Category Archives: book reviews
Book Matters
__________ Abbie is away this week getting treatments in California. This column was originally posted on November 14, 2023, and continues to be timely. __________ The Sunflower: On the Possibilities and Limits of Forgiveness By Simon Wiesenthal The author was … Continue reading
A Subtle Earthquake
In yesterday morning’s meditation, the message that came through was unprecedented. It was a large image of me, lying flat on my back, neither going anywhere nor trying to. Usually, when I get an image, I try to discern … Continue reading
Posted in Absolute Freedom and Terror, absurdism, academe, action, afterlife, agnosticism, alienation, American politics, anthropology, anti-semitism, appreciation, art, art of living, atheism, authenticity, autonomy, bad faith, beauty, Bible, Biblical Archeology, Biblical God, bigotry, book reviews, books, bureaucracy, childhood, chivalry, Christianity, cities, class, Confessions of a Young Philosopher, conformism, contemplation, contradictions, cool, courage, courtship, cults, cultural politics, culture, desire, Desire and Authenticity, dialectic, eighteenth century, erotic life, eternity, ethics, ethnicity, evil, existentialism, exploitation, faith, fashion, fatherhood, female power, femininity, feminism, filial piety, films, freedom, friendship, gender balance, glitterati, Gnosticism, guilt and innocence, health, Hegel, hegemony, heroes, hidden God, hierarchy, history, history of ideas, id, idealism, ideality, identity, ideology, idolatry, immorality, immortality, Industrial Revolution, institutional power, Jesus, Jews, journalism, Judaism, law, legal responsibility, life and death struggle, literature, love, male power, Married Philosophers Discuss Confessions, martyrdom, masculinity, master, master/slave relation, medieval, memoir, memory, Messianic Age, mind control, modern women, modernism, moral action, moral evaluation, moral psychology, morality, mortality, mortality vs immortality, motherhood, mysticism, Nihilism, nineteenth-century, non-violence, novels, ontology, oppression, pacifism, past and future, peace, Phenomenology of the Mind, philosophy, poetry, political, political movements, politics, politics of ideas, postmodernism, power, power games, presence, promissory notes, propaganda, psychology, public facade, public intellectual, race, racism, radicalism, reading, reductionism, relationships, religion, remembrance, Renaissance, repairing the culture, roles, romance, romantic love, romanticism, science, scientism, secular, seduction, self-deception, seventeenth century, sex appeal, sexuality, slave, social climbing, social construction, social conventions, social ranking, sociobiology, spiritual journey, spiritual not religious, spirituality, status, status of women, suffering, Suicide, terror, terrorism, the examined life, the problematic of men, the problematic of woman, the profane, the sacred, theism, theology, time, Trauma, Truth, TV, twentieth century, twenty-first century, Utopia, victimhood, victims, violence, war, work, writing, Zeitgeist
Tagged a reason for reasoning, absence of sincere motivation, absent basis for reasoning, advocating for oneself with medical care, alogon or inexpressibility, alogon or without reason, avoiding escapism, being in the doldrums, birth and rebirth pangs, breaking an unwritten law, broken institutional trust, cauterizing spiritual wounds, choice between good and evil, circling the promised land, costly choice for the right principle, damaging therapeutic relationship, directionlessness, emotional earthquake, facing problems to move on, facing the present, failure of basis for reasoning, failure of leadership, failure of religious leadership, fake rising above it, fake transcendence, finding personal motivation, inner springs of motivation, institutional trust, Israel modern and ancient, leadership breakdown, moral choice in family relations, morally consequential choice, motivational void as personal crisis, motivation’s absence, multi-generation trauma, ousting a predator, Personal crisis, predator in religious institution, reasonable speech, rebirth pangs of Israel, refusing transcendence, religious leadership that is sacrilegious, repairing soul damage, shooting the albatross, soul damage, spiritual directive to stop, spiritual earthquake, spiritual impasse, spiritual wounds, springboard for reasoning, taking care of business, The Rime of the Ancient Mariner by Samuel Taylor Coleridge, the spiritual dimension, therapeutic relationship that is counter therapeutic, void in personal motivation, when reason is powerless, whistleblower
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Revisited: Abigail’s Brilliant Career
Early this afternoon – just when I was about to take that rueful look in the rearview mirror promised in the title of this column – Jerry called my attention to something on the Internet that surprised me a … Continue reading
Posted in Absolute Freedom and Terror, absurdism, academe, action, afterlife, agnosticism, alienation, American politics, anthropology, anti-semitism, appreciation, art, art of living, atheism, authenticity, autonomy, bad faith, beauty, Bible, Biblical Archeology, Biblical God, bigotry, book reviews, books, bureaucracy, childhood, chivalry, Christianity, cities, class, Confessions of a Young Philosopher, conformism, contemplation, contradictions, cool, courage, courtship, cults, cultural politics, culture, desire, Desire and Authenticity, dialectic, eighteenth century, erotic life, eternity, ethics, ethnicity, evil, existentialism, exploitation, faith, fashion, fatherhood, female power, femininity, feminism, filial piety, films, freedom, friendship, gender balance, glitterati, Gnosticism, guilt and innocence, health, Hegel, hegemony, heroes, hidden God, hierarchy, history, history of ideas, id, idealism, ideality, identity, ideology, idolatry, immorality, immortality, Industrial Revolution, institutional power, Jesus, Jews, journalism, Judaism, law, legal responsibility, life and death struggle, literature, love, male power, Married Philosophers Discuss Confessions, martyrdom, masculinity, master, master/slave relation, medieval, memoir, memory, Messianic Age, mind control, modern women, modernism, moral action, moral evaluation, moral psychology, morality, mortality, mortality vs immortality, motherhood, mysticism, Nihilism, nineteenth-century, non-violence, novels, ontology, oppression, pacifism, past and future, peace, Phenomenology of the Mind, philosophy, poetry, political, political movements, politics, politics of ideas, postmodernism, power, power games, presence, promissory notes, propaganda, psychology, public facade, public intellectual, race, racism, radicalism, reading, reductionism, relationships, religion, remembrance, Renaissance, repairing the culture, roles, romance, romantic love, romanticism, science, scientism, secular, seduction, self-deception, seventeenth century, sex appeal, sexuality, slave, social climbing, social construction, social conventions, social ranking, sociobiology, spiritual journey, spiritual not religious, spirituality, status, status of women, suffering, Suicide, terror, terrorism, the examined life, the problematic of men, the problematic of woman, the profane, the sacred, theism, theology, time, Trauma, Truth, TV, twentieth century, twenty-first century, Utopia, victimhood, victims, violence, war, work, writing, Zeitgeist
Tagged a woman’s real career, a woman’s unseen career, Abigail’s marriage gets in the papers, academic politics, academic tenure, anonymity as urban skill, antisemitism and denial, antisemitism at Brooklyn College, believing a damaging lie, blaming the whistleblower, brilliant career, Brooklyn College, brothers who are bullies, defamatory fictions, defamatory fictions believed, defending the Brooklyn College core, defending the core curriculum, digital footprint, editorial in The New York Post, failing to defeat defamation, failing to fight the new antisemitism, female self image, fighting defamation, fighting for academic standards, fighting slander, fighting the new antisemitism, fired for voting wrong, former allies turning their backs, former colleagues’ indifference to antisemitism, heaven protects the working girl, historical assignment of the Jews, improbable victories in academe, internet reviews, invisibility as a skill, Jerry L. Martin defending excellence in higher ed, Jewish memory, Jews and preserving the record, life in the rear view mirror, life revisited, Manhattan as hometown, Muslim girls, Muslim women’s unseen tragedies, online reputation, ousting a predator, personal integrity, philosophic frontiers, philosophic frontiers and familiar streets, preserving personal integrity, Reform temple, reputation in multiple fields, scandal waiting to happen, self image of woman intellectual, self image of woman philosopher, slandering the resister to unfair control, the old neighborhood, the old neighborhood and life-memories, the past revisited, uncured social wounds, uncured wounds for the whistleblower, unseen in a crowd, winning reinstatement, woman’s self-image, women’s unseen tragedies, wounds to reputation, write up in The Chronicle of Higher Education, write up in The Jewish Daily Forward, write up in The New York Post
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