Generation J

By Lisa Schiffman

Book Overview

I'm not alone. I am part of a generation of fragmented Jews. We're in a kind of limbo. We're suspended between young adulthood and middle age, between Judaism and atheism, between a desire to believe in religion and a personal history of skepticism. Call us a bunch of searchers. Call us post-Holocaust Jews. Call us Generation J.

Generation J is the ambivalent generation: unaffiliated seekers, men and women who have grown up questioning the bounds of organized religion. Lisa Schiffman is one of these seekers, and Generation J chronicles her journey through the contradictory landscape of Jewish identity. Moving from the personal to the universal, from autobiography to anthropology, from laughter to tears, Schiffman shows us the many ways in which one can be religious.

Whether dipping into a ritual bath, getting henna-tattooed with the Star of David, unravelling the mysteries of the kabbalah, or confronting what Jewish tradition has to say about gay marriage, Schiffman reveals the conflicts of meaning and connection common to all who try to chart their own spiritual path. And, through it all, with humor and sensitivity, she confronts the reasons for her own quest and begins to untangle some of the thorniest questions about identity, community, and religion in America today.

This engaging exploration of what it means to be Jewish is every bit as much a fascinating tour of the varieties of contemporary Jewish practice as it is an unusual personal quest. Smart, funny, and provocative, Schiffman brilliantly explores the problems and possibilities facing any spiritual seeker today.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0062515780
• ISBN13: 9780062515780
• Release Date: August 2000
• Publisher: HarperOne
• Length: 176 Pages
• Weight: 0.39 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.5" x 5.3" x 8.0"

Customer Reviews

A Great Insight into the Modern Jewish Mind

This text follow's Lisa's search for what it actually means to be "a Jew." Great for Jews and non-Jews alike, it shows what being Jewish means to different people from different generations. Told in narrative style, it is an easy and interesting read.

This is well worth reading

She voices so many thoughts I have had that I didn't have a name for. I thought this book was just terrific and bravo for having the courage to put these thoughts out there. It helped this gay jewish boy!

a must read

If you have ever dated someone not Jewish, if you have ever wondered what other sources of spirituality might be out there, if you have ever felt a passing pang of guilt for eating a cheezeburger, if you have ever wondered what being Jewish was supposed to mean in modern times, if you have ever felt turned away from Judaism because of it's seemingly complicated, contradictory, argumentative, rigid idiosyncracies, you MUST read this book. Lisa Schiffman gives you permission to be confused, to embrace your Jewish Identity Crisis. She had me laughing out loud and jumping out of my skin at the similarities between her writing and experiences and the conversations in my head over the course of my adult years. Read it, highlight it, makes notes in the margin, recite passages out loud to your family and friends. Good luck on your journey!

An inspiring journey

This journal through the author's own Jewish journey provides a through-provoking and easy to read account of a young Jewish woman's struggle to understand the basis of who she is. In search of her Jewish self, Lisa Schiffman's unique perspective as a social anthropologist adds a demension to this book that moves well beyond the anecdotal. Her agressive approach to dissect her identity and find her place in the world is inspiring -- Lisa Schiffman is a real go-getter.

Provocative, warm, personal

This is one of the best books I have read this year. The author (an east coast, inter-married Jewish writer, now living in the bay area) captures perfectly the confusion, effort, and humor of trying to make inroads with an identity that is and is not your own. The anecdotes and research about contemporary American Jewish life are interesting and memorable. However, the book rings true not just as a personal journey through the most conflicted aspects of contemporary Jewish life, but as an open-minded and open-ended conversation about how to take ownership of the aspects of ourselves we avoid in childhood, only to find we need them later.