The Man in the Clouds - A trilingual book for interreligious and intercultural dialogue and education

This project will be the main focus during my stay in Berlin. It started in 2016 as an idea for a workshop in Stuttgart for Palestinian and Israeli teachers: to have Israeli, Palestinian and German students translate a Dutch children's book into Arabic, Hebrew and German, get a trilingual, fully illustrated edition of the book published, and use that book in Israeli, Palestinian and German elementary schools.


The book was written by Koos Meinderts and Annette Fienieg, whose permission to use the text and illustrations I asked and received before I started working on the project. The book is The Man in the Clouds (De man in de wolken), and it deals with the importance of giving, sharing, accepting the other, and the dangers of greed and materialism. Its main themes are universal, which together with the beautiful illustrations makes the book a great tool for intercultural and interreligious dialogue and education.



I teach English at the Leo Baeck Education Center in Haifa, and found two excellent partner schools, the Italian Terra Santa School, also in Haifa, and the Koenigin Charlotte Gymnasium in Stuttgart. Our students translated the story (from the published English translation of the Dutch original), and professional teachers corrected (and punctuated, in the case of the Hebrew and the Arabic translation) the text where necessary. The Solidarity Fund (Netherlands) and the Stuttgarter Lehrhaus (Germany) enabled us to publish the book in 2024. 



From left to right: Yonathan Bar-On (Leo Baeck Education Center), Giselle Abu Ayoub (principal of the Italian Terra Santa School), Arne Lang (Koenigin Charlotte Gymnasium), Hind Shaheen (Italian Terra Santa School)

With the assistance of staff members of The House of One, the house of prayer for three religions (in the making) in Berlin, I will write learning units based on the book's themes and art. Those units will then be used, together with the book, in Jewish, Christian and Muslim schools in Germany and Israel. 

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