The first meeting of "Bimat Mandel" this year, which focused on the topic of community, took place on November 15, 2010 under the headline: "If I am for myself, what am I?" We discussed the concept of "solitude" - how it is considered in Israeli sources and other nations' sources, and in literature, poetry, history, psychology and sociology. All this was an introduction to a discussion on the concept of "community" and its meanings.
Participating in the gathering were our guests Prof. Zali Gurevitch - poet, essayist, anthropologist and sociologist and Head of the Department of Sociology at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem; Dr. Melila Hellner-Eshed - a researcher of mysticism, Jewish thought and Eastern cultures from the Hebrew University; and Professor Mordechai Rotenberg, recipient of the Israel Prize for social work and the father of "Jewish psychology", also from the Hebrew University.
The discussion, which was attended by Mandel community members - fellows, graduates and guests - dealt with texts from a variety of sources as well as with film clips. In an animated conversation we tried to understand how loneliness touches each and every one of us, its positive and negative aspects and how to deal with it.
