The most important knowledge about the Jewish people, its history and religion
This extensive work was written by an authoritative in the U.S. and around the world Orthodox rabbi, professor, "Yeshiva University" Joseph Telushkin. The book contains a systematic set of basic knowledge of the Jewish religion, history and society from ancient times to the early 90s. It consists of 15 pieces, which gathered about 350 stories of small size, covering almost all aspects of Jewish life. Here are some of their titles: "The Bible", "The modern period. Western and Eastern Europe," "Zionism and Israel," "anti-Semitism", "Jewish books", "Circle of Life", etc.
In fact, we face a mini-encyclopedia, written concisely and clearly and vividly drawn up with the expectation of the reader who wants to get an idea of who is a Jew. It was created district. Telushkin as a benefit for American Jews, many of which are so assimilated that they forgot about the most important events of Jewish history and Jewish customs. Writes in the preface to the book itself p. Telushkin, "they are more likely to tell you about the three persons of the Christian Trinity, how do you explain your understanding of the Jewish mitzvot, they know that Columbus discovered America in the 1492-meters, but do not remember what event shocked the Jewish world in the same year."
Soon, however, work p. Telushkina demand was quite far from the borders of the United States. The book may contain the knowledge of a few tens of huge volumes, was an indispensable tool in the post-Soviet space, where at the time of the fall of the communist regime of the Jewish population was almost completely cut off from their roots, and literature would meet the needs of neophytes, just was not - the available in Russian books were either published more than 100 years ago, or are intended for the reader who knows something about the Jews except that it exists. Encyclopedic, and at the same time the popularity of the book provided a presentation p. Telushkina fantastic popularity in Russia and the CIS.
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