Am Yisrael High: The Story of Jews and Cannabis
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Exhibition Opening & Panel Discussion
Opening Night co-sponsored by Jews and Booze In Person:Admission: Free Zoom Livestream:Admission: Free |
Mentioned in the Bible and discussed in numerous traditional texts, cannabis has long been a part of Jewish life. For millennia, Jews have been buying, selling, and using cannabis for religious and medicinal purposes and as an intoxicant. The opening of YIVO’s latest exhibit, Am Yisrael High: The Story of Jews and Cannabis, will feature a panel discussion moderated by Eddy Portnoy, who will provide a brief overview of the relationship between Jews and cannabis. He’ll then moderate a discussion with Ed Rosenthal, Adriana Kertzer, Rabbi/Dr. Yosef Glassman, and Madison Margolin. Their discussion will consider the many connections of the Jews to cannabis – religious and spiritual, historical, scientific, and more.
#AmYisraelHigh
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About the Speakers
Ed Rosenthal is a leading cannabis horticulture expert, educator, and legalization activist. Reverently given the nickname “Guru of Ganja” by High Times Magazine, Ed has propelled the effort to legalize marijuana, leading the movement to “grow your own” marijuana for nearly 50 years.
In 1999 Ed was deputized as an officer of the City of Oakland, where he oversaw starter plant operations so that medical patients could grow their own marijuana. His ensuing highly publicized federal trial in 2003 shifted public opinion in favor of state medical marijuana laws.
He is the author and editor of more than a dozen books on marijuana cultivation and social policy, including his latest, Cannabis Grower’s Handbook. “While using marijuana may not be addictive, growing it is,” says Ed. “If my other books helped you grow, ‘Cannabis Grower’s Handbook’ will take you to new highs."
Rosenthal is the founder of the 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization Green Aid: The Medical Marijuana Legal Defense and Education Fund.
Madison Margolin is a journalist covering psychedelics, cannabis, spirituality, and Jewish life. She is the cofounder of DoubleBlind Magazine and has written for publications like Rolling Stone, Playboy, and Vice, among others. Also a co-founder of the Jewish Psychedelic Summit and host of the Set & Setting podcast on the Be Here Now Network, Madison has traveled from cannabis farms in Northern California to underground ceremonies in Brooklyn to the shores of the Ganges River and all over Israel|Palestine, reporting on the role of entheogens in religion, culture, and healing.
Adriana Kertzer is a Brazilian-American founding partner at Plant Medicine Law Group, a psychedelics and cannabis law firm. Adriana began her legal career as a corporate associate on Simpson Thacher & Bartlett’s Latin American capital markets team. Adriana has since drawn on her love of contracts as an entrepreneur in the fields of contemporary culture, real estate and cannabis, as well as in her role as Senior Advisor to the Senior Deputy Chairman at the National Endowment for the Arts under President Obama. Adriana is the author of the book Favelization: The Imaginary Brazil in Contemporary Film, Fashion and Design originally published by the Cooper Hewitt Museum (Smithsonian Institution) and the series Rebranding Pot. She runs JewWhoTokes, an Instagram account that explores relationships with cannabis and psychedelics in the Jewish community, leads the interfaith working group Faith+Psychedelics, and is on the board of Doctors for Cannabis Regulations.
Rabbi Dr. Yosef Glassman is board certified physician in Internal Medicine & Geriatrics and a specialist in Jewish cannabinoid therapeutics. After his fellowship in general internal medicine at Johns Hopkins, he taught clinical geriatrics at both Tufts and Harvard Medical Schools. During this period, Dr. Glassman obtained s’micha from the President of the Toronto Rabbinical Council, Rabbi Dovid Schochet, after having studied both at Yeshivos Hilchos Olam and Shalom Rav in Tzfat. While living in Israel, Dr. Glassman served as a lieutenant in IDF medical corps near Dimona, and as a physician for members of the Israeli Knesset while directing a unit for clinical research at Hadassah Ein Kerem University Medical Center. While directing the department in Jerusalem, he was also certified as a mohel by Rabbi Yehuda Giat of Mercaz HaRav.
Rabbi Dr. Glassman writes for, and has appeared in several features in OU, Hidabroot, Baltimore Jewish Times, Jewish Advocate, the Huffington Post, Tablet Magazine and the NJ Jewish Link for his work in integrative geriatrics and cannabinoid therapeutics.
As trustee for the LifeLineLegalfund.com, he has appeared on on ABC News, CBS News, FoxNews, the USA Today Network, the cover of Ami Magazine, the Jerusalem Post and interviewed on i24 News for his work fighting for the rights of older and frail patients in the US.
Dr. Glassman currently directs the hospitalist program at the community hospital in Lakewood, NJ as he and his family eagerly await the Moshiach and an imminent return to Israel to complete his final project, Go2IsraelNow.com.
Eddy Portnoy is a specialist on Jewish popular culture. He currently serves as Academic Advisor for the Max Weinreich Center and Exhibition Curator at the YIVO Institute for Jewish Research. The exhibitions he has created for YIVO have won plaudits from The New York Times, VICE, The Forward, and others. He is the author of Bad Rabbi and Other Strange but True Stories from the Yiddish Press (Stanford University Press 2017).
Opening Night Co-Sponsor:
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