cover image God 101: Jewish Ideals, Beliefs, and Practices for Renewing Your Faith

God 101: Jewish Ideals, Beliefs, and Practices for Renewing Your Faith

Terry Bookman. Perigee Books, $15 (208pp) ISBN 978-0-399-52658-9

God, marginalized in modernity, is making a comeback, says Bookman, rabbi of Temple Beth Am in Miami. ""God talk... has made its way to the university, the workplace, the gym, and the kitchen table,"" he writes. To help readers renew their faith, Bookman tries to address the basic, perennial and pivotal questions about God: Is there really a God? What is the nature of God? Why do bad things happen to good people? If seeing is believing, why can't we see God? Bookman's answers are self-admittedly limited. For instance, he argues that there is no proof of God, nor is there proof there is no God. But ""faith in God makes more sense, it makes the world a better place, it makes my life work better,"" he declares. ""If we could know with absolute certainty, we would not have to call it faith."" The second half of the book is more concrete and compelling, as Bookman delineates four pathways to God: prayer, the path of the heart; study, the path of the head; action, the path of the hands and feet; and relationships, the path of the soul. For Bookman, acts of loving-kindness may be as simple as using toll lanes manned by people, in recognition that ""a machine is not the same as a person."" Bookman's conversational tone makes his book easy to digest for readers of all faiths, but its nourishment is uneven. (Mar.)