Reviews for The Jewish Family Fun Book: Holiday Projects, Everyday Activities, and Travel Ideas with Jewish Themes

The average rating for The Jewish Family Fun Book: Holiday Projects, Everyday Activities, and Travel Ideas with Jewish Themes based on 2 reviews is 3 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2015-02-17 00:00:00 James Cochran I ordered this, thinking it was a halacha book. Since there aren't any halacha books that talk about hair covering except from the perspective of how it would affect her husband (minus a couple of totally machmir women's halacha books), I had hoped this would be a more reasonable presentation of the halacha of haircovering. It was all that and more. It is a collection of essays about haircovering, ranging from personal stories to scholarly halachic discussions, and several with a mix of the two. It ranged from women who decided to cover after decades of not, women who chose to stop haircovering, a women who chose to cover despite otherwise appearing like a secular Israeli, all the way to two women who shave. It made me much more open-minded about women's choices in haircovering as well as helping me to appreciate that any woman can feel conflicted about it. (I read it a few weeks before getting married.) So far, it's been the most reasonable - and useful - hair covering discussion I've seen, and I feel like I've made better informed halachic choices because of it.

Review # 2 was written on 2012-09-12 00:00:00 Pablo Fuentes This book was referenced in some other things I was reading on female modesty and I was intrigued by the concept so I decided to pick it up even though I am not Jewish. I was kind of disappointed to see that rather than one coherent piece it was an anthology of first person confessional essays, a genre I have grown quite weary of since about 1996. Still it was an interesting read, albeit uneven as such compilations typically are. I learned some things I didn't know about the Jewish legal reasoning behind female headcoverings, and some of the more specific aspects of how those laws work out in personal observances. I have to say I am a little relieved that I am not subject to the laws, as it all sounded quite stressful, frankly. I have been contemplating headcovering myself (as a Christian) but more along the lines of the reasoning behind Jewish male headcovering ("yirat haShem") than reasons of modesty. Still, food for thought and definitely off the beaten path for me.