Jonathan Blum, Red Heifer with Frog (oil on monoprint collage, 24" x 48"). http://www.jonathanblumportraits.com
Social Justice
Shulamit Seidler-Feller
Marjorie Dove Kent speaks to Congregation B’nai Jeshurun at the 2012 Rabbi Marshall T Meyer Risk Taker Awards Credit: Shulamit Seidler-Feller
As a Landmark Civil Rights Trial Unfolds, A Passover Call to Action
Marjorie Dove Kent Hopes to Pack the Courts before a Seder in the Streets This Week
“East Flatbush is calling for calm,” said Marjorie Dove Kent, executive director of Jews for Racial and Economic Justice (JFREJ), on Sunday. The killing of Kimani Gray coincides with Floyd v. City of New York, a federal class-action lawsuit filed by the Center for Constitutional Rights against the NYPD, challenging its practice of “suspicionless and race-based stops” against “hundreds of thousands if not millions of people.” Opening arguments for the trial were heard on Monday. This Wednesday, March 20th, Kent hopes the Jewish community will pack the courtroom in downtown Manhattan, then celebrate with Seder in the Streets, the latest installment of Jews for Racial and Economic Justice’s trademark boldness.
Culture
A Not-So-Brief Reflection on Limmud NY 2013 Through Twitter
If Twitter is all about about capturing a moment in time, what happens when we look back? @EstherK reflects on the Twitter trail of Limmud NY 2013. From @ to #.
Social Justice
Letter from the (New) Editor
Zeek is back.
After a stint of recalibrating, we’re rolling out a new incarnation of Zeek, and I’m both proud and a bit giddy to be taking over as editor in chief.
My biggest hope for Zeek? That our readers (you!) will find an online magazine that’s unlike any other — one that showcases the people, ideas and conversations driving an inclusive and diverse Jewish community. One that’s smart, progressive, and Jewish. The kind of magazine that engages people. Inspires action and innovation. Isn’t the least bit shy about rabble-rousing or kickstarting debate.So here’s what to look for: an online magazine that’s unabashedly progressive, covers the vitality and voices of a growing movement, and profiles and promotes the ways Jews pursue justice in America. We’ll tell the kinds of stories that make clear and urgent the links between social justice and Judaism, while keeping a sense of humor.
Social Justice
A Green Gevalt: Nigel Savage and David Weisberg on the Hazon/Freedman merger and the Jewish environmental movement
On December 3, 2012, two of the Jewish world’s leading environmental organizations announced their merger. Zeek’s Jay Michaelson sat down with Nigel Savage, founder of Hazon, and David Weisberg, executive director of Isabella Freedman, for a in-depth conversation about what it all means.
Social Justice
Jewish Youth Activism: A Model for Leadership Development?
The Jewish community needs innovative responses and approaches to foster engagement in our future. In order to create leaders who create Jewish experiences rather than merely consume them, we need to engage youth around Jewish issues that have meaning and purpose.
Social Justice
What is the Jewish Social Justice Agenda?
We must expand what is meant by “Jewish issues” beyond Israel and antisemitism. At a recent White House event in Washington DC, dozens of Jewish leaders talked about what that broader agenda should be. Here are some of them.
Fiction + Poetry
Five Stories
It cost me a great effort to discover the hidden secret of the things, but soon I was seized with panic because without my realizing it, I lost the sense of their simplicity.
From The Archive
Excuse me, Are you…?
Who are we? Like most of us, my friend David has a number of separate worlds which tend not to collide except when there’s a big event, when the inhabitants of his separate orbits are brought together and we see him in a larger context.
The War Against Tolerance (with response from Phyllis Chesler)
Rifqa Bary is an Ohio teen who ran away from home after converting to Christianity. Jews and Evangelicals banded together to save her from her Muslim family. They saw their effort as being part of a global struggle against Islam. What they were really fighting was multiculturalism. Phyllis Chesler, quoted in the article, responds.
Not the Israel My Parents Promised Me
This is the last work of the late, great Harvey Pekar, who passed away two years ago at the age of 70: an autobiographical, narrative account of Pekar’s own relationship to the Land and State of Israel (which he never visited). It’s a political work, but primarily a personal story of lessons half-learned, allegiances formed and broken.
Howard Zinn, 1922-2010
America’s best-known progressive historian passed away on Wednesday. The son of European immigrants, Zinn’s combination of activism and academia epitomized the values of the Jewish community at its best. A 2001 interview, reprinted from Bad Subjects.
Tel Aviv Wake Up
Just a few days ago, two Arab girls were prevented from entering Dizengoff Center due to their ethnic origin and what they were wearing. It was without any justification… And no one is speaking up.
Religion
Families, Holy and... there is no other kind: A Jewish Ayahuasca Journey
I saw, behind my father, his father, and his father, and his. I saw, behind him and to his left, his mother, and her parents, and hers. Stretching backward in time, I saw generations of my ancestors, not in any particular detail, but like a phalanx of men and women supporting me and holding me. And then, above and behind my father, I had a vision of something that felt like the God of our ancestors, of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob
Religion
In Defense of the Online Minyan
The synagogue in ancient Alexandria, Egypt, was so large that they had to wave flags so that the people in the back knew when to answer “amen.” The online service is essentially the same thing.
Social Justice
Hearing the Healers
“Healing” is an abstract word, but the experiences we have as healers are concrete and specific. Here, read the voices of three people engaged in the healing process: a military chaplain, a hospice volunteer, and a social worker experiencing her own grief.
Fiction + Poetry
Winners of the Anna Davidson Poetry Prize
The Anna Davidson Rosenberg Prize for Poetry on the Jewish Experience has been awarded since 1987 and is funded by the Dorothy Sargent Rosenberg Memorial Fund. We are pleased to publish the winning poems here, by Dan Bellm, Jehanne Dubrow, and Anna Torres.
Culture
Merle Feld Finds Her Words
Liturgy and family, awe and anger, these mixed ingredients produce a book best savoured in small bites.
![[the current issue of ZEEK]](https://swap.stanford.edu/was/20100322163935im_/http://zeek.forward.com/image/2/100/0/5//uploads/zeek-winter10cover-4ccf2baa.jpg)
- 5000 Pages of Zeek
- Founded in 2001, Zeek was the first Jewish online magazine, and we have over 5000 pages online to prove it, all available free of charge. Read more in the Archive.
