What ALL Jews Should Be Reading Over Shabbos - with Rabbi Dovid Bashevkin

when you started I read over chabis like what was your idea and what was the what was the goal the goal for me was to encourage using shabas not to just unplug everybody's like chabas unplug get off technology get off your phone get into something get into something on shabus and I realized every shabus I look forward that I could start a new book I could read something new an article a book or something and what I started to do is I started to post on social media I said I read this over shabas and I would just put a picture the book that I read and then some Snippets and I put it on social media everyone watch this knows what social media is right I I hope so I don't know that for sure I think people know what social media is but I I would post every single shabas this is the book that I read this the article that I read sometimes I do finish it over shabas sometimes I don't finish over shabas but to realize that shabas is a time I want to get away from unplugging on chabas and chabas is you're plugging into Torah learning ideas and it's for everybody it's a doorway no matter what your background is in learning no matter what your Jewish education's been everybody on chabs can find a book an article an idea that they can plug in you're not just zoning out I know you're right you're not in a situation of headerer with an right just like removing something like okay I'm not on my phone on chabas that's why it's special no you're positively plugging in engaging and what's beautiful is that you could measure you know at the end it where where where towards the end of the secular year 2023 I could go back and I could almost look at my entire year based on what book I read each shabas wow so I go through and I I've read you know about 52 books over the course maybe I missed a week or two over here over there and you see like wow every year you could measure your growth on like what ideas what authors what books have I been so using that concept wouldn't it be so cool if you're able to get people to look back over their Jewish year and say what I do Pas B what I do Pas Noah almost finishing saas now what did I learn new this is the idea and we've been saying this forever the original I read this over chabas the original book that we plug into each shabis isn't a Jewish history book it's not an academic book it is the weekly paraa it Isn mikra it is connecting to the ideas in each para with translation whatever you find comfortable with there's so many different ways to find a good translation and living with the para each and every week I think there's different ways to do that some people need some assistance they need things to read and think about but I find and to do this I don't think it have to be a tremendous in any way shape sense or form if you read a few rashis the par that we're going through now what comes to mind now where this week is Pas Vash last week we read Pas mik you know Rashi has a conversation between Y and theim quing a meish about H negotiation the most exciting thing for me is this partnership that we did which is I took that I read this over shopas and I read all these books about Jewish history and I realized that the things that are discussed in each paraa these were started debate and ideas that we we're still living through in our days so I realized we have such an incredible opportunity let's take the ultimate I read this over chabas the weekly paraa and let's plug it in to a different idea and incident of personalities from Jewish history each and every week so you're learning an idea in the Para through the lens of Jewish history but not just an idea we give you all the books all the Articles and that's why this partnership is so exciting for me that exactly what you said rashi's talking about hostage negotiation in a in a paraa this is playing out in our this is playing out in our times every week we we upload what we what we started to call reading Jewish history in the paraa where I take the books The Articles all the stuff that you see around here that I've been reading and we plug it into these para ideas and we give you all the links that we do on email but the audio we upload to to all para and it's a way to connect to the para through the lens of Jewish history the unfolding story of the Jewish people to be very open and honest even though I love your openness and honesty okay good thank you um even though I direct the platforms I don't have time to listen to every person share every single day and every single week I try to sample and let me down slowly I like this introduction exactly so there one specific episode I remember listening um that you recorded and the way the mind works is that if you see something about that at a later date you know it brings you back to the first time exactly so you um you you recently s that an email about this anti-zionist that was like the subject of the email anti-zionist Rabbi so someone like me would my mind would naturally flow toward s to karta anti zist right so what was it about a reformed Rabbi tell us about that episode the original the first American anti-zionist movement was anchored in this Rabbi named Rabbi Elmer Burger I think it's one of the most fascinating stories in Jewish history who really tried to uproot the concept of the Jewish people it's a dangerous story but he became what's known as the pl's rabbi he became the rabbi for the Palestinian Liberation but it's a fascinating story of where the Palestinian movement got their ideas about you know you're always talking about the Jewish people aren't real where did they get these ideas from they got it from a real Rabbi and we tell that story I think we did that par we've told stories about disagreements and early stories of religious Zionism we've come back to a lot of AR is stuff and we spoke about salv we' spoken about rev cook we spoke about the K Massacre for Paras Kar but every week we find something we said this is still playing out in our times this story is still relevant in this very very moment and we see through the lens of Jewish history is a new way to reconnect to the par so this is a question for Rabbi DAV bashkin David bashkin you really David or David I don't know up to you and T you David or David I'm David to anybody pronounce David okay fine as long as they don't say David right David anything but David you call me David you call me David you can call me debash you cannot call me David okay or David how do you think of yourself in so many different areas you're multi-talented multitasking so this is something that you did saying a shear and a sh right the way this got started is because I love I love reading that's from my parents I love reading in every shops I was reading these books and when I moved into this part of Teck the person who used to live next door to me used to give a Shear before the 9:00 minion and he ended up moving out he was a close friend George silin and I started taking over but I wanted to be a different type of par sh I don't want it to be just say over I didn't want to do he was doing like lumus in the part so you take a Rashi and then you could unpack it with these wonderful works from the from the I want to do something different I said I'm not going to do lumus off the par I'm going do Jewish history off the par so I start I started each year I've been giving this for many years I started each year with a question on the paraa and then in the middle we unpack something from Jewish history and then we close it based on that story we return back to our original question and I realized it got very popular people really started to enjoy this you're learning about Jewish history you're learning about the para you're learning about the Jewish people you're learning abouta and ideas I want to bring this to to a wider audience who it's not it's not recorded on chabas so that's where this partnership really began let's bring this to a much wider audience I'm so grateful to the sponsors who really made this happen Janet and leor hod and family they're they're the heart of the people what what I've been learning through my journey in Old AF old par and old mishna and just being involved have the the Merit of being involved the to be involved in this type of type of work is that there's there's real Torah learning which means opening up a book reading a PUK reading the Rashi whether you do it with the art scho without the art school any other translation gar the same thing listening to Air and all that but there is so much more especially in today's world that there is so much being thrown at you coming from all directions to be able to even have your enjoyment your your non right your non-learning to also be connected to learning right it's it's it's it's amazing and so important today there's something called consilience is it's this idea that I heard from one of my teachers RAR Bergman where it's where you see all of the questions all the ideas in the world ultimately connect to one central point of unity the idea that that really animates the entire Torah and you real you read a book on Modern Jewish history you read a book on some phenom phenon and how they make paper on rare books everything has an entry point and there a doorway to further advance and deepen your knowledge of Torah and that's what we do each week that's what we try to do in the year that's what we try to do in I read reading Jewish history in the PARTA and that's what the all PARTA app is all about download the all paraa app available in the app store or the Google what an app store I've got the app even bkin has the app even I have the app even he has the app