A Bar Mitzvah at the age of thirteen is a once in a lifetime event. The special significance of this time, the essence of what it means to be Bar Mitzvah, and the rewards and responsibilities that come with it are all expounded upon in Bar Mitzvah & Tefillin Secrets.As the Bar Mitzvah boy steps over the threshold from childhood into adulthood, he is introduced to the Mitzvah of Tefillin. Thorough instruction at this crucial time in both the procedure, as well as the meaning of the mitzvah and the intentions one must have while wearing tefillin - will formulate the basis for a lifetime of proper mitzvah observance.Bar Mitzvah & Tefillin Secrets contains over 200 color photos that demonstrate exactly how and where the tefillin should be worn, as well as many other fascinating customs related to Bar Mitzvah and Tefillin.

The Secrets of the Prayer Shawl is a short introduction to the purpose and meaning of the Prayer Shawl. It has been ordained by Hashem so that we may remember his constant presence in our lives all through the day so that we may live a holy life pleasing in His sight. It also acts as a private tent to meet God person to person.

This book is a collection of letters from a religious Jew in Israel to a Christian friend in Barcelona on life as an Orthodox Jew. Equal parts lighthearted and insightful, it's a thorough and entertaining introduction to the basic concepts of Judaism.

If Martin Baranek's memoir of his hellish journey were fiction, I would dismiss it as beyond comprehension. The fact that in this book Martin's own words testify in some detail to his experiences from ghetto to work camp to extermination camps to death march to liberation and eventual arrival to the Land of Israel, powerfully teaches us that the unbelievable actually happened. This is an eye opening window into humanity at its lowest and cruelest. It is also one human being's intense will to survive and rebuild his life anew. I found it riveting and gut wrenching. Martin Baranek's journey is a triumph of hope over despair. -Rabbi Gary Glickstein. "I first encountered Martin Baranek as an articulate and reflective survivor in the course of my research on the Wierzbnik ghetto and the Starachowice slave labor camps. As his powerful memoir records, these were but the first two circles of Hitler's inferno through which he descended in the years of the Holocaust. They were followed by Birkenau, Mauthausen, and Gunskirchen, with each stage of his incredible odyssey more challenging and horrifying that the previous one. Martin's overall story remains very powerful." -Christopher R. Browning, Frank Porter Graham Professor of History Emeritus. University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. "It has been said that a thousand doors had to open and close in the exact right time and succession in order for one to survive the Holocaust. If even one door opened or closed at the wrong time, your fate was sealed. Unlike 6 million other Jews, the doors Martin Baranek went through appeared for him at just the right time. But his survival was not just a matter of luck. Shining through on every page of this exceptionally moving tale are Martin's courage, perseverance and sheer will to live under the most brutal of conditions This painfully honest account is a true testament to the power of the human spirit to triumph over unimaginable adversity. Martin' story is a remarkable memoir that is nothing short of inspiring.You may have questions about God after reading this book - but you will most certainly believe in miracles." -Eli Rubenstein, National Director, March of the Living Canada.

Self-help fads come and go but the timeless Jewish practice of mussar, a strategy for ethical and spiritual character refinement, has been helping perceptive and purposeful people live fulfilling and happy lives for generations. After years of teaching mussar classes and workshops and marveling at the dramatic changes in participants' lives, Ruchi Koval provides a roadmap for all, filled with clear explanations and illustrative anecdotes guiding readers through eight practical and powerful steps to a better version of themselves.

Chaya Margolis is a sensitive and creative girl. She says the right thing, does the right things for everyone else. She lives for the stories that she is always writing because the world she creates shelters her from all the pain and disappointment she experienced as a child. Chaya has a secret. She seems to not only be at ease in her story world, but in the world of the dead. Suddenly, along came these dead spirits who put her on trial for not walking among the living. What verdict will they bring forth? Will Chaya survive having them excavate what she has tried so hard to keep buried? Or will the dead teach her how to live?

Jews and shoes / Edna Nahshon -- The biblical shoe : eschewing footwear : the call of Moses as biblical archetype / Ora Horn Prouser -- The halitzah shoe : between female subjugation and symbolic emasculation / Catherine Hezser -- The tombstone shoe : shoe-shaped tombstones in Jewish cemeteries in the Ukraine / Rivka Parciack -- The Israeli shoe : "biblical sandals" and native Israeli identity / Orna Ben-Meir -- The shtetl shoe : how to make a shoe / Mayer Kirshenblatt and Barbara Kirshenblatt-Gimblett -- The folkloristic shoe : shoes and shoemakers in Yiddish language and folklore / Robert A. Rothstein -- The Holocaust shoe : untying memory : shoes as Holocaust memorial experience / Jeffrey Feldman -- Wanderer's shoe : the cobbler's penalty : the wandering Jew in search for salvation / Shelly Zer-Zion -- The equalizing shoe : shoes as a symbol of equality in the Jewish society in Palestine during the first half of the twentieth century / Ayala Raz -- The fetishist's shoe : "poems of pedal atrocity" : sexuality, ethnicity, and religion in the art of Bruno Schulz / Andrew Ingall -- The artist's shoe : digging into the Jewish roots of shoe-field / Sonya Rapoport -- The theatrical shoe : the utterance of shoemaking : cobblers on the Israeli stage / Dorit Yerushalmi -- The cinematic shoe : Ernst Lubitsch's East European "touch" in Pinkus's Shoe Palace / Jeanette Malkin.