Andrea, I don't know if anyone else has responded with the same suggestions,
but in looking though my collection, I think the best I can find is A First
Book of Jewish Bible Stories retold by Mary Hoffman and God Sent a Rainbow and
Other Bible Stories retold by Yona Zeldis. Both have extremely tame
illustrations, but some of the wording does indeed refer to the scary stuff;
for instance, for the Noah's ark intro, the Hoffman book uses the language
"Everyone will be drowned..." and the Zeldis book says "I will blot out from
the earth everyone I created...". I guess you can't get away from it completely
unless you go for one of the cutesy stand-alone books like Noah's Bark that
simply makes no mention of G-d's reason for the ark. As for Joseph's story, in
all the books I looked at, the illustrations are not at all graphic, but you
just can't get away from the motivations.
But for the pre-reading crowd, that's where a good storyteller comes in. When I
read some of these stories to the littlest kids, I will soften the language
somewhat to make the story more age appropriate. (I also eliminate any gendered
references to G-d.) So for Noah I might say, "G-d was angry with the naughty
people and took notice of Noah and his family instead." Perhaps that is what
this grandparent can do.
Just an idea.
Rachel HausLibrary DirectorCongregation of Moses Fisher LibraryKalamazoo MI
On Monday, January 25, 2021, 12:00:13 PM EST, Andrea Rapp via Hasafran
<hasafran@lists.osu.edu> wrote:
A grandparent requests a book of Bible stories for preschool Jewish children.
I find that in my collections of that type, the stories keep the graphic
element--God's anger at the wickedness of mankind, so he destroys everythig;
the brothers smear animal blood on Joseph's coat to trick their father to think
that he is dead, the Israelites' terrible behavior earns more punishment, etc.
"The Bible is not a children's book," a rabbi once told me. Anyway, does
anyone know of a collection that differs from what I describe above? (My
inclination is to recommend titles/folktales drawn from biblical characaters,
such David and Akavish, Solomon and the Bee, etc.) What do you all think?Andrea
Rapp, Wise Temple__
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