Companions for your learning journey
THE TIME has come… to delight in the cultural riches that wait for us, for our eyes, our imaginations, our creativity.” These were the words of Dr Ruth Calderon’s maiden speech in the Knesset, referring to the Talmud — and now, heading into a new academic year, they are aptly quoted by Rabbi Neil Janes, executive director of the Lyons Learning Project and member of the rabbinic team of West London Synagogue, central London. Autumn is the traditional time to try something new and there is no shortage of courses for adults to enjoy.
Among those offered by the Lyons Learning Project is My Jewish London. Filmmaker and writer Searle Kochberg has researched and created a series of mini documentaries of “Jews like you and me”, walking their London to tell their biography. Now he will help students to create their own understanding of “my Jewish London”.
Also part of the Lyons Learning Project is a course on the contribution made by Jewish women to the suffrage movement. This will be led by Rabbi Sybil Sheridan and will include a walking tour of significant sites.
Images of God are the topic for Professor Andrew Benjamin’s course, following a path through the Book of Genesis, Greek philosophy and modern Jewish philosophy.
And indeed, you can also study the Talmud with Rabbi Neil Janes. “No previous knowledge of Talmud or ability to read Hebrew is needed,” says Rabbi Janes, “but an interest in life and moral and ethical dilemmas may get you hooked”.
The Lyons Learning Project is also offering a Melton course on Israeli SociLiterature as a Window to its Society. (The Florence Melton School of Adult Learning is a global programme organised by the Hebrew University.)
In weekly sessions, followed by five more during the West London Synagogue Israel tour, Rabbi Janes will lead a literary journey that offers a fresh and fascinating examination of Israeli society since the birth of the state in 1948. On this journey, “profound insights into the Israeli national psyche as reflections of the mythic Israel are matched by poetry and prose that is challenging and self-critical”.
Another Melton course — Jewish Mysticism: Tracing the History of Kabbalah, also led by Rabbi Janes, delves “beyond Madonna, red strings, and hocus pocus” and offers students the framework to understand the development of Jewish mysticism while using the primary texts that have been central to that tradition.
Bookings for all these courses can be made at lyonslearning.org.uk
In north west London, the JW3 community centre has courses on subjects from history to political to skills, from the First World War to bananas (yes, there really is a talk on Bananas and the Jewish Question).
You can get fit with Pilates and Feldenkrais and, in the evenings, get to grips with an eclectic selection of topics including psychoanalysis, Churchill, Esperanto, Nietzsche, Rosenberg, Klimt and Garbo.
There will be a two-day seminar commemorating 100 years since the end of the First World War, with sessions on Jewish soldiers during the war; whether the war was “good for the Jews”; marking the centenary and Churchill and the Jews.
Andrew Roberts’s new biography of Churchill, Walking with Destiny, highlights the leader’s lifelong relationship with our community. In conversations with Richard Cohen, Roberts will investigate why despite being born an aristocrat in Victorian Britain, Churchill was a philo-semite, indeed a Zionist who played a part in the Balfour Declaration and why he was unable to initiate the bombing of Auschwitz. Other highlights include a celebration of Ludwik Zamenhof and Esperanto. Polish-Jewish linguist Zamenhof grew up fascinated by the idea of a world without war, which he believed could happen with the help of a new international auxiliary language. He developed Esperanto in 1873 while still in school. This event is in Partnership with the Polish Cultural Institute.
Kristallnacht: Thoughts for the Future is part of the JW3 programme for November. Anita Lasker-Wallfish, who survived Auschwitz as a member of the women’s orchestra (and co-founded the English Chamber Orchestra), will converse with Niklas Frank, whose father, Dr Hans Frank was Governor of Nazi-occupied Poland. Frank has repudiated his father and spends his time warning new generations about the future.
Hagai Segal was one of the first teachers to feature at JW3’s launch five years ago and is returning to explore and explain the latest developments in the Middle East, including the SyriaIraq dynamic, ISIS/IS/Daesh and IsraeliPalestinian relations.
Rabbi Michael Harris will talk on Nietzsche and Soloveitchik. You might not think the philosophy of confirmed atheist Friedrich Nietzsche has anything in common with that of the leading Modern Orthodox thinker Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik. But in their new book, Daniel Rynhold and Rabbi Harris argue it might be surprisingly fruitful to consider some central aspects of Soloveitchik’s thought through a Nietzschean lens. The discussion will be accessible for newcomers to both Nietzsche and Soloveitchik.
This year, Vienna is celebrating the art of Klimt and Schiele on the centenary of their deaths. The Royal Academy of Arts, in a collaboration with the Albertina Museum in Vienna, is offering a rare opportunity to see some of the 20th century’s most important works on paper.
Art historian Patrick Bade will give JW3 guests a special insight to enable them to get the most out of their visit or just to learn about these significant artists. Patrick is an acclaimed cultural art historian and former senior lecturer at Christie’s Education.
Dr Aviva Dautch of the British Library
Delve beyond Madonna and red strings’
will lead a session on Isaac Rosenberg, best known for his poems, many written while serving on the Western Front, but also a fine painter who studied at the Slade School of Art and exhibited at the Whitechapel Gallery. To commemorate the anniversary of his birth, the session will look at Rosenberg’s Jewish identity and creative life and ask how an East End Jew became known as the most remarkable of the British poets killed in the First World War.
JW3 will partner Rene Cassin to study the Universal Declaration of Human Rights on its 70th anniversary. The genesis and values of the declaration are intrinsically linked to Jewish experience. As today’s world is marked by increasing volatility, inequality and nationalism, the session asks whether the declaration has fulfilled its promise as the dawn of a new era.
Seed, the Jewish adult and family learning organisation, runs a variety of groups. For women, there is Duties of the Heart, Life Skills Through the Eyes of our Sages, held at private homes in Mill Hill, north west London and Women
to Women, “a programme for women on topical and practical subjects” — with breakfast. If you would like to learn a Jewish topic of your choice, Seed will help you set up a study group in your own home. One-to-one learning — the format that made Seed famous — is also still available. Study partners come together to debate and discuss a wide variety of Jewish topics. A Seed family seminar is to be held in November in Daventry, under the
banner of “Just as long as they’re happy” — is that all we want for our children?. The week-long seminar includes children’s programme and crèche.
Whether you are looking for intellectual stimulation, spiritual inspiration or to improve your Hebrew before your next holiday in Israel, there is something for you at the London School of Jewish Studies.
“Podcast-type recordings” can be downloaded via social media and on the LSJS website from wherever you are in the world. You can listen to seven seven-minute thoughts on the days between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, with topics ranging from “where to find God” to “personal change” and “self-sacrifice”. These snippets of learning are short enough for all of us to fit into our busy lives.
Starting after Succot, the LSJS autumn term programme provides both daytime and evening lecture options, including the popular modern Hebrew classes.
Daytime lecture topics include modern Jewish literature, with a book club focusing on works by Jewish authors, this term including Forest Dark by
Nicole Krauss and Goodbye Columbus by Philip Roth.
Alternatively, you can take a course that critically analyses biblical characters in the book of Genesis or study the works of Soloveitchik (this time without the Nietzsche).
This term’s evening options include lectures addressing cutting-edge halachic questions such as gender reassignment, marrying a non-Jew and women’s roles. A new course, by psychologist Rabbi Steven Dansky, will analyse how our emotions interact with our ability to practise Judaism.
LSJS is also addressing the current antisemitism crisis. On November 19, Professor Michael Berkowitz of University College London will give a special guest lecture, with the title Why Hate
Jews?, explaining the origins, meaning and shape-shifting of antisemitism.
Museum tours are a hugely popular part of LSJS’s calendar. Noah’s Ark and Chanukah will form the basis of trips to the British Museum’s Mesopotamian Artefacts and Ancient Greece Collection, challenging participants to understand the significance of these ancient stories in the context of world history.
There are also tours at the National Portrait Gallery, uncovering intriguing stories behind Jewish portraits, as well as the monarchs these people served and the societal figures with whom they mingled.
All lectures can be booked online at
lsjs.ac.uk or by phone on 020 8203 6427 and attended as a complete series or on a lecture-by-lecture basis.
If you are looking for professional development or an intellectually stimulating degree programme, LSJS offers a range of options at undergraduate and postgraduate level.
The BA (Honours) in Jewish education, validated by Middlesex University, is available as a part-time programme, both on campus and online. Suitable for recent school leavers as well as mature students and career changers, the programme provides an excellent foundation for careers in education and related fields. Graduates who are interested in a career in teaching can choose from a number of options provided by the LSJS Jewish Teacher Training Partnership, which is ranked outstanding by Ofsted. Training is available for aspiring teachers of Jewish studies and secular subjects, at both primary and secondary level.
The MA in Jewish education, validated by Middlesex University, offers pedagogical insight and innovative teaching ideas.
Taught part-time over two years, on campus or online, the MA provides students — including rabbis, school leaders, informal educators and others involved in education — with the skills and knowledge to improve their schools and communities and progress their careers. For more information, contact jane.clist@lsjs.ac.uk or phone 020 8203 6427.
How do our emotions affect our practice of Judaism?’