A long-awaited collection of essays, memoir, and poetry by rabbi, former drag queen, and self-proclaimed "hope-monger," Irwin Keller. In Shechinah at the Art Institute, the author leads us on dazzling journeys into Jewish mysticism, love, loss, memory, gender, AIDS, and the Milky Way itself. Buckle your seatbelts.

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Praise for Shechinah at the Art Institute

It has been said that God made people because God loves stories. In which case Irwin is one of God’s most beloved. The stories in Shechinah at the Art Institute have many sources. Some are from the life experience of the  author. Others  have been passed from hand to hand for a thousand years. Still others are familiar as they are kin to the stories which shape our own lives. The wisdom, humor, and perspective in them all will enrich you and gently bind you to other lives both ancient and modern. A good story heals the loneliness which is the hidden wound of our time. Bravo Irwin. What a gift you have offered  to us all.  –Rachel Naomi Remen MD, author of Kitchen Table Wisdom and My Grandfather’s Blessings

I am not religious. But this book makes my heart sing. There’s music in Irwin’s words. Wisdom, too. He reminds us that in this darkened world, there is still light. And there is love. It’s what makes this book not just entertaining, but important. –Linda Ellerbee, journalist and author of And So It Goes

Quirky, playful, steeped in classical Jewish learning, Keller unveils long-suppressed queerness in Jewish tradition and encounters the sacred miraculously appearing in the secular world. –Rabbi Dr. Rachel Adler, author of Engendering Judaism and Tales of the Holy Mysticat

A few pages into reading Reb Irwin Keller’s luminous book, Shechinah at the Art Institute, I began mentally compiling a list of people I wanted to give a copy to. My father. My stepmother. My sister. My aunt. This friend who is Jewish. That one who is not. This is what Irwin does in his writings and in his life; he enlarges the circle, invites everyone in, mingling the secular with the spiritual with the skeptical with the bawdy with the beautiful. It’s all there in this book, a record of a spiritual being having a very human experience and savoring the all in all of it. Pull up a chair, feast, enjoy. –Alison Luterman, author of In the Time of Great Fires and Desire Zoo.

In these beautifully written meditations, Irwin Keller records his dialogue with sacred texts of his Jewish tradition. Ay, absolutely wonderful, so refreshing, hopeful in a world so desperate for peace. –Greg Sarris, author of Grand Avenue and The Forgetters. 

Irwin Keller, his ear trained on “the crosstalk of the Universe,” knows when angels are about: in  chance encounters, odd coincidences, dreams, and memories; even in the teeth of a vicious dog or the barrel of a gun. In Keller’s luminous writings, these divine messengers reveal both the radiance within the everyday and the clouds that subdue the sacred. With this dazzling book, Keller takes his place among the messengers. –Esther Schor, author of Emma Lazarus and The Bridge of Words

In Shechinah at the Art Institute, the wondrous Rabbi Irwin Keller inhales all the world he inhabits and savors the details of all the miracles and realities of life. Rabbi Keller is one of the most kind, compassionate, brilliantly philosophical, thoughtful and hilariously funny human beings. –Lily Brett, author of Too Many Men and Lola Bensky

Cover design and Shechinah Emblem by Sasha O’Malley.