On display through December
Workshop: Monday
December 12, 12 pm
Sandler Family Campus
“What if we believed ‘In-the-beginning’ was the beginning—until one day we asked a different question, and the sacred words sat up and told a different story? What then? What would we do with that?… Come and see—“
This introduction to Malkah’s Notebook: A Journey Into the Mystical Aleph-Bet sets up the story of a young girl, Malkah, hungry for answers to questions she thinks of as she reads Torah with her father.
As she discovers a mystical creation story within the Hebrew Aleph-Bet letters in the first line of Genesis, a door opens. This discovery soon takes her on a lifelong journey in search of her beginnings—into the lives of sages and mystical texts, to Jerusalem, Paris, and Canaan, to the realms of mythical beings, and the experience of motherhood.
Part bedtime story, part poem, and part journal, Malkah’s Notebook is a love letter to the Hebrew alphabet that unlocks life’s greatest mysteries.
Forty-three illustrations from Malkah’s Notebook are on display in the Leon Family Gallery on the Reba and Sam Sandler Family Campus. The illustrations by Israeli artist and sofer (Hebrew scribe) Josh Baum are paired with text from the book, personally selected by author, educator, and scholar Mira Z. Amiras. As visitors walk through the gallery, they are led through Malkah’s journey, each image specifically curated by Amiras and Baum to tell Malkah’s story.
Those who feel inspired by the exhibit can create their own work of art at a hands-on workshop, offered by the Konikoff Center for Learning on Monday, December 12. For details, see page 34.
For more information about the Leon Family Gallery, the Lee & Bernard Jaffe Family Jewish Book Festival, or other arts-related events, contact Hunter Thomas, director of Arts + Ideas, at HThomas@UJFT.org.
The Lee & Bernard Jaffe Family Jewish Book Festival is held in coordination with the Jewish Book Council, the longest-running organization devoted exclusively to the support and celebration of Jewish literature.
–Hunter Thomas