Mazal Tov/Mabrouk to ASF supporter, volunteer, and Syrian Sephardic Grandmom, Marilyn M. Faham, for returning to writing with the publication in The Jewish Voice of “Customs in Color: SUKKOT,” “an interactive piece to be read by parents and their children” on the beauty of Sephardic holiday traditions!
Click here to dedicate a future issue in honor or memory of a loved one.
Thank you to Sephardi World Weekly Patrons Professor Rifka Cook, Maria Gabriela Borrego Medina, and Distinguished ASF Vice President Gwen Zuares! Become a Patron today!
Please donatenowvia PayPal to support the American Sephardi Federation!
With your generous, tax-deductible donation, the ASF can cultivate and advocate, preserve and promote, as well as educate and empower!
For more information about sponsorship opportunities: email or leave a message at 212.294.8350. To donate by mail, please send a check payable to “American Sephardi Federation” to 15 W 16th St., New York, NY, 10011
Together, we can go from strength to strength in the New Year!
Pnina Tamano-Shata
(Photo courtesy of Global Fusion)
Pnina Tamano-Shata, Israel’s first-ever Ethiopian cabinet minister, understands that a crisis is a terrible thing to waste. Owing to Israel's budget crisis, no one is coordinating and prioritizing Corona-induced spending, and “money is suddenly available in unprecedented amounts.” Tamano-Shato “has a policymaker’s mind,” and she’s been leveraging the present confusion to advance projects that will aid new immigrants and lone soldiers: “‘I don’t like complicated systems, I don’t like bureaucracy. I like solutions.’”
Yaron Pe’er performs a Sukkot piyyut from the Afghani tradition, Yevorakh Shem Kavod (“Blessed be the Name of Glory”) by Yitzhak Ben David. Even though Ben David embedded his name as an acrostic in the beginning of each rhyme and added in the last line that he is the father of six sons, we know little else about him, including when and where he lived.
Gyðingakökur before baking
(Photo courtesy of Mona Guttormsen/Fjölmennt)
Ever eaten a “gyðingakökur”? It's an Icelandic desert whose name means, “Jewish cookie.” What's the deal? Apparently, these “Jewish” cookies travelled to Iceland via Denmark and Holland. In short, Sephardic Jews who were expelled from Spain and Portugal in the 15th and 16th centuries found refuge in Holland, where they remixed traditional Iberian foods with the local Scandinavian cuisine. This cultural fusion included cookies based on butter instead of olive oil. From there, “the cookies spread to Denmark where they became a traditional pre-Christmas treat.” With recipe.
Surviving Salvation: The Ethiopian Jewish Family in Transition
By Ruth K. Westheimer, Steven B. Kaplan
On May 25, 1991, a Boeing 747 packed with over 1,000 Ethiopian Jews left the besieged capital of Addis Ababa for Ben Gurion Airport near Tel Aviv. In the next 36 hours, 13,000 more Ethiopian Jews were to depart for Israel in what became known as Operation Solomon. After generations of praying and years of diplomatic wrangling, Ethiopia's Jews were at last going to the Promised Land. In the last twelve years, 40,000 Ethiopian Jews have left their native land and emigrated to Israel. Rarely in human history has an entire community been transplanted in such a short period from one civilization to another.
This is not a book about the journey of the Ethiopian Jews; rather, it is a chronicle of their experiences once they reached their destination. The focus of this work is the crucial issue of family life, examining how the personal relationships of the Ethiopian Jews are being radically transformed as they become assimilated into Israeli society. This engrossing and handsomely illustrated volume is the tale of their struggle and the emotional saga of their experiences in the Promised Land.
The Kosher Kitchen: A Guide To the Laws Of Kashrut By Rafael Avraham HaCohen Soae
A delightful, detailed book that includes the Laws of Kosher Meat and Vegetable Products according to the Shulchan Aruch, the Rama, and the Acharonim.
The Kosher Kitchen includes comprehensive explanations of Bee Honey, Bishul Nochre, Challah, Mother's Milk, the Priestly Gifts, Salting, Worms and Insects, and more.
Illustrations and explanations seek to provide a quick, visual study for those who have no time.
Sponsorship and Naming opportunities available: info@americansephardi.org
The ASF Institute of Jewish Experience presents:
Learn Arabic with Professor Daniel Tsadik
Always wanted to learn Arabic but never had the time/opportunity? Now you do!
Join us twice a week throughout the fall in the comfort of your own home.
Learn to read and write as well as basic Arabic language skills with Professor Daniel Tsadik of Yeshiva University.
17 online sessions
Every Monday & Wednesday
14 October through 9 December at 10 AM EDT
Sign-up Now! Registration required for the full course
Wednesday, 14 October at 12:00PM EDT Sina Kahen will discuss his new book, “Ideas: Bereshit,” ideas on the weekly Torah portion through a Western Sephardi lens. Sign-up Now!
Wednesday, 28 October at 12:00PM EDT Alma Rachel Heckman discusses her new book, “The Sultan’s Communists: Moroccan Jews and the Politics of Belonging.” Sign-up Now!
Enter for a chance to win a spot in the ASF’s Virtual Cookbook and other prizes!
Does your family have the best Sephardic recipe? Like to cook Sephardic? Let the world know by submitting your recipe to the ASF’s Great Sephardic Chef Competition. Entries will be judged by a panel of scholars, chefs, restaurateurs, and authors in the following categories:
Appetizers
Bread
Communities (Greek, Iraqi, Italian, Moroccan, Persian, Spanish, Syrian, et al...)
Desserts
Entrees
Grandma’s Favorite
Mom’s Best
Salads
Shabbat
Soups
Special Occasions & Creations
Vegan
Yom Tov
Submission Due Date: 15 October 2020 $10 per entry; unlimited entries!
Wednesday, 4 November at 12:00PM EDT Shalva Weil discusses her new book, “The Baghdadi Jews in India: Maintaining Communities, Negotiating Identities and Creating Super-Diversity.” Sign-up Now!
Wednesday, 11 November at 12:00PM EDT Stanley Mirvis discusses his new book, “The Jews of Eighteenth-Century Jamaica: A Testamentary History of a Diaspora in Transition.” An in-depth look at the Portuguese Jews of Jamaica and their connections to broader European and Atlantic trade networks. Sign-up Now!
Wednesday, 18 November at 12:00PM EDT Jane Gerber discusses her new book, “Cities of Splendour in the Shaping of Sephardi History.” Sign-up Now!
Wednesday, 25 November at 12:00PM EDT Cedric Cohen-Skalli discusses his new book, “Don Isaac Abravanel: An Intellectual Biography.” Sign-up Now!
Wednesday, 2 December at 12:00PM EDT Danny Bar Maoz discusses his new book, “Life without a Childhood in the Yemenite Jewish Community 1882-1948.”
The book is in Hebrew (חיים ללא ילדות בקהילות יהודי תימן 1882-1948) but the lecture will be given in English. Sign-up Now!
Wednesday, 9 December at 12:00PM EDT Aviva Ben-Ur discusses her new book, “Jewish Autonomy in a Slave Society: Suriname in the Atlantic World, 1651-1825.” Sign-up Now!
An online course presented in 10 minute episodes.
Learn at your own pace.
Please sign-up now! Total cost of the course is $75.00
The ASF Institute of Jewish Experience is proud to present “The Crypto Experience,” an online course on Crypto-Jews. It is part of a series of online courses on a variety of topics that make up the robust Jewish experience.
For hundreds of years there have been descendants of Crpto-Jews, who have covertly kept some of their traditions while maintaining a very different public persona. It is a question of identity, be it Huegenot, Catholic, Sephardi, or Mashadi. Professing one faith on the outside and another on the inside speaks to our quest for defining identity today.
These questions of identity that we think are so new and so relevant are really rather old questions under different circumstances. In this course Dr. Hilda Nissimi (Bar Ilan University) presents an overview of crypto societies historically and in the context of today. She challenges the participants to ask themselves difficult questions like: What defines identity? If I project this outer self, how do I keep my real me? Who is the real me? Am I the me before the expression of an outer facade? Is it a new me?
The course discusses these questions as they pertain to Jews, specifically. What does it mean to be a Jew? What do I have to keep if I want to call myself a Jew? Am I allowed to change? Am I the person to decide? Who will decide? How can anyone decide under such circumstances?
In order to understand this in historic and cultural contexts, world-renowned scholars and experts in the field have joined Dr. Nissimi and will be presenting the challenges facing a range of crypto societies:
Huegenots – Dr. Hilda Nissimi Spanish-Portuguese Crypto Society – Dr. Ronnie Perelis (Yeshiva University) Bildi’in of Morocco – Professor Paul Fenton (Sorbonne Université, Paris) Mashhadi Jews of Iran – Dr. Hilda Nissimi Tracing Jewish Roots – Genie and Michael Milgrom Growing Up Mashhadi– Reuben Ebrahimoff
The Greek Experience Explore the world of Greek Jewry from the ancient Romaniote to the Sephardim and others who made it to and through Greece.
An online course presented in 10 minute episodes.
Learn at your own pace.
Please sign-up now! Total cost of the course is $75.00
Jews have been in Greece since before the Temple was destroyed. They were in Greece upon the founding of the Greek Orthodox Church. Community members, known as Romaniote, made their way through Venice, Byzantium, Spain, across the Ottoman Empire, and beyond. Dr. Yitzchak Kerem provides an overview of the unique languages, liturgical nuances, and communal life of Jews across Greece. Dr Kerem spent significant time living in Greece and researching Greek and Sephardic history. Photographs, maps, and personal accounts provide course participants with a full picture of the unique nature of the Jews of Greece and its surroundings. In the course, participants will look at major influential points in Greek Jewish history. They will explore The Golden Age of Salonika, a time when Greece’s northern city was a hub of Jewish scholarship. Kerem introduces the tension arising in the Greek Jewish community because of Shabtai Tzvi and the Sabbateanism movement that brought with it false messianism and conversion to Islam, at least outwardly. The course looks at when the Alliance Israélite Universelle moved in and the Sephardic culture in Greece developed a rich secular culture with its own novels, theater, and music. This is part of the greater Jewish heritage and history that is often overlooked. ASF IJE online courses will bring to life all parts of the greater Jewish Experience.
“We have to unite our energies together. All Jews, together…. If we are united, all Sephardim and also Ashkenazim, together... we will see the light!”
~Enrico Macias
The ASF Institute of Jewish Experienceis uniquely dedicated to ensuring that today’s Jews know our history; appreciate the beauty, depth, diversity, and vitality of the Jewish experience; and have a sense of pride in Jewish contributions to civilization. Donate Now!
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The American Sephardi Federation is located at the Center for Jewish History (15 West 16th Street, New York, New York, 10011).