Not enough statistics?

Well, thanks for all the bioethics and Yiddish and poetry (the Yiddish bioethics poetry is yet to be written), say you, but what about statistics and mathematics blogs?

I didn't know Jordan Ellenberg (the novelist and mathematician of the Do the Math feature in Slate) has a blog. And he often links to the Three-toed Sloth. Andrew Gelman writes well about all sorts of statisticky stuff, though he's a touch more technical.

There you are. More such links please from you, if you know about them. (Or, heck, if you're an electrical engineer or astronomer or chemist and know about interesting blogs in those fields, the more the merrier.)

Books and Baltimore all Beautifully Brought to Blog

by the Baltimore Bibliophile.

This blog is very nice

This one, here. It is about books of poetry. You will notice that the blog's title is booksofpoetry (or alternatively BOOKS OF POETRY) so you won't forget it. Nor should you. Go read it.

Titsher!

Katle Kanye brings shalekh-mones (Purim gifts) to a neighborhood English teacher (a titsher is an instructor for secular subjects among Yiddish-speaking Chasidim). Translation mine.

We rang the doorbell and the door was opened by a Jew of about sixty, short, with a pointy beard, in a white shirt without a tallit katan, and with a black yarmulke - but made of cloth. In other words a yekke-ish Jew. I mean, we're talking about titshers and except for a convert or a newly religious person it's really rare to see a Chasidic titsher. My nephew, as a matter of fact, has a Chasidic titsher, born and bred into holiness, who teaches the kids English - in Yiddish. If they can teach Hebrew in Yiddish, why not English? As to what they call him: Titsher Felberblum. Since he's a rebbe in the mornings what to call him is a momentous question. If they called him Rebbe Felberblum that would mean that a rebbe is teaching English to the children, something which shouldn't be seen or found. If they call him Mister Felberblum that would mean they're calling a melamed Mister - but then the people would cry out at this dishonor they stabbed our Rabbi, they knocked down our Rabbi! So then what did they do? Just calling him titsher would be fine for goyim or goyish Jews. But you can't refer to as titsher a Chasid with a gartel and shoes and long socks, someone who calls his fellow an evil name has no part in the World to Come. A compromise was hit upon: Titsher Felberblum. This incorporates both his Jewish name and his profession of secular studies. Thus the Torah doesn't God forbid come to be shamed, and the morning melamed's glory remains in its place.

ברוך מחיה מתים / Resurrection

Fafblog is back.

You look so drawn

Satisfactory Comics has a blog!

Disclaimers apply
And modesty! Lots of modesty.

It's not that I really think I'm the best overall Jewish or Israeli blogger, but you might as well vote for me, since someone was nice enough to nominate me. (Please also vote for In Mol Araan as best food blog and Katle Kanye as best non-English blog. All nominees in these categories here.)

A happy, doubtful New Year from Katle Kanye
Saith the Yiddish blogmaster [my translation; read the whole post!]:

I don't have any answers [to these doubts], and I won't find any answer during the many holidays whose threshhold we're on now. On the first day of Selichot I hopped up on the wagon, and I'm riding until the end of Simchat Torah. Not because I want something, and not because I'm afraid that if I don't I stand to lose something. I can't say that I'm a willing passenger, but my fate is to go along for the ride. I won't justify it to myself by saying that it's the right path, but I'm still not jumping off. This is my portion from all my labors -- to look on as my traveling companions drag big bags of the four species and whole sukkahs, seeing only what's going on in the wagon, and I'm traveling lightweight and keep wanting to look out the window. I want to see who's pulling the wagon and who's driving the horses, and they just want to open their baggage, because they're so sure that the wagon will keep on going whatever happens. Will I stay till the end of the trip? For now I'm just happy that I'm not being thrown off.

Housekeeping

Two readers have already sent me a few blogs they would like me to take a look at -- thanks, KH and EQJ. If anyone has found a blog they think is well written, let me know. (I would prefer to know about blogs that are not already among the most popular. I've already broken this rule with Dooce, but she writes too well to be ignored.)

Words Without Borders is a translation journal run on a shoestring grant by a team of selfless editors. In the new issue, devoted to religious literature, you can find three new translations of mine of Yiddish poems by Glatshteyn, Tseytlin, and Lyesin.

Next week I'll be at the Yidish-vokh, and thereafter I'll be trying to cut away everything from my draft that doesn't read like a dissertation. So I crave the Readership's indulgence as I enter what is called in Blogland a "hiatus." (Why we don't call it a "break" I dunno. Not dignified enough, I guess.) Or, at least, less frequent posting.

Khayele the Baptized

Below is my translation of an entry in Noam Starik's Yiddish blog. Any historical novelists out there?

A terrible tragedy occurred on June 5th, 1814, in the house of Dovid Slutski, the rabbi of Kiev. After the Sabbath meal, Khayele, the thirteen-year-old daughter, suddenly disappeared. By the next day the whole city knew that priests had kidnapped the rabbi's daughter and were planning to convert her to Christianity. Her father protested to the churches and their responsible authorities. The priests, for their part, stood their ground, claiming that the girl had freely converted to the Orthodox faith, and that therefore they could not help the rabbi.

The priests moved Khayele to a fanatic Orthodox family in Kiev that was known for baptizing Jewish children. They paired her off with a Christian named Ivan Popov, and gave her the name Maria; so it was that Khayele became Maria Popov.

But on June 25th, her 12th day in captivity, she managed to smuggle out from under the noses of her guards nine dramatic letters she had written on tattered green paper. From the letters themselves -- heart-rendingly naive in tone, in a childish spelling -- it also seems that she managed to receive the responses from her family.

[I have made no attempt to preserve the original variations in spelling. ZShB]

Letter 3:

Darling father dearest, please take me out of this house. God should let me get away from these Christians, and I ask you, father, get me out of here fast, you must come quickly because I am so weak I don't eat and I can't eat and sleep. God should let you come soon with health and joy and we should all see and we should all be happy together Amen. Darling father dearest, my mother is too weak to get through this, please come and don't delay, you should come soon with joy Amen. Dear sister Hedele, write me dearest in good health. God should let me see you soon in good health and joy Amen.

Letter 5:

Darling sister-in-law dearest, I received your note that you wrote. I thank you very much for it. Please, please get me out of this unclean house. Darling brother dearest, please write me about your health and my darling sister. It's awful that I am away from you and that they don't let me out of here to see my dear mother. God should let my darling mother get through the troubles that have happened. How awful it is that I left my father and that my father is not there and I am with the Christians. God should let us see each other in health.

I allow myself to speculatethat the rabbi's daughter, the 13-year-old, tried to get herself converted by her own free will, but afterwards she realized what she had done and felt awful. She tried to run away (say the historical documents) from her home, and sent the sad notes to her family, but by then it was no help. Since she had already converted, the priests were able to hold her. From the above-quoted letters ("How awful it is that I left my father") it seems that she went to the church willingly and volunteered to be baptized. She quickly awoke from her dream and some days later she wrote the desperate letters. Perhaps she became frightened when she was matched with Ivan -- she had not expected that much.

We don't know the end of the story -- the documents don't tell us. We've found out about this history through searching the archives of the Orthodox church. From the same documents we know that a legal case was begun against the father for accusing the priests of lying, kidnapping, and baptizing the daughter against her will. We have no written evidence of the outcome of the trial.

[The article is based on Shoel Ginzburg, A terrible page of history, Di Tsukunft, July, 1932, pp. 423-427.]