Shabbat Surfing: Tributes

The Jewish community felt some heavy losses this week with the passing of three “iconic misfit Jews”

The Beastie Boys’ Adam Yauch, also known as MCA,  passed away last Friday after a hard-fought battle with cancer. The Beastie Boys were just inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in April.

Maurice Sendak,  children’s book author, died Tuesday. President Obama has made it a tradition to animatedly read Sendak’s Where the Wild Things Are at the annual White House Easter Egg Roll. In a 2011 interview with NPR’s Terry Gross, Sendak said of his life: “There are so many beautiful things in the world which I will have to leave when I die, but I’m ready, I’m ready, I’m ready.”

Hair revolutionary Vidal Sassoon passed away in Los Angeles on Wednesday. Sassoon is probably best known for his wash-and-wear cuts that freed women from hours in a salon and Mia Farrow’s pixie cut in Rosemary’s Baby . However, he was also involved in fighting against British fascists and a veteran of the Israeli War of Independence.