Shalom Freedman

Shalom (Seymour) Freedman (born June 17, 1942) is an American-Israeli writer, thinker, poet, and public intellectual.As a “Jewish writer” his best-known work consists of conversations with thinkers and spiritual leaders centering on the concept of "avodat Hashem" or service of God. As a public intellectual his work has touched on a wide variety of issues regarding the human condition and future, while focusing most urgently on Israel’s struggle for survival and wellbeing.

Early Years and Education

Born in Troy, New York, to Reuben (Kelly) Freedman and Edith (Zeibert) Freedman, he graduated from Harpur College (now Binghamton University) in 1964. He received his M.A. (thesis: “"The Influence of the Religious Thought of Henry James Sr. on the Philosophy of William James"”) and Ph.D. (thesis: “"The American-Jewish Novel"”) in English Literature and American Studies from Cornell University, under the guidance of Professor Cushing Strout.

Aliyah to Israel

Troubled by the threat to the survival of Israel in the October 1973 Yom Kippur War, in early 1974 he made "aliyah" (immigrated) to Israel. This aliyah to Israel also became a process of "teshuva" or return to traditional Jewish religious practice. In this he was inspired by Rabbis Eliyahu Barness and Chaim Pearl, and in a later phase by the teacher of Hasidism, David Herzberg.

Books

In addition to countless articles and Web postings, Freedman has published eight books. Four of these have been selected as Jewish Book Club selections of the month.

His books include a work of Jewish aphoristic thought, “"Life as Creation: A Jewish Way of Thinking of the World",” the autobiographical “"Seven Years in Israel: A Zionist Storybook",” a book of poetry, “"Mourning for My Father",” and a philosophical journal, “"Small Acts of Kindness: Striving for Derech Eretz in Everyday Life in Israel".” His three works of conversations with Jewish religious and spiritual teachers focus on how they perceive their own "avodat Hashem" or Service of God. One of these works centers on and is largely the work of Rabbi Irving (Yitz) Greenberg. Among the distinguished rabbis and Torah teachers included in these conversations are Rabbis Shlomo Riskin, Berel Wein, Shubert Spero, Adin Steinsaltz, David Hartman, Nachum Rabinowitz, Aharon Rakeffet, Chaim Eisen, Mendel Lewittes, Natan Lopes Cardozo, Dr. Miriam Adahan, and more than thirty others. His most recent published book is a biography of former Israel Chief Rabbi Shlomo Goren.

Book Reviewing/Internet Writing

His book reviews have appeared in "The Jerusalem Post, Midstream, The Journal of Jewish Political Studies, The Jewish Press, H-Net," and JBooks. As an “Internet writer” he is a “Top Fifty Amazon Reviewer” where he has done over three thousand book reviews. His book reviews focus on Israel, Jewish Thought, Poetry, Middle East Affairs, English and American Literature, the Human Situation. His television reviews attempt to provide a brief description and critical commentary on many of the segments of America’s most wide-ranging cultural program, “"The Charlie Rose Show".”

Jewish Political Affairs and Israel Advocacy Writing

The concern with the survival and wellbeing of Israel is at the heart of his public writing. In recent years he has written extensively on the threat presented to Israel by Iranian nuclear ambitions. Among those who have contributed to his thought on Israel’s situation and struggle are P. David Hornik, Dr. Joel Fishman, Moshe Bobrovsky z”l, Dr. Manfred Gerstenfeld, Dr. Yaakov Fogelman, Yossi Klein-Halevi, Barry Rubin, Hillel Halkin, Vic Rosenthal, Isi Leibler, Alan Dershowitz, and Natan Sharansky. He is a regular political columnist for the "Arutz Sheva" website. He has also contributed political articles to "H-Net, Intervention.com, Nativ, Jerusalem Post, Israel Insider, Jewish Political Studies Review, Jewish Press, JBooks, Milnet".

His Israel advocacy letters and posts have appeared in more than one hundred national and international publications including "Commentary", "The New York Times", "IHT", "The New Republic", "The Times of London", "The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists", "The China Times".

Poetry

A member of the "Israel Association for Writers in English", he has been an editor of its journal, "Arc", and a regular contributor to Israel’s best-known English poetry journal (founded by the late Reuben Rose, and long edited by Mark Levinson) “"Voices Israel".” In a survey article on Israeli poetry, Professor Howard Schwartz cited him as among the significant writers of English-language poetry in Israel. A selection of his poems from "Mourning for my Father" is included in Alan Kay’s "Jewish Book of Comfort". The most comprehensive, easily accessible sampling of his poetry appears on the PoemHunter.com website [http://poemhunter.com/shalom-freedman/] . An E-book of 150 poems is also available from this site.

Thought

Freedman’s thought centers on the ongoing struggle of the Jewish people to live a life of "Derech Eretz" and moral example in the Land of Israel, and to contribute to the wellbeing of mankind as a whole. Central to this vision is the idea of “Creation in Service of God.” Drawing on a fundamental insight of Rabbi Joseph Dov Baer Soloveitchik he sees the Jewish people and mankind as having their essence in being creators who help complete the divine creation. This idea has a further elaboration in a subsequent work of thought “"In the Service of God".” There he contends that it is primarily through our actions and decisions in everyday life that the mass of mankind is involved in the divine creation. Another major dimension of his thought focuses on his meditations on the human condition and future. These are at the heart of his most comprehensive philosophical work, the still-in-process “"Thoughts".” Freedman has also written in other genres, including “thought-stories,” philosophical and religious meditations, essays, novellas, and a variety of autobiographical forms.

Quotations

*The Jewish return to Israel was an effort to reassume responsibility in history, an effort to re-create the Jewish people as free in deciding its own destiny.
*The Jews are a people who dwell alone. The great creators, too, dwell alone, as God was Alone in creating the world.
*Better a single masterpiece than a thousand forgotten works.
*The great creator is often a child struggling for the approval of a parent who will never wholly approve.
*The Jews are the people who have created and suffered the most in history. This connection cannot be incidental but must certainly relate to God’s plan for humanity.
*Without God life has no ultimate meaning. The need for God is the need to find reason and purpose for human existence.

*"Virtual Immortality" is now guaranteed to all of us. But no one really knows for how long.
*As we have enormously enhanced our power to transform our immediate terrestrial world we have become aware of our infinitesimal smallness and almost absolute powerlessness in the universe as a whole.
*If it weren’t for the idea of God we would have all been hopelessly mortal long ago.
*It is forbidden for humanity to create a kind of being which will totally replace it. This principle should be held constantly in mind by the developers of the new and strange forms of being there will be in the future.
*The Internet has, with all the positive possibilities it has opened up, led also to an exponential growth in publicly available nonsense, error and stupidity.
*There are characters we have known in real life who seem so great as to make even the most devoted literary effort at their immortalization small and inadequate.
*The future before us seems on the one hand incredibly open and vast—and on the other determined to end in ultimate disaster. And so beyond all the evidence, and beyond all what we now know, and what we are likely to know millions of years from now, the single ultimate hope for Mankind is still in the idea of a God transcending all that we can, as intelligent creatures, ever possibly conceive.

Family

He is married to Rifkah Goldberg, Jerusalem painter and poet. He is the father of two children from his first marriage, a son and a daughter, and is the step-grandfather of five.

Bibliography

Books by Shalom Freedman
*"Seven Years in Israel (A Zionist Storybook)"(Gefen Publishers: Jerusalem, 1983) 124pp.

*"Mourning for my Father" (Field: Jerusalem, 1989) 128 pp.

*"Life as Creation (A Jewish Way of Thinking about the World)" (Jason Aronson Inc.: Northvale N.J., 1993) 139 pp.

*"In the Service of God: Conversations with Teachers of Torah in Jerusalem" (Jason Aronson: Northvale, N.J., 1995) 265 pp.

*"Learning in Jerusalem: Dialogues with Distinguished Teachers of Judaism" (Jason Aronson: Northvale N.J., 1998) 372 pp.

*(with Irving Greenberg) "Living in the Image of God -- Jewish Teachings to Perfect the World: Conversations with Rabbi Irving Greenberg" (Northvale, N.J.: Jason Aronson, 1998) 340 pp.

*"Small Acts of Kindness: Striving for Derech Eretz in Everyday Life" (Urim Publications: Jerusalem, 2004) 280 pp.

*"Rabbi Shlomo Goren: Torah Sage and General" (Urim Publications: Jerusalem, 2006) 253 pp.

References: Selected Book Reviews and Articles about His Work

*Berger, Shalom: Review of "Shlomo Goren: Torah Sage and General. Lookstein Journal" 2006.

*Chertok, Haim: Jewish Prose-Poem Review of ‘"Life as Creation"’, "Jerusalem Post", April 29, 1994.

*Chertok, Haim: "A good grey conversationalist." Review of ‘"Learning in Jerusalem"’, "Jerusalem Post", April 2 1999.

*Chertok, Haim: Review of ‘"Shlomo Goren: Torah Sage and General"’, "Hadassah Magazine" June–July 2007.

*Ellenson, David: Review of ‘"Living in the Image of God"’, "Modern Judaism" - Volume 20, Number 1, February 2000, pp. 113-116.

*Elkins, Dov Peretz: Review of ‘"Small Acts of Kindness"’, "Jewish Media Review".

*Hornik, David: Review of ‘"Small Acts of Kindness"’, "Jewish Press", Sept. 22, 2004.

*Littrell, Dennis: ‘"A year in the life"’, review of ‘"Small Acts of Kindness"’, Amazon.Com, Dec. 9, 2004.

*Kay, Alan: "Jewish Book of Comfort" (Jason Aronson Inc. 1997).

*Moskowitz, Ira: "Writing for Sanity and Israel", "Haaretz", Anglo-file Profile, May 21, 2006.

*Mitchell, Donald: "A practical optimist", Review of ‘"Small Acts of Kindness"’, Amazon.Com, Nov. 13 2004.

*Novak, David: Review of ‘"Living in the Image of God"’, "First Things: A Monthly Journal", May, 1999.

*Scheidemann, Mike ed.: "A song to life and world peace: Selected essays and poems presented at the XIII World Congress of Poets of the World Academy of Arts and Culture" (Posner and Sons: Jerusalem, 1993).

*Teicher, Morton: Review of ‘"Small Acts of Kindness"’ "The National Jewish Post and Opinion", 2006.

External links

*Freedman's Online archive at Israel National News [http://www.israelnationalnews.com/Search.aspx?cx=partner-pub-5569699846303362%3Ackiu06-ros1&cof=FORID%3A11&q=%22shalom+freedman%22&x=0&y=0#1467]

*Freedman's Online archive at Jerusalem Post [http://pqasb.pqarchiver.com/jpost/results.html?QryTxt=%22shalom%20freedman%22]

*Freedman's Online archive at Jewish Political Studies Review

*Freedman's Online comments on FresnoZionism.org [http://fresnozionism.org]