Revisiting the Idea of Vocation

Revisiting the Idea of Vocation

Author: John C Haughey

Publisher: CUA Press

Published: 2004-02

Total Pages: 266

ISBN-13: 0813213614

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

Until recently theologians have been in a deep slumber about the subject of vocations. This volume represents one of the first awakenings in the theological community to this subject. The ten contributors, all theologians at Loyola University Chicago, present original essays that explore vocations, or callings.


The Purposeful Graduate

The Purposeful Graduate

Author: Tim Clydesdale

Publisher: University of Chicago Press

Published: 2016-09-08

Total Pages: 359

ISBN-13: 022641888X

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

American higher education is more expensive than ever and the rewards seem to be diminishing daily. Sociologist Tim Clydesdale s new book, however, offers some rare good news: when colleges and universities meaningfully engage their organizational histories to launch sustained conversations with students about questions of purpose, the result is a rise in overall campus engagement and recalibration of post-college trajectories that set graduates on journeys of significance and impact. The book is based on a study of programs launched at 88 colleges and universities that invited students, faculty, staff, and administrators to incorporate questions of meaning and purpose into the undergraduate experience. The results were so positive that Clydesdale came away from the study arguing that every campus (religious or not) should engage students in a broad conversation about what it means to live an examined life. This conversation needs to be creative, intentional, systematic, and wide-ranging, he says, because for too long this core liberal educational task has been relegated to the margins, and its attendant religious or spiritual discourse banished from classrooms and quads, to the detriment of higher education s virtually universal mission: graduates marked by thoughtfulness, productivity, and engaged citizenship."


The Routledge Companion to Jewish History and Historiography

The Routledge Companion to Jewish History and Historiography

Author: Dean Phillip Bell

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2018-10-10

Total Pages: 863

ISBN-13: 0429859171

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

The Routledge Companion to Jewish History and Historiography provides an overview of Jewish history from the biblical to the contemporary period, while simultaneously placing Jewish history into conversation with the most central historiographical methods and issues and some of the core source materials used by scholars within the field. The field of Jewish history is profitably interdisciplinary. Drawing from the historical methods and themes employed in the study of various periods and geographical regions as well as from academic fields outside of history, it utilizes a broad range of source materials produced by Jews and non-Jews. It grapples with many issues that were core to Jewish life, culture, community, and identity in the past, while reflecting and addressing contemporary concerns and perspectives. Divided into four parts, this volume examines how Jewish history has engaged with and developed more general historiographical methods and considerations. Part I provides a general overview of Jewish history, while Parts II and III respectively address the rich sources and methodologies used to study Jewish history. Concluding in Part IV with a timeline, glossary, and index to help frame and connect the history, sources, and methodologies presented throughout, The Routledge Companion to Jewish History and Historiography is the perfect volume for anyone interested in Jewish history.


The Rabbi As Symbolic Exemplar

The Rabbi As Symbolic Exemplar

Author: Jack H Bloom

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2012-12-06

Total Pages: 341

ISBN-13: 1136407359

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

The solution to the growing problem of stress and burnout in rabbis! Written by a practicing clinical psychologist who spent 10 years as a congregational rabbi, The Rabbi As Symbolic Exemplar: By the Power Vested in Me presents positive solutions to the inevitable negative effects of symbolic exemplarhood, coaching rabbis through dilemmas of the inner soul. Being a rabbi means serving as a Symbolic Exemplar of the best that is in humankind, being experienced and treated and expected to act as a stand-in for God, and a walking, talking symbol of all that Jewish tradition represents. The burden of being a symbolic exemplar of God is extraordinary, and the struggle to live up to its requirements can be one of loneliness, frustration, and despair, alienating rabbis who tire of living in a glass house. The Rabbi As Symbolic Exemplar examines how the symbolic role that serves as the source of the rabbi’s authority and power can lead to disillusionment and disenchantment. Author Jack H Bloom draws on his own experience as a rabbi who watched the successful career he enjoyed turn into one he desperately wanted to forsake and how he was inspired to become an athletic coach for rabbis. This unique book details how symbolic exemplarhood is created, what its downside is, what power it offers, how it can be used effectively, how rabbis can deal with their inner lives, and what can be done to help rabbis stay human while maintaining their leadership. The Rabbi As Symbolic Exemplar is equally effective as a complete text or as a source of stand-alone chapters on specific topics, including: special tensions of being a rabbi effects of symbolic exemplarhood on the rabbi’s family educating rabbis on their power training suggestions curing and healing and The Ten Commandments for rabbis The Rabbi As Symbolic Exemplar is essential reading for rabbis, rabbinical students, congregants, Christian clergy, seminarians and anyone interested in what it is to be a clergy person and how they can support the work clergy do. The book educates both clergy and laity on the humanity of clergy. Visit the author’s website at http://jackhbloom.com


Calling in Today's World

Calling in Today's World

Author: Cahalan & Schuurman

Publisher: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing

Published: 2016

Total Pages: 256

ISBN-13: 0802873677

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

The concept of "vocation" or "calling" is a distinctively Christian concern, grounded in the long-held belief that we find our meaning, purpose, and fulfillment in God. But what about religions other than Christianity? What does it mean for someone from another faith tradition to understand calling or vocation? In this book contributors with expertise in Catholic and Protestant Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, Confucianism and Daoism, and secular humanism explore the idea of calling from these eight faith perspectives. - from back of book.


I Would Do It Again - Perhaps

I Would Do It Again - Perhaps

Author: Simon Glustrom

Publisher: Xlibris Corporation

Published: 2000-10-05

Total Pages: 286

ISBN-13: 1462830102

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

Before packing away his robes, Simon Glustrom was a practicing rabbi for forty-three years. One of the compelling reasons for deciding to write a memoir was in response to the endless variety of questions about the interior life of a rabbi: Who influenced him to enter the rabbinate? Can a rabbi have religious doubts and still be true to his calling? Would he repeat such a rigorous life if he knew from the beginning the demands that would be made upon him? This book provides the reader with some uncommon answers. The author does not hesitate to reveal some of his lingering doubts, regrets and fears even as he refers with pride to his skills and strengths. Rabbi Glustrom reaches back to his early youth in Atlanta. He recalls some of the unheralded personalities who influenced him during his most impressionable years and impacted on his life in college, in rabbinical school and in the broader community. The author feels the need to sing on behalf of his unsung heroes. Much of this memoir deals with the human and spiritual problems the author encountered in a new suburban congregation in Fair Lawn, New Jersey where he served as the first rabbi. Nostalgically he recalls those pioneering years in the Fifties and documents some of the monumental changes that took place over four decades, including some of the unresolved crises, such as the problem of egalitarianism in synagogue life. Clergy and lay people will identify with much of the rich anecdotal material, from the humorous to the pathetic, that is so candidly expressed in this memoir.


Beyond the Glory: Community Rabbis in Eastern Europe

Beyond the Glory: Community Rabbis in Eastern Europe

Author: Mordechai Zalkin

Publisher: Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG

Published: 2020-11-23

Total Pages: 279

ISBN-13: 3110711729

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

The heroes of Beyond the Glory are not the famous rabbis, the heads of the yeshivas, or Hasidic righteous, but rather the "second circle" rabbis - the community rabbis in 19th century Eastern Europe, the backbone of the rabbinical world of the time,those who knew the world of their community members closely and were required to answer a wide range of questions, both daily and existential. Who were these rabbis? What were their training processes? How did they win their positions? Did they win "tenure," or was the threat of dismissal constantly hovering above their heads? How were their working conditions and their financial situation? Were they considered as spiritual shepherds and social leaders of the community? What was their relationship with the local rabbinic scholars and the economic elite? How did they navigate between their duties as halachic rulers and their desire to engage in studying and teaching? This book attempts to answer these questions, and many others, based on examining the world of over a thousand community rabbis.