A British book conference dedicated to everybody’s favorite teenage wizard will attempt to answer the question of Harry Potter’s “Jewishness” when it meets this July at Reading University. Though the evidence is scant, presenter Amy Miller believes that even though Harry doesn’t go to Hebrew school or keep kosher, “he cares about how others are feeling, he is kind, and he defends his beliefs; these are a very few examples of proper Jewish behavior” and therefore a yiddishe neshama (Jewish soul.) Cia Sautter plans to draw conclusions between author J.K Rowling’s magical (and uh, fictional) world and Kabbalah; conference organizers are astounded by the public interest in Harry’s “Jewish connection” since it seems entirely based upon wishful thinking.
We’ve read all five books twice, upside down and sideways, and, even as the conspiracy theorists we are, cannot not find one single piece of compelling proof that warrants this discussion. We’d love to claim Harry, really, unless he starts chanting the 72 names of God or has a bar mitzvah, we’re just skeptical muggles.

One of our favorite toys as a kid was a motorcycle that turned into a robot when flipped it a certain way; we used it to torture our younger sibling by convincing him that the eyes contained radioactive powers. If lil’ brother wants revenge, he can take it up with Henry Orenstein, who patented the Transformers in the 80’s and went on to make oodles of money with the “robots in disguise” action figures (which spawned comics, cartoons and now a live action movie) and other best-selling toys, including Dolly Surprise, a doll that grows long hair when you move her arm.
Orenstein, a Holocaust and dedicated philanthropist (he has been one of the top contributors to the Metropolitan Council on Jewish Poverty in New York for 30 years), has another claim to fame besides providing children with clever playthings; he’s behind the TV poker craze that has elevated a backroom vice to a respectable spectator sport:
“He, more than any other person, is the sole reason for the explosion of poker in this country,” Jon Miller, senior vice president of NBC Sports, tells JTA. “He created the camera. Everybody who shows poker on television now uses his technology.”
On May 1, 60 years after he bluffed his way out of Nazi confinement, Orenstein will be competing in the National Heads-Up Poker Championship on NBC. Those other guys better know when to walk away and know when to run, ‘cause any man who can make a tractor turn into a gun-wielding badass is bound to have a couple tricks up his sleeve.
Shabbat Shalom!

Rediff.com reports that Britney Spears and her stripper-luvin’ husband of three minutes, Kevin Federline, are seeking the guidance of a Kabbalah rabbi to help with their marital troubles. Maybe it’s just us, but it would seem the first step to a healthy marriage would not be a wife “giving her blessing” for a raucous Vegas weekend of lapdances and mojitos, but maybe that’s not spelled out in phonics in the Zohar.

Literary giant Saul Bellow passed away at 89, leaving behind a groups of novels destined to remain in the canon as long as the major existential quandaries of life remain unsolved. Winner of the Pulitzer Prize, the Nobel Prize, and three National Book Awards, Bellow was the author of The Adventures of Augie March, Herzog, and Henderson the Rain King, in which his slightly depressed main characters struggle with assimilation, upward mobility, and of course, sex. While his characters more often than not chose assimilation over a pure Jewish life, Bellow remained interested in what it means to be a Jewish American in the 20th century (excellent article on Jewish themes in his fiction here.) Even though he was ambivalent about whether he believed in God, he said “my intuition is immortality. No argument can be made for it, but it’s just as likely as oblivion.” Whether he’s right or not, he remains immortal for the coming generations who will surely find meaning in his work.

According to today’s JPost, using safety pins and other common household objects to pierce oneself is not only the kind of “ugly stupid” that only a teenager could possibly think is cool, it poses a health risk due to “wandering” nickel that can cause brain damage. This would explain why someone would do it repeatedly.

Fresh off her stint on the UK’s version of Celebrity Big Brother, the drool-worthy Caprice Bourret seems to have found a niche in reality TV: She’s movin’ on up (?) to VH-1’s Surreal Life, where she will be filmed 24/7 living in a Hollywood Hills mansion along with her co-stars Bronson Pinchot (remember him as that crazy foreign fellow Balki in that 80’s sitcom? Think really, really hard,) Janice Dickenson (Sylvester Stallone’s ex), Pink’s skanky biker boyfriend Carey Hart (no, not the “I Wear My Sunglasses At Night” dude—thanks, Esther—but, like, whatever happened to that guy? He was hunky!), Apprentice über-bitch Omarosa and baseball shanda Jose Canseco.
We love you, Caprice, but, honey? We’re thinking this is not such a hot career move for you. At least we’ll be able to catch a glimpse of Your Jewish Litheness on stateside cable, but we have a feeling we’ll be sorry.

CraigNCo‘s Celebrate Passover CD mixes up traditional and original tunes for a dynamic musical experience that will keep you humming long after the breadbox is full of muffins! Far from being a cheesy compilation of the Exodus’ greatest hits, Alan Eder’s reggae-ish Go Down Moses and Hlomo Gronich’s Motherless Child are treasures that stand on their own, while Craig Tubman’s and Laurence Juber’s Dayenu has a beat ya can actually dance to. We’ve found it quite a motivating force as we begin the spring cleaning preparations! And check it out: the CD is free when you purchase four items from the CraigNCo store, including the inimitable Dancing Matzah Man.

There’ll be no more falling asleep at the seder when you bring your set of Ten Plagues finger puppets to the table! Lighten up the mood as you recite each horrible fate that befell the Pharoah, but remember not to revel in the misery of other people. And after that fourth class of wine, better hide them from Cousin Shai in case he tries to recreate his gall bladder surgery.

Pope John Paul II passed away Saturday, which should make Guy Ritchie feel really bad about his Purim lampooning last week. Israeli PM Ariel Sharon called the papal father of the Christian world “a man of peace, a friend of the Jewish people,” considering he didn’t order any inquisitions or pogroms in his 26-year reign. He did do his best to reconcile Jewish/Catholic relations, and we hope he gets to keep his tall white hat up in heaven.
The church’s top position needs to be filled as soon as possible, lest the pious world dissolve into anarchy, and it looks like the next in line could be Cardinal Jean-Marie Lustiger, a Holocaust survivor who converted to Catholicism as a young man. Described as charismatic with a gift for paradox, Lustiger “has become a living bridge over the river of bad blood, mischief and mistrust that has divided the relationship between Catholicism and Judaism for 2,000 years.”
Not to get all New Testament symbol-y on y’all, but isn’t a Jewish Pope one of the seven signs of the Apocalypse or something?
(Hat tips to Jewschool and Jewlicious.)