In these perilous times, rabbis have been begging the Jewish people to be especially careful to avoid baseless hatred and negative and destructive speech, and to increase acts of baseless love and positive speech.
Fortunately for the English reader, multiple books have been published on these topics, all designed to help us refine our character in these ways. Here are four inspirational classics worth reading for the first time or pulling from the shelf and rereading.
1. Living Kiddush Hashem: Sanctifying Hashem in everything we do, by Rabbi Shraga Freedman (2014)
We have all witnessed the sudden and shocking rise in antisemitism. At such a time, it is especially important for Jewish people to behave in a way that sanctifies God’s name in the world rather than desecrating it.
Living Kiddush Hashem reviews sensitive topics such as how to respect all of humanity; how to be a person who only speaks truth; how to rebuke a person who has strayed, in a way that does not embarrass him or her; how to find meaning in tragedy; and how to serve God in the way our specific life circumstances allow.
The book’s appendix includes 21 short lessons on ways that Shabbat and the Jewish holidays offer opportunities to serve as a reflection of God’s goodness. The reader should be aware that the book does assume a significant level of Jewish literacy.
2. Loving Kindness: Daily lessons in the power of giving, by Chana Nestlebaum (2003)
The book is divided into 178 brief lessons, each no more than two pages long. The book’s format is based on the behavioral idea that studying a topic daily over many months is more effective in creating real change than immersing oneself in a topic over a short period. Thus, the book contains six months’ worth of short lessons.
The daily lessons in Loving Kindness focus on the importance of undertaking acts of kindness and how to do so successfully. For example, the lesson for Day 77 details how to run a free-loan society, with reasonable guidelines that allow the fund administrator to handle the community’s charitable donations responsibly, without being taken advantage of.
The book includes many relevant teachings from the Torah, the Talmud, and other rabbinic works about how helping others through acts of kindness benefits us. For example, the lesson for Day 159 reminds the reader that God “is close to the brokenhearted” (Psalms 34:19). The application of this verse suggests that someone who visits a shiva house that is not particularly well attended is bestowing a kindness on someone who is especially treasured by God.
In the 19th century, Rabbi Yisrael Meir ha-Kohen Kagan, popularly known as the Hafetz Hayim, published a book called Ahavat Hessed. Rabbi Fishel Schachter taught a series of classes based on that classic Torah book, and those classes were adapted for publication in Loving Kindness.
3. The Garden of Gratitude, by Rabbi Shalom Arush. Translated by Rabbi Lazer Brody (2011)
Each of the 13 chapters of The Garden of Gratitude is divided into a dozen or more brief sections that focus on the central idea that expressing gratitude to God for all our blessings helps avert disaster and brings the ultimate redemption closer.
Rabbi Arush writes with very clear language, such as this passage from Chapter 4 about suffering. “No one wants to suffer. But if we do encounter suffering in our lives, then Rebbe Nahman explains that it is all for our benefit. The purpose of tribulations is to bring us closer to Hashem.”
The Garden of Gratitude also explains how increasing our expressions of gratitude to God is not just good for the world, it’s also an antidote to personal despair and sadness.
4. The Other Side of the Story, by Yehudis Samet (1996)
We are all prone to judging others without understanding the bigger picture. The Other Side of the Story includes almost 200 true stories of times when people were so sure that their negative assessment of another person’s behavior in an everyday situation was accurate, only to find out that they were missing certain critical information.
The book offers a deep understanding of why it’s so important to judge others favorably and provides many practical tips about how to do so.
- 1. LIVING KIDDUSH HASHEM
- By Rabbi Shraga Freedman
- ArtScroll
- 424 pages; $24
- 2. LOVING KINDNESS
- By Chana Nestlebaum
- ArtScroll
- 392 pages; $29
- 3. THE GARDEN OF GRATITUDE
- By Rabbi Shalom Arush
- Translated by Rabbi Lazer Brody
- 380 pages; $20
- 4. The Other Side of the Story
- By Yehudis Samet
- ArtScroll
- 318 pages; $20