Memory & Redemption

Reflections on Jewish life from within

A Damaged Mirror

 

Read the Foreword by Rabbi Nathan Lopes Cardozo.

 

Start reading online now!
Or download a Sample Chapter

 

Excerpts from A Damaged Mirror

Recent Posts

  • The Great Hanukkah Cover-up: self-censorship and national survival
  • The Time of Our Rejoicing – In spite of everything
  • Making order of the Passover Seder
  • The Post War Challenge: Learning from successes as well as failures
  • Knowing the Way Home

Topics

  • Home
  • About Yael Shahar
    • Yael Shahar – Author bio
    • Becoming a Different Yael Shahar
    • The Revival of the Dead: A personal journey
    • Writing as Self-Transformation: Kasva Press interviews Yael Shahar
    • Book a speaking engagement, lecture, or interactive workshop
    • Contact Yael Shahar
  • For Book Clubs & Educators
    • Resources for Book Clubs & Educators
    • About the Book
    • Reader’s guide
    • Reflections & Resources on T’shuvah – Free download
    • Moral Dilemmas in the Holocaust: Discussion topics
    • Returning: Glossary of Hebrew terms
  • Blog: Reflections & Musings

The Night a Sonderkommando absolved God

May 1, 2019 by Yael Shahar Leave a Comment

A poem in honor of Yom HaShoah 5779. A Sonderkommando’s memories and the role of the living.

The seeds planted on Tisha b’Av

July 24, 2015 by Ovadya ben Malka 1 Comment

The seeds planted on Tisha b’Av, a poem by Ovadya ben Malka: “A curse and a blessing were laid on us that day. Having lived the curse, can we doubt that blessing will come as well?”

On the Liberation of Birkenau

January 27, 2015 by Ovadya ben Malka 1 Comment

On the liberation of Birkenau. Only those who’ve known the depths can known the full impact of redemption. A poem by Ovadya ben Malka.

The Past in the Rear-view Mirror

January 18, 2015 by Ovadya ben Malka Leave a Comment

A poem by Ovaday ben Malka on memory and our inability to flee from the past.

Our Last Journey

April 27, 2014 by Ovadya ben Malka 1 Comment

My past has faded away into nothing
Leaving shreds of longing.
The sea.
The sound of the waves.
My mother’s voice
The feel of my sister’s hair as she slept,
her head in my lap.

Incident on Line 409

March 1, 2014 by Yael Shahar Leave a Comment

Listening to Sufi oud and flute,
Thinking mellow Sufi thoughts as I code html.
The bones inside the book.
Suddenly, a sharp jab!
I stop, afraid to look too closely at the wound….

The Revival of the Dead: A Poem by Ovadya ben Malka

August 1, 2013 by Ovadya ben Malka Leave a Comment

T’chiat HaMetim means being reborn to see death for what it is, and to know that those things are most precious that can be taken from us in the blink of an eye

Dazzling… Returning is an extraordinary and challenging book on many levels.
– Philip K. Jason, Washington Independent Review of Books

Intriguing! At times dark and haunting, at times lyrical and introspective, Returning resonates long after “the end”!
– Dan Sofer, author of the Dry Bones Society trilogy

Returning is a compelling, puzzling, remarkably honest story of a Jew’s sins against his people and his tradition, and of his search for forgiveness and restoration.
– Bill Tammeus, Faith Matters

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Yael Shahar

Yael Shahar

Yael Shahar is the author of Returning. She spent most of her career working in security and intelligence, with brief forays into teaching astronomy and physics. She now divides her time between researching trends in terrorism and learning Talmud with anyone who will sit still long enough.

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"In those circumstances we are reduced to bare existence, bereft of all that we once believed to define us. Naked, we have no pockets in which to store the things that we once used in the natural trade of human interactions. Instead, we come to value a different currency—our humanity. It is this currency that truly defines us, and even death cannot entirely devalue it. The more is taken away, the more we value what is left."

 

- Ovadya ben Malka, A Damaged Mirror

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“We stand on the edge of the abyss, across whose unknowable face we paint meaning so as not to see into it. It is always there. But we’re here too, and we are no less real than the abyss. We are no less meaningful for being transient creatures caught up in something too big for us. There is still value to our lives. I’ve learned that those things that are most fragile are also the most precious.”

 

― Ovadya ben Malka, A Damaged Mirror

Top Posts & Pages

  • HaRav Adin Steinsaltz: A place at the four dimensional table
  • Parashat Terumah: The Tent of the King
  • We have met the enemy... The Jewish terrorists among us
  • It is not in Heaven: Musings on the Meaning of Torah min Shamayim
  • Yael Shahar - Home
  • Haveil Havelim Jewish Blog Carnival
  • Book Review: The Disappearance of God by Richard Elliot Friedman
  • The Law of the King: individual commandment or national constitution?
  • Book Review: An Unexpected Afterlife by Dan Sofer
Cover_3D_small

 

With a new Foreword by Rabbi Nathan Lopes Cardozo.

View a Sample Chapter

 

Excerpts from A Damaged Mirror

Main Topics

  • Book Reviews
  • Featured
  • Guest Posts
  • Halakhic Process
  • Hashkafah & Jewish Thought
  • Havruta with a One-Eyed Cat
  • Memory & History
  • Miscellaneous
  • Parashat HaShavua
  • Poetry
  • Returning
  • T'shuvah & Healing
  • The Jewish Year
  • Writing & Publishing

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