October 30, 2016

I’m at the beginning of my book tour and, despite not having hired a publicist, I’ve gotten a little publicity. The Jewish Exponent of Philadelphia [http://www.jewishexponent.com/event/maggie-anton-fifty-shades-of-talmud] had an article about my speaking in Elkins Park on Nov 2, and the New Jersey Jewish Standard had a nice interview with me prior to my speaking in Jersey City Nov 4-5, Somerset on Nov 6, and Fairlawn on Nov 7. Here is quote about how Jewish women are allowed, even encouraged, to use birth control, despite the commandment to “be fruitful and multiply.”

There is so much material in the Talmud because “it is so vast,” she said. “It discusses everything. The rabbis had no idea that what they were saying was going to become Jewish canon. And considering that the first commandment in the Bible is to be fruitful and multiply — that means that you are commanded to have sex.
“It’s interesting that even though the Torah is quite clearly talking to both Adam and Eve, the rabbis used Talmudic finagling to make it apply to men only,” Ms. Anton continued. “Only men are commanded to procreate.
“I do not see that at all as misogyny,” she added. “It allowed women to use birth control.” Pregnancy and childbirth always could be enormously dangerous; that’s true even now, and certainly was more true before the development of modern medicine. Some women always and most women at some time in their lives could not carry babies to term without risking their own lives. “How could God have given us a commandment that would have made so many women die?” the rabbis wondered. “So God excused women from the commandment, which allowed them to use contraceptives. And the rabbis expanded that even more, by making it almost obligatory for a woman whose pregnancy would be dangerous to use contraception. Those women must use it, they said, and other women may use it.”
Contraception? They didn’t have birth control pills. What did they know? “They had sterility potions, there was a kind that was kind of permanent and another that was temporary. They had something that you’d insert after you smeared it with spermicide. We actually have the recipe for some of the spermicides, but they don’t give the exact amounts. Medical scholars have looked at them and said yeah, they would have worked, but there’s not much difference between a dose that would have been ineffective and a dose that would have killed you. So it would have had to have been someone very experienced, as a midwife or an herbalist, to have known exactly how much each woman could take.
As Ms. Anton knew, the rabbis in the Talmud say a great deal about a huge number of subjects. Sex is among them. “At first, it was so surprising to me, how progressive the rabbis were,” she said. “We are talking about guys who lived more than 1,500 years ago.” (The Mishna, the Talmud’s inner section, was compiled about 200 CE, and the Gemara, which surrounds, explicates, and dances its ideas into wild intellectual and fanciful flourishes, was compiled around 500 CE.)
“So I thought that I really could write Fifty Shades of Talmud,” she concluded.

To read the entire interview, go to this Jewish Standard link

Posted by maggie at 08:20 PM | Comments (0)

October 27, 2016

travel book review

A Travel Guide to the Jewish Caribbean and South AmericaA Travel Guide to the Jewish Caribbean and South America by Ben G. Frank

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


I'll be doing a scholar weekend at the synagogue in St. Thomas in December, so I wanted to read up on the island's history and attractions. I only read the chapter on the Virgin Islands, but found it well-written and informative, especially the. This is a good book to take out from the library and photocopy only the pages a traveler needs.



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Posted by maggie at 12:54 PM | Comments (0)

October 24, 2016

CA book signings illegal?

I hadn’t gotten around last Sunday’s Los Angeles Times business section when my husband pointed out the front page article about a new California law, aimed at stopping the trade in faked signatures purporting to be from entertainment personalities, that apparently sets up “draconian bureaucratic burdens” on bookstores that sell author-autographed books. The new law simply revised a 1992 law applying to autographed sports memorabilia, essentially by striking the word “sports.” The result was a bill that applied to any autographed item sold in or from California by “a dealer to a consumer for five dollars ($5) or more.”

Considering that none of my books sell for less than $5, my husband thought this new law might apply to my speaking events. Which would mandate that “every item carry a signed certificate of authenticity bearing the name and address of the seller, the name of a witness to the signing, and more. Each certificate has to be kept by the dealer for seven years.” Yikes! A simple one-minute book sale could now take ten times as long, never mind my having to keep records on hundreds, maybe thousands, of sales for seven years. And never mind that “certificates of authenticity” are essentially worthless since nothing would stop a determined forger from faking them, too.

The new law doesn’t go into effect until January, so hopefully there will be time to get it fixed so that booksellers are exempt. If not, I guess I’ll see what other authors are doing.

Posted by maggie at 03:22 PM | Comments (0)

October 18, 2016

busy 2 weeks

Several new things have kept me busy over the last two weeks, which I expect to blog about in more detail, but right now I’ll just whet your curiosity. In no particular order they are: 1] I’ve joined a gym. 2] I’m finalizing all the details for my three-week, 24 event, mid-Atlantic East Coast book tour that starts Oct 28, 3] I’m preparing two scholar programs that will also involve some vacationing: Dec 1-8 for Hebrew Congregation of St. Thomas in the US Virgin Islands, and Dec 19-29 for Limmud UK in England, and 4] I’m trying to put together a Spring 2017 book tour that focuses on the DC/VA/MD and Philadelphia area.

Regarding subject #1. Starting in the early 1980’s, I used to be a body builder and worked out in the gym with weights regularly until I hurt my neck and shoulder in a car crash in 1998. I've missed being in shape, but I was afraid to re-injure myself. But now we live less than 10-minute walk from LA Fitness, so I tried it over free Labor Day weekend and then got a free 3-day pass. I liked the machines and didn't feel hurt afterwards, but wanted to wait for a membership sale. Then after we paid to fix our daughter's car, she stepped up and added us to her membership.

So I've been working out with weights twice a week for over a month, and recently tried out a yoga class to improve my flexibility and balance [which I definitely need to improve at my age]. While I understand the importance of keeping this up for my health, the time I spend doing it is not trivial.

Posted by maggie at 10:01 PM | Comments (0)

October 13, 2016

God vs evolution

I’d been saving this quote from Elizabeth Gilbert’s The Signature of All Things to share during the High Holy Days, but only remembered it today. I consider myself a scientist and a religious person, and as such have no trouble reconciling evolution with the existence of God as Creator. In my opinion, a God who creates the universe over time through an evolutionary process is greater than one who creates by fiat.

I’m not sure I need any proof for God’s existence, but in case I did, the view expressed by the heroine of Gilbert’s historical novel most nearly sums up my view. Which is asking what evolutionary purpose can there be for all the things that fill people with awe—the Grand Canyon, beautiful sunsets, or music that brings tears to our eyes for example?

“I believe that evolution explains nearly everything about us, and I certainly believe that it explains absolutely everything about the rest of the natural world. But I do not believe that evolution alone can account for our unique human consciousness. There is no evolutionary need, you see, for us to have such acute sensitivities of intellect and emotion. There is no practical need for the minds that we have. We don't need a mind that can play chess ... We don't need a mind that can invent religions or argue over our origins. We don't need a mind that causes us to weep at the opera. We don't need opera, for that matter—nor science, nor art. We don't need ethics, morality, dignity, or sacrifice. We don't need affection or love—certainly not to the degree that we feel it. If anything, our sensibilities can be a liability, for they can cause us to suffer distress.”

Posted by maggie at 10:01 PM | Comments (0)

October 02, 2016

Monstrous Regiment of Women

A Monstrous Regiment of Women (Mary Russell, #2)A Monstrous Regiment of Women by Laurie R. King

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


I had a lot of mixed feelings about this book. I thoroughly enjoyed two other Mary Russell mysteries, Vol 1 and Vol 4, and expected to like this one as much. It started out very promising with the feminist slant, and parts involving Judaism and women's lives in the aftermath of WW1 were fascinating. I certainly appreciated Russell's theological discussions with Childe on female influences in the Bible. However, I thoroughly disliked the heroin subplot, wherein Russell is kidnapped by mysterious men, imprisoned in a dark room, and rendered helpless until she is eventually rescued by Holmes. What happened to the plucky and intrepid heroine I'd come to know and love? After all this feminism, she has to be saved by the hero. And then the villain turns out to be someone we never heard of until the end. I could have believed Childe's husband as the murderer if only there had been somer earlier setup.

Two other complaints, one I saw in other reviews and the other apparently unique to me. Yes, I cringed at the sexual/romantic relationship between 21 year-old Russell and 60+ year-old Holmes, especially to learn he felt this way when she was 15. Yuck! And how come the epilogue never tells us what happened with the paper/lecture Russell was on the way to discuss at Oxford when she was kidnapped? This was such an important project for her and yet it seemed to be completely forgotten. But on the positive side, the writing is so good and the characters and locations so well drawn, that I never considered giving up. Maybe we'll learn what happened to Russell's thesis in Vol 3?



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Posted by maggie at 11:52 AM | Comments (0)