PAKET UMROH BULAN FEBRUARI MARET APRIL MEI 2018

HIKMAH DARI IBADAH HAJI ATAU RUKUN ISLAM YANG KE LIMA

Oleh
Syaikh Abdul Aziz bin Abdullah Baz

Diantara Asmaul Husna yang dimiliki Allah Subhanahu wa Ta’ala adalah Al-Hakim yang bermakna : “Yang menetapkan Hukum, atau Yang mempunyai sifat Hikmah, di mana Allah tidak berkata dan bertindak dengan sia-sia. Oleh karena itulah semua syari’at Allah Subhanahu wa Ta’ala mempunyai kebaikan yang besar dan manfaat yang banyak bagi hamba-Nya di dunia seperti kebagusan hati, ketenangan jiwa dan kebaikan keadaan. Juga akibat yang baik dan kemenangan yang besar di kampung kenikmatan (akhirat) dengan melihat wajah-Nya dan mendapatkan ridha-Nya.
Demikian pula haji, sebuah ibadah tahunan yang besar yang Allah syari’atkan bagi para hamba-Nya, mempunyai berbagai manfaat yang besar dan tujuan yang besar pula, yang membawa kebaikan di dunia dan akhirat. Dan diantara hikmah ibadah haji ini adalah.

[1]. Mengikhlaskan Seluruh Ibadah
Beribadah semata-mata untuk Allah Subhanahu wa Ta’ala dan menghadapkan hati kepada-Nya dengan keyakinan bahwa tidak ada yang diibadahi dengan haq, kecuali Dia dan bahwa Dia adalah satu-satunya pemilik nama-nama yang indah dan sifat-sifat yang mulia. Tidak ada sekutu bagi-Nya, tidak ada yang menyerupai-Nya dan tidak ada tandingan-Nya.

Dan hal ini telah diisyaratkan dalam firman-Nya.

“Artinya : Dan ingatlah ketika Kami menempatkan tempat Baitullah untuk Ibrahim dengan menyatakan ; “Janganlah engkau menyekutukan Aku dengan apapun dan sucikan rumah-Ku ini bagi orang-orang yang thawaf, beribadah, ruku dan sujud” [Al-Hajj : 26]

Mensucikan rumah-Nya di dalam hal ini adalah dengan cara beribadah semata-mata kepada Allah di dekat rumah-Nya (Ka’bah) yang mulia, mebersihkan sekitar Ka’bah dari berhala-berhala, patung-patung, najis-najis yang Allah Subhanahu wa Ta’ala haramkan serta dari segala hal yang mengganggu orang-orang yang sedang menjalankan haji atau umrah atau hal-hal lain yang menyibukkan (melalaikan, -pent) dari tujuan mereka.

[2]. Mendapat Ampunan Dosa-Dosa Dan Balasan Jannah
“Dari Abu Hurairah bahwa Nabi Shallallahu ‘alaihi wa sallam bersabda : “Satu umrah sampai umrah yang lain adalah sebagai penghapus dosa antara keduanya dan tidak ada balasan bagi haji mabrur kecuali jannah” [HR Bukhari dan Muslim, Bahjatun Nanzhirin no. 1275]

“Abu Hurairah Radhiyallahu ‘anhu berkata : “Aku mendengar Nabi Shallallahu ‘alaihi wa sallam bersabda bahwa barang siapa berhaji ke Baitullah ini karena Allah, tidak melakukan rafats dan fusuuq, niscaya ia kembali seperti hari ia dilahirkan oleh ibunya” [HR Bukhari]

Rafats : jima’ ; pendahuluannya dan ucapan kotor, Fusuuq : kemaksiatan

Sesungguhnya barangsiapa mendatangi Ka’bah, kemudian menunaikan haji atau umrah dengan baik, tanpa rafats dan fusuuq serta dengan ikhlas karena Allah Subhanahu wa Ta’ala semata, niscaya Allah Subhanahu wa Ta’ala mengampuni dosa-dosanya dan menuliskan jannah baginya. Dan hal inilah yang didambakan oleh setiap mu’min dan mu’minah yaitu meraih keberuntungan berupa jannah dan selamat dari neraka.

[3]. Menyambut Seruan Nabi Ibrahima Alaihissalam
“Dan serulah manusia untuk berhaji, niscaya mereka akan datang kepadamu dengan berjalan kaki dan mengendarai unta yang kurus yang datang dari segenap penjuru yang jauh”[Al-Hajj : 27]

Nabi Ibrahim Alaihissalam telah menyerukan (agar berhaji) kepada manusia. Dan Allah Subhanahu wa Ta’ala menjadikan siapa saja yang Dia kehendaki (untuk bisa) mendengar seruan Nabi Ibrahim Alaihissalam tersebut dan menyambutnya. Hal itu berlangsung semenjak zaman Nabi Ibrahim hingga sekarang.

[4]. Menyaksikan Berbagai Manfaat Bagi Kaum Muslimin
Allah Subhanahu wa Ta’ala berfirman : “Agar supaya mereka menyaksikan berbagai manfaat bagi mereka” [Al-Hajj : 28]

Alah Subhanahu wa Ta’ala menyebutkan manfaat-manfaat dengan muthlaq (secara umum tanpa ikatan) dan mubham (tanpa penjelasan) karena banyaknya dan besarnya menafaat-manfaat yang segera terjadi dan nanti akan terjadi baik duniawi maupun ukhrawi.

Dan diantara yang terbesar adalah menyaksikan tauhid-Nya, yakni mereka beribadah kepada Allah Subhanahu wa Ta’ala semata-mata. Mereka datang dengan niat mencari wajah-Nya yang mulia bukan karena riya’ (dilihat orang lain) dan juga bukan karena sum’ah (dibicarakan orang lain). Bahkan mereka betauhid dan ikhlas kepada-Nya, serta mengikrarkan (tauhid) di antara hamba-hamba-Nya, dan saling menasehati di antara orang-orang yang datang (berhaji dan sebagainya,-pent) tentangnya (tauhid).

Mereka thawaaf mengelilingi Ka’bah, mengagungkan-Nya, menjalankan shalat di rumah-Nya, memohon karunia-Nya, berdo’a supaya ibadah haji mereka diterima, dosa-dosa mereka diampuni, dikembalikan dengan selamat ke nergara masing-masing dan diberi anugerah kembali lagi untuk berdo’a dan merendah diri kepda-Nya.

Mereka mengucapkan talbiyah dengan keras sehingga di dengar oleh orang yang dekat ataupun yang jauh, dan yang lain bisa mempelajarinya agar mengetahui maknanya, merasakannya, mewujudkan di dalam hati, lisan dan amalan mereka. Dan bahwa maknanya adalah : Mengikhlaskan ibadah semata-mata untuk Allah dan beriman bahwa Dia adalah ‘ilah mereka yang haq, Pencipta mereka, Pemberi rizki mereka, Yang diibadahi sewaktu haji dan lainnya.

[5]. Saling Mengenal Dan Saling Menasehati
Dan diantara hikmah haji adalah bahwa kaum muslimin bisa saling mengenal dan saling berwasiat dan menasehati dengan al-haq. Mereka datang dari segala penjuru, dari barat, timur, selatan dan utara Makkah, berkumpul di rumah Allah Subhanahu wa Ta’ala yang tua, di Arafah, di Muzdalifah, di Mina dan di Makkah. Mereka saling mengenal, saling menasehati, sebagian mengajari yang lain, membimbing, menolong, membantu untuk maslahat-maslahat dunia akhirat, maslahat taklim tata cara haji, shalat, zakat, maslahat bimbingan, pengarahan dan dakwah ke jala Allah.

Mereka bisa mendengar dari para ulama, apa yang bermanfaat bagi mereka yang di sana terdapat petunjuk dan bimbingan menuju jalan yang lurus, jalan kebahagiaan menuju tauhidullah dan ikhlas kepada-Nya, menuju ketaatan yang diwajibkan oleh Allah Subhanahu wa Ta’ala dan mengetahui kemaksiatan untuk dijauhi, dan supaya mereka mengetahui batas-batas Allah dan mereka bisa saling menolong di dalam kebaikan dan taqwa.

[6]. Mempelajari Agama Allah Subhanahu wa Ta’ala
Dan diantara manfaat haji yang besar adalah bahwa mereka bisa mempelajari agama Allah dilingkungan rumah Allah yang tua, dan di lingkungann masjid Nabawi dari para ulama dan pembimbing serta memberi peringatan tentang apa yang mereka tidak ketahui mengenai hukum-hukum agama, haji, umrah dan lainnya. Sehingga mereka bisa menunaikan kewajiban mereka dengan ilmu.

Dari Makkah inilah tertib ilmu itu, yaitu ilmu tauhid dan agama. Kemudian (berkembang) dari Madinah, dari seluruh jazirah ini dan dari seluruh negeri-negeri Allah Subhanahu wa Ta’ala yang ada ilmu dan ahli ilmu. Namun semua asalnya adalah dari sini, dari lingkungan rumah Allah yang tua.

Maka wajib bagi para ulama dan da’i, dimana saja mereka berada, terlebih lagi di lingkungan rumah Allah Subhanahu wa Ta’ala ini, untuk mengajari manusia, orang-orang yang menunaikan haji dan umrah, orang-orang asli dan pendatang serta para penziarah, tentang agama dan manasik haji mereka.

Seorang muslim diperintahkan untuk belajar, bagaimanapun (keadaannya) ia, dimana saja dan kapan saja ; tetapi di lingkungan rumah Allah yang tua, urusan ini (belajar agama) lebih penting dan mendesak.

Dan di antara tanda-tanda kebaikan dan kebahagian seseorang adalah belajar tentang agama Allah Subhanahu wa Ta’ala.

“Artinya : Nabi Shallallahu ‘alaihi bersabda : “Barangsiapa yang dikehendaki oleh Allah Subhanahu wa Ta’ala memperoleh kebaikan, niscaya Dia menjadikan faqih terhadap agama” [HR Bukhari, Kitab Al-Ilmi 3 bab : 14]

Di sini, di negeri Allah, di negerimu dan di negeri mana saja, jika engkau dapati seorang alim ahli syari’at Allah, maka pergunakanlah kesempatan. Janganlah engkau takabur dan malas. Karena ilmu itu tidak bisa diraih oleh orang-orang yang takabur, pemalas, lemah serta pemalu. Ilmu itu membutuhkan kesigapan dan kemauan yang tinggi.

Mundur dari menuntut ilmu, itu bukanlah sifat malu, tetapi suatu kelemahan. Allah Subhanahu wa Ta’ala berfirman.

“Artinya : Dan Allah tidak malu dari kebenaran” [Al-Ahzab : 53]

Karenanya seorang mukmin dan mukminah yang berpandangan luas, tidak akan malu dalam bab ini ; bahkan ia maju, bertanya, menyelidiki dan menampakkan kemusykilan yang ia miliki, sehingga hilanglah kemusykilan tersebut.

[7]. Menyebarkan Ilmu
Di antara manfaat haji adalah menyebarkan ilmu kepada saudara-saudaranya yang melaksanakan ibadah haji dan teman-temannya seperjalanan, yang di mobil, di pesawat terbang, di tenda, di Mekkah dan di segala tempat. Ini adalah kesempatan yang Allah Subhanahu wa Ta’ala anugerahkan. Engkau bisa menyebarkan ilmu-mu dan menjelaskan apa yang engkau miliki, akan tetapi haruslah dengan apa yang engkau ketahui berdasarkan Al-Kitab dan As-Sunnah dan istimbath ahli ilmu dari keduanya. Bukan dari kebodohan dan pemikiran-pemikiran yang menyimpang dari Al-Kitab dan As-Sunnah.

[8]. Memperbanyak Ketaatan
Di antara manfaat haji adalah memperbanyak shalat dan thawaf, sebagaimana firman Allah Subhanahu wa Ta’ala.

“Artinya : Kemudian hendaklah mereka menghilangkan kotoran yang ada pada badan mereka ; hendaklah mereka menyempurnakan nadzar-nadzar mereka dan hendaklah mereka berthawaf sekeliling rumah yang tua itu (Ka’bah)” [Al-Hajj : 29]

Maka disyariatkan bagi orang yang menjalankan haji dan umrah untuk memperbanyak thawaf semampunya dan memperbanyak shalat di tanah haram. Oleh karena itu perbanyaklah shalat, qira’atul qur’an, tasbih, tahlil, dzikir. Juga perbanyaklah amar ma’ruf nahi mungkar dan da’wah kepada jalan Allah Subhanahu wa Ta’ala di mana banyak orang berkumpul dari Afrika, Eropa, Amerika, Asia dan lainnya. Maka wajib bagi mereka untuk mempergunakan kesempatan ini sebaik-baiknya.

[9]. Menunaikan Nadzar
Walaupun nadzar itu sebaiknya tidak dilakukan, akan tetapi seandainya seseorang telah bernadzar untuk melakukan ketaatan, maka wajib baginya untuk memenuhinya.

Rasulullah Shallallahu ‘alaihi wa sallam bersabda.

“Artinya : Barangsiapa bernadzar untuk mentaati Allah, maka hendaklah dia mentaati-Nya” [HR Bukhari]

Maka apabila seseorang bernadzar di tanah haram ini berupa shalat, thawaf ataupun ibadah lainnya, maka wajib baginya untuk menunaikannya di tanah haram ini.

Allah Subhanahu wa Ta’ala berfirman.

“Artinya : Dan hendaklah mereka menunaikan nadzar” [Al-Hajj : 29]

[10]. Menolong Dan Berbuat Baik Kepada Orang Miskin
Di antara manfaat haji adalah bisa menolong dan berbuat baik kepada orang miskin baik yang sedang menjalankan haji atau tidak di negeri yang aman ini.

Seseorang dapat mengobati orang sakit, menjenguknya, menunjukkan ke rumah sakit dan menolongnya dengan harta serta obat.

Ini semua termasuk manfaat-manfaat haji.

“Artinya : ….agar mereka menyaksikan berbagai manfaat bagi mereka” [Al-Hajj : 28]

[11]. Memperbanyak Dzikir Kepada Allah
Di negeri yang aman ini hendaklah memperbanyak dzikir kepada Allah, baik dalam keadaan berdiri, duduk dan bebaring, dengan tasbih (ucapan Subhanallah), hamdalah (ucapan Alhamdulillah), tahlil (ucapan Laa ilaaha ilallah), takbir (ucapan Allahu Akbar) dan hauqallah (ucapan Laa haula wa laa quwata illa billah).

“Artinya : Dari Abu Musa Al-As’ari Radhiyallahu ‘anhu bahwa Nabi Shallallahu ‘alaihi wa sallam bersabda : “Perumpamaan orang yang mengingat Rabb-nya dan yang tidak mengingat-Nya adalah sebagai orang hidup dan yang mati”. [HR Bukhari, Bahjatun Nadzirin no. 1434]

[12]. Berdo’a Kepada-Nya
Di antara manfaat haji, hendaknya bersungguh-sungguh merendahkan diri dan terus menerus berdo’a kepada Allah Subhanahu wa Ta’ala, agar Dia menerima amal, membereskan hati dan perbuatan ; agar Dia menolong untuk mengingat-Nya, bersyukur kepada-Nya dan memperbagus ibadah kepada-Nya ; agar Dia menolong untuk menunaikan kewajiban dengan sifat yang Dia ridhai serta agar Dia menolong untuk berbuat baik kepada hamba-hamba-Nya.

[13]. Menunaikan Manasik Dengan Sebaik-Baiknya
Di antara manfaat haji, hendaknya melaksanakannya dengan sesempurna mungkin, dengan sebaik-baiknya dan seikhlas mungkin baik sewaktu melakukan thawaf, sa’i, wukuf di Arafah, berada di Muzdalifah, melempar jumrah, maupun sewaktu shalat, qira’atul qur’an, berdzikir, berdo’a dan lainnya. Juga hendaknya mengupayakannya dengan kosentrasi dan ikhlas.

[14]. Menyembelih Kurban
Di antara manfaat haji adalah menyembelih (binatang) kurban, baik yang wajib tatkala berihram tammatu dan qiran, maupun tidak wajib yaitu untuk taqarrub kepada Allah Subhanahu wa Ta’ala.

Sewaktu haji wada’ Rasulullah Shallallahu ‘alaihi wa sallam telah berkurban 100 ekor binatang. Para sahabat juga menyembelih kurban. Kurban itu adalah suatu ibadah, karena daging kurban dibagikan kepada orang-orang miskin dan yang membutuhkan di hari-hari Mina dan lainnya.

Demikianlah sebagian hikmah dari ibadah haji (rukun Islam yang ke lima) mudah-mudahan kita bisa mengambil manfaatnya, dan senantiasa diberi petunjuk dari Allah Subhanahu wa Ta’ala serta diberi kemudahan untuk menunaikannya. Amin

[Disalin dari Majalah As-Sunnah Edisi 09/Tahun III/1419H/1999M, Disadur oleh Abu Shalihah dari Majalah Al-Furqon nomor 72 hal.18-21. Penebit Yayasan Lajnah Istiqomah Surakarta, Jl. Solo – Purwodadi Km 8 Selokaton Gondangrejo – Solo 57183 ]

Sumber : http://www.alquran-sunnah.com

Baca Artikel Lainnya : PANDUAN UNTUK MELAKSANAKAN IBADAH HAJI

TIPS MENGGANTI BOHLAM/BOLA LAMPU MOBIL

penggantian bola lampu h4 /lampu besar mobil yang tidak mengikuti aturan akan dapat membuat kerusakan di

komponen elektrik lain,misalnya pada kotak fuse/sekring dan di sentral saklar dim.di sebabkan tegangan

bola lampu yg tinggi,untuk pemakaian bola standart adalah 60/55 watt,dan di pasaran banyak yang beredar

100/90 watt.untuk penggunaan bola lampu yang 100/90 watt atau 130/100 watt di perlukan pemasangan

relay set.kami anjurkan buat mobil yang standart agar memakai bola standart jga,60/55 watt.

Bola lampu yang di pergunakan bola h4 putih polos jangan memakai bola lampu yg berwarna,sebab bola

lampu yang berwarna itu akan jadi masalah di hari hujan,karena cahayanya hilang karena berbaur dengan air hujan.sedangkan bola biasa yang putih itu tak terpengaruh cuaca.

KEBAKARAN YANG TERJADI DI STASIUN GAMBIR

saco-indonesia.com, Si jago merah telah mengamuk di Stasiun Gambir, Jakarta Pusat. Sebanyak 10 mobil pemadam kebakaran telah di terjunkan ke lokasi kejadian.

Petugas Pemadam Kebakaran Jakarta Pusat Poniman juga mengatakan, kebakaran telah terjadi sekitar pukul 09.10 WIB. Poniman juga mengaku belum dapat mengetahui penyebab dari kebakaran ini.

"Api berasal dari sebuah restoran yang terbakar," kata Poniman, Jumat (27/12).

Saat ini petugas juga masih terus berjibaku untuk dapat memadamkan api yang terus berkobar. Belum dapat diketahui apakah ada korban dalam kejadian ini.

Editor : Dian Sukmawati

81 MAYAT DI TPU CIHUNI DIPINDAH SECARA DIAM-DIAM

saco-indonesia.com, Sebanyak 81 makam di TPU Desa Cihuni, Kecamatan Pagedangan, Kabupaten Tangerang, telah dibongkar secara diam-diam. Diduga, pembongkaran itu telah dilakukan oleh orang suruhan pengembang untuk dapat membangun perumahan mewah.

Menurut warga Desa Cihuni, Safrudin, pengembang perumahan mewah juga sempat melakukan negosiasi untuk dapat memindahkan makam tersebut. Namun negosiasi untuk ruislag itu telah dimentahkan warga.

"Tapi, warga telah menolak atas pemindahan makam yang luasnya telah mencapai 700 meter tersebut untuk diruislagh," kata Safrudin, Minggu (2/2) kemarin.

Safrudin juga mengungkapkan, atas kasus pembongkaran makam tersebut, warga telah menangkap tiga orang yang diduga suruhan pengembang tersebut. Ketiga orang pembongkar makam itu diserahkan ke Polsek Pagedangan, Legok, Banten.

"Tiga pelaku tersebut yang berinisial I, D dan A," ungkap dia.

Informasi yang telah berhasil dihimpun, 81 mayat sudah dibongkar dan dipindahkan pelaku ke pemakaman lainnya, tanpa sepengetahuan warga Desa Cihuni. Saat ini pelaku juga sudah diamankan di Polsek Pagedangan.

Kepala Polsek Pagedangan AKP Murodih telah membenarkan atas kejadian tersebut. "Tersangka telah berhasil digelandang warga dan kini kami amankan dan kemudian akan diproses secara hukum," paparnya.

Editor : Dian Sukmawati

KRIMINAL

Kriminal

Cher and Marc Jacobs

Rhapsody, a Lofty Literary Journal, Perused at 39,000 Feet

Photo

 

Last summer at a writers’ workshop in Oregon, the novelists Anthony Doerr, Karen Russell and Elissa Schappell were chatting over cocktails when they realized they had all published work in the same magazine. It wasn’t one of the usual literary outlets, like Tin House, The Paris Review or The New Yorker. It was Rhapsody, an in-flight magazine for United Airlines.

It seemed like a weird coincidence. Then again, considering Rhapsody’s growing roster of A-list fiction writers, maybe not. Since its first issue hit plane cabins a year and a half ago, Rhapsody has published original works by literary stars like Joyce Carol Oates, Rick Moody, Amy Bloom, Emma Straub and Mr. Doerr, who won the Pulitzer Prize for fiction two weeks ago.

As airlines try to distinguish their high-end service with luxuries like private sleeping chambers, showers, butler service and meals from five-star chefs, United Airlines is offering a loftier, more cerebral amenity to its first-class and business-class passengers: elegant prose by prominent novelists. There are no airport maps or disheartening lists of in-flight meal and entertainment options in Rhapsody. Instead, the magazine has published ruminative first-person travel accounts, cultural dispatches and probing essays about flight by more than 30 literary fiction writers.

Photo

 

An airline might seem like an odd literary patron. But as publishers and writers look for new ways to reach readers in a shaky retail climate, many have formed corporate alliances with transit companies, including American Airlines, JetBlue and Amtrak, that provide a captive audience.

Mark Krolick, United Airlines’ managing director of marketing and product development, said the quality of the writing in Rhapsody brings a patina of sophistication to its first-class service, along with other opulent touches like mood lighting, soft music and a branded scent.

“The high-end leisure or business-class traveler has higher expectations, even in the entertainment we provide,” he said.

Some of Rhapsody’s contributing writers say they were lured by the promise of free airfare and luxury accommodations provided by United, as well as exposure to an elite audience of some two million first-class and business-class travelers.

“It’s not your normal Park Slope Community Bookstore types who read Rhapsody,” Mr. Moody, author of the 1994 novel “The Ice Storm,” who wrote an introspective, philosophical piece about traveling to the Aran Islands of Ireland for Rhapsody, said in an email. “I’m not sure I myself am in that Rhapsody demographic, but I would like them to buy my books one day.”

In addition to offering travel perks, the magazine pays well and gives writers freedom, within reason, to choose their subject matter and write with style. Certain genres of flight stories are off limits, naturally: no plane crashes or woeful tales of lost luggage or rude flight attendants, and nothing too risqué.

“We’re not going to have someone write about joining the mile-high club,” said Jordan Heller, the editor in chief of Rhapsody. “Despite those restrictions, we’ve managed to come up with a lot of high-minded literary content.”

Guiding writers toward the right idea occasionally requires some gentle prodding. When Rhapsody’s executive editor asked Ms. Russell to contribute an essay about a memorable flight experience, she first pitched a story about the time she was chaperoning a group of teenagers on a trip to Europe, and their delayed plane sat at the airport in New York for several hours while other passengers got progressively drunker.

“He pointed out that disaster flights are not what people want to read about when they’re in transit, and very diplomatically suggested that maybe people want to read something that casts air travel in a more positive light,” said Ms. Russell, whose novel “Swamplandia!” was a finalist for the 2012 Pulitzer Prize.

She turned in a nostalgia-tinged essay about her first flight on a trip to Disney World when she was 6. “The Magic Kingdom was an anticlimax,” she wrote. “What ride could compare to that first flight?”

Ms. Oates also wrote about her first flight, in a tiny yellow propeller plane piloted by her father. The novelist Joyce Maynard told of the constant disappointment of never seeing her books in airport bookstores and the thrill of finally spotting a fellow plane passenger reading her novel “Labor Day.” Emily St. John Mandel, who was a finalist for the National Book Award in fiction last year, wrote about agonizing over which books to bring on a long flight.

“There’s nobody that’s looked down their noses at us as an in-flight magazine,” said Sean Manning, the magazine’s executive editor. “As big as these people are in the literary world, there’s still this untapped audience for them of luxury travelers.”

United is one of a handful of companies showcasing work by literary writers as a way to elevate their brands and engage customers. Chipotle has printed original work from writers like Toni Morrison, Jeffrey Eugenides and Barbara Kingsolver on its disposable cups and paper bags. The eyeglass company Warby Parker hosts parties for authors and sells books from 14 independent publishers in its stores.

JetBlue offers around 40 e-books from HarperCollins and Penguin Random House on its free wireless network, allowing passengers to read free samples and buy and download books. JetBlue will start offering 11 digital titles from Simon & Schuster soon. Amtrak recently forged an alliance with Penguin Random House to provide free digital samples from 28 popular titles, which passengers can buy and download over Amtrak’s admittedly spotty wireless service.

Amtrak is becoming an incubator for literary talent in its own right. Last year, it started a residency program, offering writers a free long-distance train trip and complimentary food. More than 16,000 writers applied and 24 made the cut.

Like Amtrak, Rhapsody has found that writers are eager to get onboard. On a rainy spring afternoon, Rhapsody’s editorial staff sat around a conference table discussing the June issue, which will feature an essay by the novelist Hannah Pittard and an unpublished short story by the late Elmore Leonard.

“Do you have that photo of Elmore Leonard? Can I see it?” Mr. Heller, the editor in chief, asked Rhapsody’s design director, Christos Hannides. Mr. Hannides slid it across the table and noted that they also had a photograph of cowboy spurs. “It’s very simple; it won’t take away from the literature,” he said.

Rhapsody’s office, an open space with exposed pipes and a vaulted brick ceiling, sits in Dumbo at the epicenter of literary Brooklyn, in the same converted tea warehouse as the literary journal N+1 and the digital publisher Atavist. Two of the magazine’s seven staff members hold graduate degrees in creative writing. Mr. Manning, the executive editor, has published a memoir and edited five literary anthologies.

Mr. Manning said Rhapsody was conceived from the start as a place for literary novelists to write with voice and style, and nobody had been put off that their work would live in plane cabins and airport lounges.

Still, some contributors say they wish the magazine were more widely circulated.

“I would love it if I could read it,” said Ms. Schappell, a Brooklyn-based novelist who wrote a feature story for Rhapsody’s inaugural issue. “But I never fly first class.”

Tribute for a Roller Hockey Warrior

Hockey is not exactly known as a city game, but played on roller skates, it once held sway as the sport of choice in many New York neighborhoods.

“City kids had no rinks, no ice, but they would do anything to play hockey,” said Edward Moffett, former director of the Long Island City Y.M.C.A. Roller Hockey League, in Queens, whose games were played in city playgrounds going back to the 1940s.

From the 1960s through the 1980s, the league had more than 60 teams, he said. Players included the Mullen brothers of Hell’s Kitchen and Dan Dorion of Astoria, Queens, who would later play on ice for the National Hockey League.

One street legend from the heyday of New York roller hockey was Craig Allen, who lived in the Woodside Houses projects and became one of the city’s hardest hitters and top scorers.

“Craig was a warrior, one of the best roller hockey players in the city in the ’70s,” said Dave Garmendia, 60, a retired New York police officer who grew up playing with Mr. Allen. “His teammates loved him and his opponents feared him.”

Young Craig took up hockey on the streets of Queens in the 1960s, playing pickup games between sewer covers, wearing steel-wheeled skates clamped onto school shoes and using a roll of electrical tape as the puck.

His skill and ferocity drew attention, Mr. Garmendia said, but so did his skin color. He was black, in a sport made up almost entirely by white players.

“Roller hockey was a white kid’s game, plain and simple, but Craig broke the color barrier,” Mr. Garmendia said. “We used to say Craig did more for race relations than the N.A.A.C.P.”

Mr. Allen went on to coach and referee roller hockey in New York before moving several years ago to South Carolina. But he continued to organize an annual alumni game at Dutch Kills Playground in Long Island City, the same site that held the local championship games.

The reunion this year was on Saturday, but Mr. Allen never made it. On April 26, just before boarding the bus to New York, he died of an asthma attack at age 61.

Word of his death spread rapidly among hundreds of his old hockey colleagues who resolved to continue with the event, now renamed the Craig Allen Memorial Roller Hockey Reunion.

The turnout on Saturday was the largest ever, with players pulling on their old equipment, choosing sides and taking once again to the rink of cracked blacktop with faded lines and circles. They wore no helmets, although one player wore a fedora.

Another, Vinnie Juliano, 77, of Long Island City, wore his hearing aids, along with his 50-year-old taped-up quads, or four-wheeled skates with a leather boot. Many players here never converted to in-line skates, and neither did Mr. Allen, whose photograph appeared on a poster hanging behind the players’ bench.

“I’m seeing people walking by wondering why all these rusty, grizzly old guys are here playing hockey,” one player, Tommy Dominguez, said. “We’re here for Craig, and let me tell you, these old guys still play hard.”

Everyone seemed to have a Craig Allen story, from his earliest teams at Public School 151 to the Bryant Rangers, the Woodside Wings, the Woodside Blues and more.

Mr. Allen, who became a yellow-cab driver, was always recruiting new talent. He gained the nickname Cabby for his habit of stopping at playgrounds all over the city to scout players.

Teams were organized around neighborhoods and churches, and often sponsored by local bars. Mr. Allen, for one, played for bars, including Garry Owen’s and on the Fiddler’s Green Jokers team in Inwood, Manhattan.

Play was tough and fights were frequent.

“We were basically street gangs on skates,” said Steve Rogg, 56, a mail clerk who grew up in Jackson Heights, Queens, and who on Saturday wore his Riedell Classic quads from 1972. “If another team caught up with you the night before a game, they tossed you a beating so you couldn’t play the next day.”

Mr. Garmendia said Mr. Allen’s skin color provoked many fights.

“When we’d go to some ignorant neighborhoods, a lot of players would use slurs,” Mr. Garmendia said, recalling a game in Ozone Park, Queens, where local fans parked motorcycles in a lineup next to the blacktop and taunted Mr. Allen. Mr. Garmendia said he checked a player into the motorcycles, “and the bikes went down like dominoes, which started a serious brawl.”

A group of fans at a game in Brooklyn once stuck a pole through the rink fence as Mr. Allen skated by and broke his jaw, Mr. Garmendia said, adding that carloads of reinforcements soon arrived to defend Mr. Allen.

And at another racially incited brawl, the police responded with six patrol cars and a helicopter.

Before play began on Saturday, the players gathered at center rink to honor Mr. Allen. Billy Barnwell, 59, of Woodside, recalled once how an all-white, all-star squad snubbed Mr. Allen by playing him third string. He scored seven goals in the first game and made first string immediately.

“He’d always hear racial stuff before the game, and I’d ask him, ‘How do you put up with that?’” Mr. Barnwell recalled. “Craig would say, ‘We’ll take care of it,’ and by the end of the game, he’d win guys over. They’d say, ‘This guy’s good.’”

Maya Plisetskaya, Ballerina Who Embodied Bolshoi, Dies at 89

Ms. Plisetskaya, renowned for her fluidity of movement, expressive acting and willful personality, danced on the Bolshoi stage well into her 60s, but her life was shadowed by Stalinism.

In Baltimore, National Guard Pullout Begins as Citywide Curfew Is Lifted

David Goldman/Associated Press

National Guard soldiers boarding a truck in Baltimore on Sunday.

Baltimore residents prepared to resume the more familiar rhythms of their lives as days passed without new bouts of widespread rioting and as the National Guard began to pull its troops from the city.

In Baltimore, National Guard Pullout Begins as Citywide Curfew Is Lifted | PAKET UMROH BULAN JANUARI 2016

Calvin Peete, 71, a Racial Pioneer on the PGA Tour, Is Dead

With 12 tournament victories in his career, Mr. Peete was the most successful black professional golfer before Tiger Woods.

Richard Suzman, 72, Dies; Researcher Influenced Global Surveys on Aging

At the National Institutes of Health, Dr. Suzman’s signature accomplishment was the central role he played in creating a global network of surveys on aging.

Taiwan party leader affirms eventual reunion with China

BEIJING (AP) — The head of Taiwan's Nationalists reaffirmed the party's support for eventual unification with the mainland when he met Monday with Chinese President Xi Jinping as part of continuing rapprochement between the former bitter enemies.

Nationalist Party Chairman Eric Chu, a likely presidential candidate next year, also affirmed Taiwan's desire to join the proposed Chinese-led Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank during the meeting in Beijing. China claims Taiwan as its own territory and doesn't want the island to join using a name that might imply it is an independent country.

Chu's comments during his meeting with Xi were carried live on Hong Kong-based broadcaster Phoenix Television.

The Nationalists were driven to Taiwan by Mao Zedong's Communists during the Chinese civil war in 1949, leading to decades of hostility between the sides. Chu, who took over as party leader in January, is the third Nationalist chairman to visit the mainland and the first since 2009.

Relations between the communist-ruled mainland and the self-governing democratic island of Taiwan began to warm in the 1990s, partly out of their common opposition to Taiwan's formal independence from China, a position advocated by the island's Democratic Progressive Party.

Despite increasingly close economic ties, the prospect of political unification has grown increasingly unpopular on Taiwan, especially with younger voters. Opposition to the Nationalists' pro-China policies was seen as a driver behind heavy local electoral defeats for the party last year that led to Taiwanese President Ma Ying-jeou resigning as party chairman.

Gene Fullmer, a Brawling Middleweight Champion, Dies at 83

Fullmer, who reigned when fight clubs abounded and Friday night fights were a television staple, was known for his title bouts with Sugar Ray Robinson and Carmen Basilio.

François Michelin, Head of Tire Company, Dies at 88

Under Mr. Michelin’s leadership, which ended when he left the company in 2002, the Michelin Group became the world’s biggest tire maker, establishing a big presence in the United States and other major markets overseas.

Jean Nidetch, 91, Dies; Pounds Came Off, and Weight Watchers Was Born

A 214-pound Queens housewife struggled with a lifelong addiction to food until she shed 72 pounds and became the public face of the worldwide weight-control empire Weight Watchers.

How Some Men Fake an 80-Hour Workweek, and Why It Matters

Imagine an elite professional services firm with a high-performing, workaholic culture. Everyone is expected to turn on a dime to serve a client, travel at a moment’s notice, and be available pretty much every evening and weekend. It can make for a grueling work life, but at the highest levels of accounting, law, investment banking and consulting firms, it is just the way things are.

Except for one dirty little secret: Some of the people ostensibly turning in those 80- or 90-hour workweeks, particularly men, may just be faking it.

Many of them were, at least, at one elite consulting firm studied by Erin Reid, a professor at Boston University’s Questrom School of Business. It’s impossible to know if what she learned at that unidentified consulting firm applies across the world of work more broadly. But her research, published in the academic journal Organization Science, offers a way to understand how the professional world differs between men and women, and some of the ways a hard-charging culture that emphasizes long hours above all can make some companies worse off.

Photo

 

Ms. Reid interviewed more than 100 people in the American offices of a global consulting firm and had access to performance reviews and internal human resources documents. At the firm there was a strong culture around long hours and responding to clients promptly.

“When the client needs me to be somewhere, I just have to be there,” said one of the consultants Ms. Reid interviewed. “And if you can’t be there, it’s probably because you’ve got another client meeting at the same time. You know it’s tough to say I can’t be there because my son had a Cub Scout meeting.”

Some people fully embraced this culture and put in the long hours, and they tended to be top performers. Others openly pushed back against it, insisting upon lighter and more flexible work hours, or less travel; they were punished in their performance reviews.

The third group is most interesting. Some 31 percent of the men and 11 percent of the women whose records Ms. Reid examined managed to achieve the benefits of a more moderate work schedule without explicitly asking for it.

They made an effort to line up clients who were local, reducing the need for travel. When they skipped work to spend time with their children or spouse, they didn’t call attention to it. One team on which several members had small children agreed among themselves to cover for one another so that everyone could have more flexible hours.

A male junior manager described working to have repeat consulting engagements with a company near enough to his home that he could take care of it with day trips. “I try to head out by 5, get home at 5:30, have dinner, play with my daughter,” he said, adding that he generally kept weekend work down to two hours of catching up on email.

Despite the limited hours, he said: “I know what clients are expecting. So I deliver above that.” He received a high performance review and a promotion.

What is fascinating about the firm Ms. Reid studied is that these people, who in her terminology were “passing” as workaholics, received performance reviews that were as strong as their hyper-ambitious colleagues. For people who were good at faking it, there was no real damage done by their lighter workloads.

It calls to mind the episode of “Seinfeld” in which George Costanza leaves his car in the parking lot at Yankee Stadium, where he works, and gets a promotion because his boss sees the car and thinks he is getting to work earlier and staying later than anyone else. (The strategy goes awry for him, and is not recommended for any aspiring partners in a consulting firm.)

A second finding is that women, particularly those with young children, were much more likely to request greater flexibility through more formal means, such as returning from maternity leave with an explicitly reduced schedule. Men who requested a paternity leave seemed to be punished come review time, and so may have felt more need to take time to spend with their families through those unofficial methods.

The result of this is easy to see: Those specifically requesting a lighter workload, who were disproportionately women, suffered in their performance reviews; those who took a lighter workload more discreetly didn’t suffer. The maxim of “ask forgiveness, not permission” seemed to apply.

It would be dangerous to extrapolate too much from a study at one firm, but Ms. Reid said in an interview that since publishing a summary of her research in Harvard Business Review she has heard from people in a variety of industries describing the same dynamic.

High-octane professional service firms are that way for a reason, and no one would doubt that insane hours and lots of travel can be necessary if you’re a lawyer on the verge of a big trial, an accountant right before tax day or an investment banker advising on a huge merger.

But the fact that the consultants who quietly lightened their workload did just as well in their performance reviews as those who were truly working 80 or more hours a week suggests that in normal times, heavy workloads may be more about signaling devotion to a firm than really being more productive. The person working 80 hours isn’t necessarily serving clients any better than the person working 50.

In other words, maybe the real problem isn’t men faking greater devotion to their jobs. Maybe it’s that too many companies reward the wrong things, favoring the illusion of extraordinary effort over actual productivity.

Advertisement Politics Obama Finds a Bolder Voice on Race Issues

As he reflected on the festering wounds deepened by race and grievance that have been on painful display in America’s cities lately, President Obama on Monday found himself thinking about a young man he had just met named Malachi.

A few minutes before, in a closed-door round-table discussion at Lehman College in the Bronx, Mr. Obama had asked a group of black and Hispanic students from disadvantaged backgrounds what could be done to help them reach their goals. Several talked about counseling and guidance programs.

“Malachi, he just talked about — we should talk about love,” Mr. Obama told a crowd afterward, drifting away from his prepared remarks. “Because Malachi and I shared the fact that our dad wasn’t around and that sometimes we wondered why he wasn’t around and what had happened. But really, that’s what this comes down to is: Do we love these kids?”

Many presidents have governed during times of racial tension, but Mr. Obama is the first to see in the mirror a face that looks like those on the other side of history’s ledger. While his first term was consumed with the economy, war and health care, his second keeps coming back to the societal divide that was not bridged by his election. A president who eschewed focusing on race now seems to have found his voice again as he thinks about how to use his remaining time in office and beyond.

Continue reading the main story Video

Play Video|1:17

Obama Speaks of a ‘Sense of Unfairness’

In the aftermath of racially charged unrest in places like Baltimore, Ferguson, Mo., and New York, Mr. Obama came to the Bronx on Monday for the announcement of a new nonprofit organization that is being spun off from his White House initiative called My Brother’s Keeper. Staked by more than $80 million in commitments from corporations and other donors, the new group, My Brother’s Keeper Alliance, will in effect provide the nucleus for Mr. Obama’s post-presidency, which will begin in January 2017.

“This will remain a mission for me and for Michelle not just for the rest of my presidency but for the rest of my life,” Mr. Obama said. “And the reason is simple,” he added. Referring to some of the youths he had just met, he said: “We see ourselves in these young men. I grew up without a dad. I grew up lost sometimes and adrift, not having a sense of a clear path. The only difference between me and a lot of other young men in this neighborhood and all across the country is that I grew up in an environment that was a little more forgiving.”

Organizers said the new alliance already had financial pledges from companies like American Express, Deloitte, Discovery Communications and News Corporation. The money will be used to help companies address obstacles facing young black and Hispanic men, provide grants to programs for disadvantaged youths, and help communities aid their populations.

Joe Echevarria, a former chief executive of Deloitte, the accounting and consulting firm, will lead the alliance, and among those on its leadership team or advisory group are executives at PepsiCo, News Corporation, Sprint, BET and Prudential Group Insurance; former Secretary of State Colin L. Powell; Senator Cory Booker, Democrat of New Jersey; former Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr.; the music star John Legend; the retired athletes Alonzo Mourning, Jerome Bettis and Shaquille O’Neal; and the mayors of Indianapolis, Sacramento and Philadelphia.

The alliance, while nominally independent of the White House, may face some of the same questions confronting former Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton as she begins another presidential campaign. Some of those donating to the alliance may have interests in government action, and skeptics may wonder whether they are trying to curry favor with the president by contributing.

“The Obama administration will have no role in deciding how donations are screened and what criteria they’ll set at the alliance for donor policies, because it’s an entirely separate entity,” Josh Earnest, the White House press secretary, told reporters on Air Force One en route to New York. But he added, “I’m confident that the members of the board are well aware of the president’s commitment to transparency.”

The alliance was in the works before the disturbances last week after the death of Freddie Gray, the black man who suffered fatal injuries while in police custody in Baltimore, but it reflected the evolution of Mr. Obama’s presidency. For him, in a way, it is coming back to issues that animated him as a young community organizer and politician. It was his own struggle with race and identity, captured in his youthful memoir, “Dreams From My Father,” that stood him apart from other presidential aspirants.

But that was a side of him that he kept largely to himself through the first years of his presidency while he focused on other priorities like turning the economy around, expanding government-subsidized health care and avoiding electoral land mines en route to re-election.

After securing a second term, Mr. Obama appeared more emboldened. Just a month after his 2013 inauguration, he talked passionately about opportunity and race with a group of teenage boys in Chicago, a moment aides point to as perhaps the first time he had spoken about these issues in such a personal, powerful way as president. A few months later, he publicly lamented the death of Trayvon Martin, a black Florida teenager, saying that “could have been me 35 years ago.”

Photo

 

That case, along with public ruptures of anger over police shootings in Ferguson and elsewhere, have pushed the issue of race and law enforcement onto the public agenda. Aides said they imagined that with his presidency in its final stages, Mr. Obama might be thinking more about what comes next and causes he can advance as a private citizen.

That is not to say that his public discussion of these issues has been universally welcomed. Some conservatives said he had made matters worse by seeming in their view to blame police officers in some of the disputed cases.

“President Obama, when he was elected, could have been a unifying leader,” Senator Ted Cruz of Texas, a Republican candidate for president, said at a forum last week. “He has made decisions that I think have inflamed racial tensions.”

On the other side of the ideological spectrum, some liberal African-American activists have complained that Mr. Obama has not done enough to help downtrodden communities. While he is speaking out more, these critics argue, he has hardly used the power of the presidency to make the sort of radical change they say is necessary.

The line Mr. Obama has tried to straddle has been a serrated one. He condemns police brutality as he defends most officers as honorable. He condemns “criminals and thugs” who looted in Baltimore while expressing empathy with those trapped in a cycle of poverty and hopelessness.

In the Bronx on Monday, Mr. Obama bemoaned the death of Brian Moore, a plainclothes New York police officer who had died earlier in the day after being shot in the head Saturday on a Queens street. Most police officers are “good and honest and fair and care deeply about their communities,” even as they put their lives on the line, Mr. Obama said.

“Which is why in addressing the issues in Baltimore or Ferguson or New York, the point I made was that if we’re just looking at policing, we’re looking at it too narrowly,” he added. “If we ask the police to simply contain and control problems that we ourselves have been unwilling to invest and solve, that’s not fair to the communities, it’s not fair to the police.”

Moreover, if society writes off some people, he said, “that’s not the kind of country I want to live in; that’s not what America is about.”

His message to young men like Malachi Hernandez, who attends Boston Latin Academy in Massachusetts, is not to give up.

“I want you to know you matter,” he said. “You matter to us.”

Sid Tepper Dies at 96; Delivered ‘Red Roses for a Blue Lady’ and Other Songs

Mr. Tepper was not a musical child and had no formal training, but he grew up to write both lyrics and tunes, trading off duties with the other member of the team, Roy C. Bennett.

Rolf Smedvig, Trumpeter in the Empire Brass, Dies at 62

A former member of the Boston Symphony Orchestra, Mr. Smedvig helped found the wide-ranging Empire Brass quintet.