Arts & Entertainment ON THE BOOKSHELF Endangered Species? A worried Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz tackles problems facing the future of Judaism. Sandee Brawarsky Special to the Jewish News A n interviewer of Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz can ask a single question, sit back and witness an amazing stream of topics, the workings of an uncommon mind. The rabbi's clear blue eyes light up when he knows he has taken a particular- ly satisfying ramble. Many speak of his genius: A master of talmu- dic law and of Judaism's hidden wisdom, his interests and com- mand of subjects is vast. Rabbi Steinsaltz is a man who moves easily in many worlds. He is devoted to his family, has writ- ten more than 60 books and set up institutions of Jewish learning in several countries. He is sought out by religious leaders of other faiths and major thinkers in vari- ous fields. He has met with the Dalai Lama, Alan Dershowitz, Leon Kass and Woody Allen, and has studied Talmud with Itzhak Perlman as well as a group in Washington, including the late Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan, Justice Antonin Scalia and Sen. Joseph Lieberman. His new book, We Jews: Who Are We and What Should We Do? (Jossey-Bass; $24.95), showcases the quality of his mind and the depth of his concern for the Jewish people. The book includes profound questions along with provocative answers that lead to more questions, covering such topics as assimilation, leadership, Jewish identity, Jewish character, stereotypes of Jews, chosenness, anti-Semitism, the Jews' role in the world and the Jewish future. He also discusses issues of holi- ness, faith, messianism and prayer. For Rabbi Steinsaltz, Jews are an endangered species — and he's worried. Family Conversation "This is a book about Jews:' he 60 writes. "It is a private, intimate conversation within the Jewish family." And family is how he defines the Jewish people — not as a religion, nation, race or ethnic group. "To be a member of a family is a fact that a person can relate to emotionally in any manner he pleases, but he cannot alter the fact or cut the tie Rabbi Steinsaltz writes. "He is geneti- cally bound up with the family past, and thereby also bound to its present and future." Each of the 12 chapters con- cludes with questions posed by Rabbi Steinsaltz's longtime editor and student, Arthur Kurzweil, who also wrote the foreword. To Kurzweil's question of whether the Jews are a dysfunctional fam- ily, Rabbi Steinsaltz replies that Jews function — with their infighting and disputes and also defense of one another — like a normal but not ideal family. In his first chapter, "Are We Actors with Masks?" he writes of the innate ability of Jews to imi- tate others, particularly their hosts in other nations, in their interior and exterior lives. Over generations, Jews have been able to wander from place to place and truly fit in, becoming at times "more English than the English, more French than the French." But this chameleon-like quality has its considerable strains and dangers when Jews lose the essence of who they are. In the chapter titled "What Will Become of the Jewish People he calls for an unprece- dented effort of renewal. He explains that Jews cannot rely on their past, that Jewish education should not just be for children but also for their parents and grandparents, and that it's possi- ble to create a second center of Jewish life in the diaspora. In a voice full of hope, Rabbi Steinsaltz concludes that many Jews, even if estranged from Judaism, are first-rate people who "can become the foundation for a different, better future!' Self-Taught The book grew out a series of essays Rabbi Steinsaltz wrote more than a decade ago while a scholar at the Woodrow Wilson Institute in Washington, D.C. "In many ways the book is more timely now than when it was written," he says in a conver- sation that turns out to be more about current interests rather than his latest book. The book of which he spoke most was the one he was reading at the time, a 1929 biography of the French statesman Joseph Fouche by the Austrian writer Stefan Zweig. Rabbi Steinsaltz, the recipient of the Israel Prize and the French Order or Arts and Literature, was born in Jerusalem in 1937 and grew up as the only child of a decidedly non-religious, socialist family. He studied physics and chemistry at Hebrew University and began his journey to Orthodoxy as a teenager. Although Time magazine profiled Rabbi Steinsaltz in 1988 — refer- ring to him as a "once in a mil- lennium scholar" — several American Jews have followed his . A. Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz "Once-in-a-Millennium Scholar" —Time Magazine S Who Are We and What Should We Do? "Our 'chosen' status' demands that we be the priests to the world," writes Rabbis Steinsaltz in We Jews. career from an earlier time. "He doesn't sound how he looks," says Steve Shaw, a rabbi, organizational consultant and field naturalist who met Rabbi Steinsaltz in Israel in 1964 and is one of his oldest friends in the United States."That's part of the fascination with him!' Shaw adds, "He has a voice and a stance that's hard to classify, with a great sense of humor. He's basically an autodidact!' When Shaw first encountered the young red-haired rabbi, he was seeking answers to some profound questions. "He speaks from an Orthodox Jewish tradition, but he- breaks all the stereotypes:' Shaw says. During Shaw's years of run- ning the Radius Institute in the 1970s and '80s, he brought Rabbi Steinsaltz to the United States and had him speak about the Talmud to new audiences and in dialogue with various public fig- ures about the dilemmas of modernity. "As someone who studied both math and physics as well as probed the depths of Jewish mys- ticism, he's capable of seeing a level or reality that most of us have no contact with," Shaw says. As Shaw points out, those who are familiar with concepts of Lurianic Kabbalah and the Tanya will find much that resonates in this latest book. Rabbi Herbert Weiner's vivid and sensitive portrait of Rabbi Steinsaltz in his 1969 book 91/, Mystics remains timely. When Rabbi Weiner first met Rabbi Steinsaltz in Jerusalem, he found his ideal teacher in the 26-year- old rabbi. Rabbi Weiner recounts that when the then president of Israel, Zalman Shazar, held a reception to celebrate the publi- cation of the first volume of the Steinsaltz edition of the Talmud, religious authorities and Talmud scholars joined with representa- tives of Israel's Socialist Party. In Rabbi Weiner's words, October 6 • 2005