The library is open whenever the Temple buildings are open. Please feel free to come in and browse our collection. Make sure to sign out any books that you are borrowing. Our library is staffed from 3:30-5:30 pm, Tuesday-Thursday, and on Sunday mornings when there is Sunday Program.

Questions: library@betham.org or leave a message at (650) 493-3117, ext. 220.

The Library Committee meets on the 4^th Tuesday of each month at 7:30 p.m. in the library. New members or volunteers are always welcome. Please refer to the monthly calendar to confirm.

Any member of the congregation or the community-at-large may check out books on a self-service basis for a period of 3 weeks. Please follow written instructions posted in the library. Make sure to return any books that you have borrowed at the book returns located outside next to the patio door and also inside the library at the counter.

Videos may be checked out for a period of one week. Video checkout is through a staff person only. See staff hours above.

The Beth Am Library has a wide selection of periodicals for your use. The most recent issue of a periodical is for use only in the Library. Back issues may be checked out for one week. We welcome suggestions for additional periodicals for the Library.

Avotaynu, Jewish genealogy, quarterly
Azure, ideas for the Jewish nation, quarterly
Biblical Archaeology Review, quarterly
Bridges, a journal for Jewish feminists and our friends, every 9 months
Commentary, monthly
Genealogical Society, quarterly
Hadassah, bi-monthly
Israel Horizons, bi-monthly
Jerusalem Post, weekly by airmail from Jerusalem
Jerusalem Report, bi-monthly
Jewish Woman, quarterly
Landsmen, publication of the Suwalk-Lomza (Lithuania) Interest Group for
Jewish Genealogists, bi-annually
Lilith, the independent Jewish women's magazine, quarterly
Moment, quarterly
Pakn Treger, magazine of the Yiddish Book Center, quarterly
Reform Judaism, publication of the UAHC, quarterly
Sh'ma, monthly
Tikkun, a Jewish critique of politics, culture, and society, bi-monthly
Western States Jewish History, quarterly
Zichronote, publication of the San Francisco Bay Area Jewish Genealogical Society, quarterly

The Beth Am Library has a state-of-the-art Judaica Library Computer Catalog system. Books and videotapes may be searched by author, title, subject, or keyword. We also offer computer use for internet searches.

Generous donations have helped make it possible to continue to grow our collections. For $18.00 or more, a book will be purchased and a bookplate will be included with your name and the person you are honoring or memorializing. For more information, please contact us by e-mail or phone as shown below.

New Books in the Library:

Abraham’s Children: Race, Identity, and the DNA of the Chosen People, by Jon Entine Emma Lazarus, by Esther Schor

Gentlemen of the Road: A Tale of Adventure, by Michael Chabon

The Jewish Americans: Three Centuries of Jewish Voices in America (recent PBS series), by Beth S. Wenger

Shimon Peres: The Biography, by Michael Bar-Zohar

New DVDs in the Library:
Rambam--The Story of Maimonides
Another Road Home
Virtual Chanukah
Chutzpak-Chutzpak
Ushpizin
Image Before My Eyes--A History of Jewish Life in Poland
Everything is Illuminated
Dreyfus Affair (History Channel)

Hoffman Book Donation
Tom and Mitzi Hoffman recently donated 65 books they purchased at bob & bob bookstore in honor of Dick and Caroline Hoffman. Dick and Caroline started the Beth Am library some 50 years ago and both are still very much involved in directing and running the library, volunteering together for 20 hours every week. Here are some of the books:

Jeffrey Shandler, Awakening Lives: Autobiographies of Jewish Youth in Poland Before the Holocaust.

Benjamine Blech, Eyewitness to Jewish History

Anne Roiphe, Water from the Well:  Sarah, Rebekah, Rachel and Leah

Sylviah Barack Fishman, The Way into Varieties of Jewishness.

Books from bob & bob:
When bob and bob closed their Palo Alto shop, they call the Beth Am library to donate some of their b ooks. We thankfully accepted their donation of books, valued over $3,000. Some titles included in their generous donation are:

Always from Somewhere Else:  A Memoir of my Chilean Jewish Father, by Marjorie Agosin.

Barrier:  The Seam of the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict,  by Isabel Kershner

Bible Dreams: The Spiritual Quest: How the Dreams in the Bible Speak to Us Today,  by Seymour rossel.

The Holocaust Encyclopedia ,  Edited by Walter Laqueur

The Inner Circle:  Seven Gates to Marriage,  by Shayna Ostrov.

Holocaust Books, Videos and DVDs for Reference and Borrowing:

The Holocaust in Lithuania 1941-45: A Book of Remembrance (2002) by Rose Lerer Cohen & Saul Issroff.

How to Document Victims and Locate Survivors of the Holocaust (1995) by Gary Mokotoff.

Where Once We Walked: A Guide to the Jewish Communities Destroyed in the Holocaust (Rev) (2002) by Gary Mokotoff.

Imperfect Justice: Looted Assets, Slave labor, and the Unfinished Business of World War II (2003) by Stuart E. Eizenstat.

A Conspiracy of Indifference, The Raoul Wallenberg Story (2001) by Alan Gersten.

A Moral Reckoning: The Role of the Catholic Church in the Holocaust and Its Unfulfilled Duty of Repair (2002) by Daniel Jonah Goldhagen.

In My Brother's Image: Twin Brothers Separated by Faith After the Holocaust (2002) by Eugene L. Pogany.

Tolerance, Pluralism & Diversity Booklist - Asilomar, 2005

Eric Bergtraun chairs the Library Committee. Our professional librarian, Diane Rauchwerger, library committee volunteers, and madrichim staff are available to assist congregants with their library needs.

We welcome the opportunity to provide additional information. Please e-mail us at library@betham.org or leave a message through the library voicemail at 650/493-3117 extension 220.