Most studies of the history of interpretation of Song of Songs focus on its interpretation from late antiquity to modernity. In My Perfect One, Jonathan Kaplan examines earlier rabbinic interpretation of this work by investigating an underappreciated collection of works of rabbinic literature from the first few centuries of the Common Era, known as the tannaitic midrashim. In a departure from earlier scholarship that too quickly classified rabbinic interpretation of Song of Songs as allegorical, Kaplan advocates a more nuanced reading of the approach of the early sages, who read Song of Songs through a mode of typological interpretation concerned with the correspondence between Scripture and ideal events in Israel's history. Throughout the book Kaplan explores ways in which this portrayal helped shape a model vision of rabbinic piety as well as of an idealized vision of their beloved, God, in the wake of the destruction, dislocation, and loss the Jewish community experienced in the first two centuries of the Common Era. The archetypal and idealized language of Song of Songs provided, as Kaplan argues, a textual landscape in which to imagine an idyllic construction of Israel's relationship to her beloved, marked by mutual devotion and fidelity. Through this approach to Song of Songs, the Tannaim helped lay the foundations for later Jewish thought of a robust theology of intimacy in God's relationship with the Jewish people.

My Perfect One: Typology and Early Rabbinic Interpretation of Song of Songs

Religion & Spirituality

Kaplan, Jonathan

Christian Books & Bibles

Oxford University Press

Making Sense of Evolution explores contemporary evolutionary biology, focusing on the elements of theories—selection, adaptation, and species—that are complex and open to multiple possible interpretations, many of which are incompatible with one another and with other accepted practices in the discipline. Particular experimental methods, for example, may demand one understanding of “selection,” while the application of the same concept to another area of evolutionary biology could necessitate a very different definition. Spotlighting these conceptual difficulties and presenting alternate theoretical interpretations that alleviate this incompatibility, Massimo Pigliucci and Jonathan Kaplan intertwine scientific and philosophical analysis to produce a coherent picture of evolutionary biology. Innovative and controversial, Making Sense of Evolution encourages further development of the Modern Synthesis and outlines what might be necessary for the continued refinement of this evolving field.

Making Sense of Evolution: The Conceptual Foundations of Evolutionary Biology

Science & Math

Pigliucci, Massimo

Biological Sciences

University of Chicago Press

Making Sense of Evolution explores contemporary evolutionary biology, focusing on the elements of theories—selection, adaptation, and species—that are complex and open to multiple possible interpretations, many of which are incompatible with one another and with other accepted practices in the discipline. Particular experimental methods, for example, may demand one understanding of “selection,” while the application of the same concept to another area of evolutionary biology could necessitate a very different definition. Spotlighting these conceptual difficulties and presenting alternate theoretical interpretations that alleviate this incompatibility, Massimo Pigliucci and Jonathan Kaplan intertwine scientific and philosophical analysis to produce a coherent picture of evolutionary biology. Innovative and controversial, Making Sense of Evolution encourages further development of the Modern Synthesis and outlines what might be necessary for the continued refinement of this evolving field.

The Dressing Station is a book from the medical front line which shatters any preconceptions we may have about the nature of surgery. Kaplan describes what its like to face pain and death on a regular basis and plunges the reader into the frenetic world of the operating theatre.

The Dressing Station: A Surgeon's Odyssey

Biographies & Memoirs

Picador

The Dressing Station: A Surgeon's Chronicle of War and Medicine

The Dressing Station is a searing portrait of devastation on the battlefield that "illuminates the consequences of war and the ambiguities of relief work at a time when these issues couldn't matter more." (Caroline Fraser, Outside) From treating the casualties of apartheid in Cape Town to operating on Kurdish guerrillas in northern Iraq at the end of the Gulf War, Jonathan Kaplan has saved (and lost) lives in the remotest corners of the world in the most extreme conditions. He has been a hospital surgeon, a ship's physician, an air-ambulance doctor, and a trauma surgeon. He has worked in locations as diverse as England, Burma, Eritrea, the Amazon, Mozambique, and the United States. In this story of unforgettable adventure and tragedy, Dr. Kaplan explores the great challenge of his career -- to maintain his humanity even when that option does not seem possible. The Dressing Station is a haunting and elucidating look into the nature of human violence, the shattering contradictions of war, and the complicated role of medicine in this modern world. "A unique mix of biography and reportage, both personal and clinical," it is "a rare insight into the mind of a surgeon." -- Sue Cullinan, Time "Eloquent ... Beautifully written ... Provides a startling glimpse of battlefield surgery in those conflicts that CNN does not cover." -- Abraham Verghese, The New York Times Book Review "Kaplan ... has a keen sense of the smaller moments that leaven the agonies of daily life." -- Julian B. Orenstein, The Washington Post

Professionals & Academics

Architects of buildings and architects of software have more in common than most people think. Both professions require attention to detail, and both practitioners will see their work collapse around them if they make too many mistakes. It's impossible to imagine a world in which buildings get built without blueprints, but it's still common for software applications to be designed and built without blueprints, or in this case, design patterns. A software design pattern can be identified as "a recurring solution to a recurring problem" Using design patterns for software development makes sense in the same way that architectural design patterns make sense-if it works well in one place, why not use it in another? But developers have had enough of books that simply catalog design patterns without extending into new areas, and books that are so theoretical that you can't actually do anything better after reading them than you could before you started. Crawford and Kaplan's J2Ee Design Patterns approaches the subject in a unique, highly practical and pragmatic way. Rather than simply present another catalog of design patterns, the authors broaden the scope by discussing ways to choose design patterns when building an enterprise application from scratch, looking closely at the real world tradeoffs that Java developers must weigh when architecting their applications. Then they go on to show how to apply the patterns when writing realworld software. They also extend design patterns into areas not covered in other books, presenting original patterns for data modeling, transaction / process modeling, and interoperability. J2Ee Design Patterns offers extensive coverage of the five problem areas enterprise developers face: Maintenance (Extensibility) Performance (System Scalability) Data Modeling (Business Object Modeling) Transactions (process Modeling) Messaging (Interoperability) And with its careful balance between theory

J2EE Design Patterns: Patterns in the Real World

Computers & Technology

Crawford, William

Computer Science

O'Reilly Media

A trauma surgeon describes his life as a field doctor in various locales around the world as he reveals the devastation he has encountered in some of the zones of conflict in which he has worked and the challenging struggle he has had to maintain his humanity in the face of unbearable odds. 25,000 first printing.

Grove Pr

The author of The Dressing Station offers a powerful memoir of the author's experiences in a combat-zone hospital in Iraq, sharing stories of his father's experiences as a surgeon on the battlefield in World War II. 25,000 first printing.

Contact Wounds: A War Surgeon's Education

GROVE PRESS

The Dressing Station is a searing portrait of devastation on the battlefield that "illuminates the consequences of war and the ambiguities of relief work at a time when these issues couldn't matter more." (Caroline Fraser, Outside) From treating the casualties of apartheid in Cape Town to operating on Kurdish guerrillas in northern Iraq at the end of the Gulf War, Jonathan Kaplan has saved (and lost) lives in the remotest corners of the world in the most extreme conditions. He has been a hospital surgeon, a ship's physician, an air-ambulance doctor, and a trauma surgeon. He has worked in locations as diverse as England, Burma, Eritrea, the Amazon, Mozambique, and the United States. In this story of unforgettable adventure and tragedy, Dr. Kaplan explores the great challenge of his career -- to maintain his humanity even when that option does not seem possible. The Dressing Station is a haunting and elucidating look into the nature of human violence, the shattering contradictions of war, and the complicated role of medicine in this modern world. "A unique mix of biography and reportage, both personal and clinical," it is "a rare insight into the mind of a surgeon." -- Sue Cullinan, Time "Eloquent ... Beautifully written ... Provides a startling glimpse of battlefield surgery in those conflicts that CNN does not cover." -- Abraham Verghese, The New York Times Book Review "Kaplan ... has a keen sense of the smaller moments that leaven the agonies of daily life." -- Julian B. Orenstein, The Washington Post

Surgery is the crude art of cutting people open, yet it is also a symphony of delicate manipulation and subtle chords. So says Jonathan Kaplan in his stunning book Contact Wounds, an electrifying account of a doctor’s education in the classroom, in life, and on the battlefield. Inspired by his father, a military surgeon in World War II and Israel’s nascent fight for statehood, Kaplan became a doctor and was appointed to a post at a woefully understaffed South African general hospital in a black township. Fleeing apartheid, he traveled the globe in search of sanctuary, experiencing riots, tropical fevers, political upheaval, and a jungle search for a lost friend. Kaplan eventually landed in Angola, taking charge of a combat-zone hospital, the only surgeon for 160,000 civilians, where he was exposed daily to the horrors of war. Journeying further into dangerous territory, Kaplan portrays serving as a volunteer surgeon in Baghdadwhere he treated civilian casualties amid gunfights for control of hospitals and dealt with gangs of AK-47-wielding looters stripping pharmacies. Contact Wounds is a stirring testament of adventure, discovery, survival, and the making of a career devoted to saving people caught in the crossfire of war.

Leaders & Notable People

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Kaplan, Jonathan. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by Kaplan, Jonathan

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Kaplan, Jonathan. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

My Perfect One: Typology and Early Rabbinic Interpretation of Song of Songs

Making Sense of Evolution: The Conceptual Foundations of Evolutionary Biology

Making Sense of Evolution: The Conceptual Foundations of Evolutionary Biology

The Dressing Station: A Surgeon's Odyssey

The Dressing Station: A Surgeon's Chronicle of War and Medicine

J2EE Design Patterns: Patterns in the Real World

The Dressing Station: A Surgeon's Chronicle of War and Medicine

Contact Wounds: A War Surgeon's Education

The Dressing Station: A Surgeon's Chronicle of War and Medicine

Contact Wounds: A War Surgeon's Education