climates?

Which animals drink seawater?

Why do geese fly in formation?

What is FrogWatch?

Why do cats’ eyes shine in the dark?

Which industries release the most toxic chemicals?

What causes most wildfires in the United States?

Which woman received the Nobel Prize in two different fields (two different years)?

What is the difference between science and technology?

For anyone wanting to know how the universe, Earth, plants, animals, and human beings work and fit into our world, this informative book also includes a helpful bibliography, and an extensive index, adding to its usefulness. It will help anyone’s science questions!

New Book Release: Valiant or Virtuous?

Valiant or Virtuous? Gender Bias in Bible Translation by Suzanne McCarthy

This book explores a systematic bias in translating the Bible and in interpreting its teachings, which suggests that men are inherently suited to be leaders in the home, church, and community, while it is God’s plan for women to submit to men’s leadership. This erroneous understanding of the Bible has been promoted by certain influential evangelical Christian leaders in order to push back the growing influence of feminist attitudes, the expansion of women’s leadership roles, and the increase in egalitarian relationships among evangelicals in English-speaking North America. 

Written in a down-to-earth, engaging way, this book will appeal to young women searching the Bible for guidance on women’s roles in relationships and in the church. It highlights the dynamic roles played by women in the narratives of Old and New Testament and in the work of Bible translation. Built on a solid framework of biblical and linguistic scholarship, this book will also be of interest to Bible scholars and to anyone seeking a deeper understanding of what the Bible actually says in its original languages. 

New Book Release: The Call of the Mourning Dove

The Call of the Mourning Dove: How Sacred Sound Awakens Mystical Unity by Stephanie Rutt

Spiritual seekers across faith traditions share a fierce yearning for mystical unity with their God. While beliefs and practices differ, what ignites the human heart to quest for the mystical, the unknowable, the holy just beyond understanding, is the same. The Call of the Mourning Dove: How Sacred Sound Awakens Mystical Unity offers a new paradigm, the Sonic Trilogy of Love, that details how sacred sound, embedded in the ancient canons across faith traditions, creates just such a portal into this unmitigated experience of God. Because the experience is ubiquitous across faith traditions, it does not matter whether a seeker has embarked on an eclectic quest for God or remains deeply committed to questing within one particular faith tradition. All seekers, known as Lovers within the Trilogy, discover that by intoning the sacred sounds, the Love embedded in the ancient languages, the conditions are set to experience unity with God, the Beloved. This unity occurs in unforeseen moments, as love, the core organizing principle of the Trilogy, circles in on itself, dissolving all distinctions, leaving the Lover filled with only the silent wonder of God. And, graciously, nothing is the same. 

New Book Release: The Rage Against the Light

The Rage Against the Light: Why Christopher Hitchens was Wrong by Peter Harris

Christopher Hitchens was the most eloquent of the New Atheists. With great rhetorical polish and an encyclopedic mind for historical facts and literary quotations, he presents the case of anti-theism very effectively. Though now deceased, Hitchens’ arguments continue to reverberate through his best-selling books and online presence. God, asserts Hitchens, would be, if he existed, the greatest of dictators. Religion, according to Hitchens, is morally bankrupt and madly irrational. The world is better off without them! But is this true? It is the purpose of this book to identify Hitchens’ worldview in order to subject it to a critique that will powerfully expose its many flaws. Rather than a dictator, God will be shown to be a God of love. Christianity too will be revealed as a faith that ought to resist tyranny, provides the best foundation for intrinsic human value, and is a rational belief-system. In so doing, this book appeals to all who have been influenced or convinced by Hitchens’ arguments to reconsider their position and refuse to rage against the light. 

New Book Release: Viktor Frankl and the Book of Job

Viktor Frankl and the Book of Job: A Search for Meaning by Marshall Lewis

This book accomplishes two distinct tasks. First, it develops the psychological theory of Dr. Viktor E. Frankl as a literary hermeneutic. Second, it applies the hermeneutic by reading the book of Job. 

Key issues emerge through three movements. The first movement addresses Frankl’s concept of the feeling of meaninglessness and his rejection of reductionism and nihilism. The second movement addresses the dual nature of meaning; an association is revealed between Frankl’s understanding of meaning and the Joban understanding of wisdom. The third movement involves an exploration of Frankl’s ideas of ultimate meaning and self-transcendence.

As a Holocaust survivor, Frankl had a personal stake in the effectiveness of his approach. He lived the suffering about which he wrote. Because of this, reading the book of Job with a hermeneutic based on Frankl’s ideas will present readers with opportunities to discover unique meanings and serve to clarify their attitudes toward pain, guilt, and death. As meaning is discovered through participation with the text, we will see that Job’s final response can become a site for transcending suffering.

New Book Release: Extracted

Extracted: Unmasking Rampant Antisemitism in America's Higher Education by Perry Brickman

On a late summer day in 2006, Brickman and his wife attended an exhibit on the history of Jewish life at Emory University and were astonished to come face-to-face with documents that strongly suggested that Brickman and many others had been failed out of Emory’s dental school because they were Jewish. They decided to embark on an uncharted path to uncover the truth. With no initial allies and plenty of resistance, Brickman awoke each morning determined to continue extracting evidence hidden in deep and previously unmined archives. While the overt discrimination was displayed in charts and graphs, the names of the victims were scrupulously withheld.

The ability of the perpetrators to silence all opposition and the willingness of the Jewish community to submit to the establishment were deeply troubling as Brickman continued to dig deeper into the issue. Extracted brings to light the human element of the rampant antisemitism that affected the dental profession in twentieth-century America—the personal tragedies, the faces, and the individual stories of shame and humiliation. After five years of identifying, interviewing, and recording the victims, Brickman was finally permitted to present his documentary to Emory officials and ask for redemption for the stain she had made.