May 16, 2008 – Iyar 11 5768
– Omer Day 26
Rabbi Joshua Hammerman,
This
Shabbat-O-Gram is sponsored by Michael and Risa Pollack, in honor of Brian
becoming Bar Mitzvah
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THANK YOU TO ALL WHO MADE LAST WEEKEND’S
SYNAPLEX SHABBAT SO SUCCESSFUL!!
A full collection of past articles, sermons and essays can
now be found at my new blog at http://joshuahammerman.blogspot.com/
Contents
of the Shabbat O Gram:
(Click
to scroll down)
The (Occasionally) Ranting Rabbi
Mitzvah/Tzedakkah
Opportunities
The Beth El Bar/Bat
Mitzvah Commentary
Masechet Cyberspace (NEW)
Required Reading and Action Items (links
to key articles on Israel and Jewish life)
TBE Family Photos
of the Week (NEW)
(send us your photos of a TBE event
involving your family..
…because your family IS our family!)
“Scenes from a Naming”
New
TBE member Hallie Sklar and
Johanna just after Jo Jo’s naming last Sunday
Hallie
and Jamie, along with Johanna’s grandparents, at the ceremony
Our
newest member, resting
Our Junior Choir sang proudly at last
week’s
For new photos, check our website
More Good News from the TBE Family:
Mazal Tov to Lisa Bloch Rodwin, daughter
of Larry and Steffi Bloch,
on being confirmed by the NY Senate
to serve as Family Court Judge in
Read about Lisa here
See the full
Quote for the Week
“Learn from yesterday,
live for today,
hope for tomorrow.
The important thing
is not to stop
questioning.”
Albert Einstein
This was the quote heading the
program for the Israeli
President's Conference, “Facing Tomorrow,”
convened in
Many dignitaries attended,
including President Bush.
Here are Peres’ opening remarks:
Dear
Participants,
We are gathered in
Across the
millennia, the exhortations of the prophets of
The
history of the Jewish people oscillates between acceptance and rebellion - between
the tragedy of a helpless people at the mercy of a cruel fate and the resurgence
of that same people to take control of its fate and shape for itself the tomorrow
it once only dreamt about.The establishment of the
State of Israel after two millennia of exile is a remarkable expression of the
weaving of history by humans. This chutzpah - of the refusal to
accept things as they are - has its roots to the early dawn of the Jewish
people. More than three thousand years passed between the time of Moses and
that of Herzl, but in those two gigantic crossroads
on the path of the Jewish journey through history we
find the same people - a people that has taken control of its fate to emerge
from slavery to freedom, and shape its national vision and human mission.
These
enormous turns of history are made by humans. They teach us the extent to which
all things are foreseen; yet the choice is given.
Tomorrow does not await us locked and pre-determined. Tomorrow calls upon us to
shape it. It presents us with empty pages and invites us to write on them the histories
of tomorrow. The future awaits our decisions, our inventions, our dreams and
our imagination. Facing Tomorrow will
look closely at the trends and developments that are mapping the future, and
serve as an incubator for some selected proactive responses. Participants will be charged with examining, confronting, and responding
to three intertwining futures: the global tomorrow, the Jewish tomorrow, and
the Israeli tomorrow.
Each
“tomorrow” - Jewish, Israeli, and world - will be examined through a set of three
critical lenses: The leadership necessary to navigate the challenges ahead, the
values that are meant to guide our journey, and the
creativity required to embrace the new and keep pace with a rapidly changing
world. We wish for a conference that not only ‘talks’ but also drives action.
We seek toencourage practical initiatives intended to positively shape our future. In honor of the Conference,
gathered in
If the role
of historians is to explain how yesterday was shaped,
our challenge is to show the path to shaping tomorrow. We must extend our
understanding of the trends that will influence the face of tomorrow. We must
be humble but courageous: Humble - to accept that not all trends can be shaped and changed and that sometimes our only choice
is to be
well-prepared;
Courageous - to insist that where change is possible, we should act, steer,
innovate and make the difference between what could be to what should be.
In all my
years, I have been party to many dreams. The ones that became reality had one
thing in common: they were all blessed with the proper
mix of imagination, will, and compassion. I am quite sure that all three of
these very human qualities will be abundantly evident at this conference, and
will afford it the intellectual fertility, curiosity, and enthusiasm any
meaningful consideration of tomorrow requires.
With very
best regards,
Shimon
Peres, President of
Candle lighting: 7:48 pm on Friday, May 16,
2008. For Havdalah times, other Jewish
calendar information, and to download a Jewish calendar to your PDA, click on http://www.hebcal.com/. To see the festivals of other faiths as well,
go to http://www.interfaithcalendar.org/. The United Synagogue has updated its candlelighting information. To learn more, click here.
THE FULL SERVICE SCHEDULE NOW APPEARS ON THE
SEPARATE TBE ANNOUNCEMENTS E-MAIL
Friday Night Shabbat Services:
7:30 – Main Service – in
the sanctuary – Join our third graders, who will be receiving their siddurim in a special ceremony
Tot Shabbat at 6:45, in the chapel
Shabbat Morning:
Mazal tov to Brian Pollack, son of Risa and
Michael, brother of Jonathan,
who becomes Bar Mitzvah
this Shabbat morning
Morning Minyan:
7:30 Weekdays, 9:30 Sundays
PLEASE COME
TO MINYAN!
TO ENSURE A “GUARANTEED MINYAN” FOR THE DAY OF
YOUR YAHRZEIT – GO TO THE ROSNER MINYAN MAKER AT WWW.TBE.ORG
AND THEN NOTIFY OUR OFFICE.
Now you can become more comfortable with the prayers of our
morning service by heading to…
http://www.tbe.org/site/sog/minyanmastery.htm
Parashat Behar
Torah
Portion: Leviticus 25:1 - 26:2
1: 25:1-3
2: 25:4-7
3: 25:8-13
4: 25:14-18
5: 25:19-24
6: 25:25-28
7: 25:29-38
maf: 25:35-38
Haftarah Jeremiah
32:6 - 32:27
Text Studies and Commentaries on Behar
Click here
for a summary of B’har.
Text Studies
This Land Is God’s Land by Rabbi Marsha J. Pik-Nathan
Provided by Hillel’s
Reaching Out To Those In Need by Rabbi Neal Joseph Loevinger
Provided by KOLEL--The Adult Centre for Liberal Jewish Learning, which is affiliated with
Sowing Seeds Of Redemption by Judith Ovadia
Provided by the Union of American Hebrew Congregations,
the central body of Reform Judaism in
Commentaries
The Mitzvah of Shemitah by Noam Yehuda Sendor
Provided by Canfei Nesharim, providing Torah wisdom about the importance of protecting our environment.
We Are All God's Creatures by Rabbi James Jacobson-Maisels
Provided by American Jewish World Service, pursuing global justice through grassroots change.
Divine Lottery by Ari Weiss
Provided by American Jewish World Service, pursuing global justice through grassroots change.
Elevation or Obstacle? by Rabbi Kerry Olitzky
Provided by the Jewish Outreach Institute, an organization dedicated to creating a more open and welcoming Judaism.
Fairness In The Marketplace by Steve Greenberg
Provided by CLAL: The National Jewish Center for Learning and Leadership, a multi-denominational think tank and resource center.
Our Love For The Land Of Israel by Rabbi Bradley Shavit Artson
Provided by the
Responding Swiftly To Need by Rabbi Shimon Felix
Provided by the Bronfman Youth Fellowships in
A New World by Rabbi Asher Brander
Provided by the Orthodox
Economic Justice For Insiders And Outsiders by Rabbi Joshua Heller
Provided by the Jewish Theological Seminary, a Conservative rabbinical seminary and university of Jewish studies.
Masters Of Servitude by Rabbi Michael Bernstein
Provided by SocialAction.com, an on-line Jewish magazine dedicated to pursuing justice, building community, and repairing the world.
No
More “Three-Day” Jews
by Joshua Hammerman
Special To The Jewish Week
If there were a graveyard for the outmoded, it would
be filled with typewriters, telephone dials, shortwave radios and
three-day-a-year Jews. These items don’t exist any more, except in museums,
attics and the nostalgic yearnings of those caught up in the imagery of
yesteryear.
All are victims of the technological revolution. Typewriters have been replaced by the computer; dial phones with touch
tones, shortwave with Web sites, and three-day Jews have been rendered obsolete
by radically new modes of connection providing grass-roots Jewish empowerment
365 days a year.
A few weeks ago, a congregant came up to me and the conversation
turned to one of those moral perplexities that seem to confound us with greater
frequency these days. As we parted, he said,
“I guess the answer will never be fully understood, just like the
red cow.”
“Right,” I said as I walked away, impressed that he knew all about
that obscure law, categorized by commentators as one of those few mitzvot that
defy human
understanding. It’s complicated
stuff, indicating a high level of curiosity and inquiry.
Now this particular congregant is hardly of the legendary three-day
ilk. He attends services often, but his erudite allusion was typical of
comments I’ve been getting lately,
even from congregants whom
I rarely see between High Holy Days.
I’ve always felt that this three-day thing was overrated. Even the
most marginal Jew occasionally finds his way to a synagogue for bar mitzvahs,
funerals, concerts or lectures. The “three-day” moniker was just another way to
foster guilt and degradation, to reinforce the hierarchical nature of Jewish
life and to highlight the alienation many feel from institutional Judaism. But
it never had much to do with true levels of Jewish engagement.
Centuries ago, the Baal Shem Tov literally blew the whistle on such
derogatory labels with his tale of the shepherd who came to services on Yom
Kippur, and who, when moved to pray, pulled out his shepherd’s whistle and
blew. The congregation was outraged, until the founder of modern
Chasidism asserted that only the shrill blasts of this uninitiated stranger had
enabled everyone’s prayers to pierce the gates of heaven.
The Dalai Lama hasn’t seen the inside of his holy place since 1959,
yet no one calls him a three-day Tibetan. It’s time to stop bemoaning the drop
in institutional affiliation and recognize that Jewish identification is now
being fostered in ways that community leaders cannot possibly measure — much of
it anonymously, online.
Now, everyone has complete access, in the office or at home, to a
Jewish library larger than the cumulative libraries of every great rabbi for
the past two millennia. The entire Talmud, the venerable Jewish Encyclopedia
and reams of Torah commentary are just a click away.
It’s a new era. As we’ve seen this year in domestic and foreign
politics, the operative direction for the flow of information is no longer
top-down but rather bottom-up. The old hierarchies no longer hold the power
they used to, from the Chinese government, which struggles to control
grassroots protests against repressive policies, to the Catholic Church, which
faces dissent from within.
Good thing we don’t have such hierarchies in Judaism.
And if we did, we won’t. Now every Jew is theoretically his or her
own rabbi. The Torah, after all, calls us a “nation of priests.” But while we
no longer need rabbis or synagogues to access Jewish information, it helps to
have someone capable of interpreting it, who can help
people choose from the dizzying array of options. Just as the WebMD generation still needs doctors, we still need trained
rabbis — but the training needs to be more befitting a non hierarchical age of
empowerment.
Behold, the birth of the Wiki
Jew.
According to — what else? — Wikipedia, “A wiki is software that
allows users to collaboratively create, edit, link, and organize the content of
a website... Wikis are often used to create
collaborative websites.”
Wikipedia has many flaws, but the enormity of the collaboration
that creates it is awe-inspiring. The community that is constructing this vast
compendium of accumulating knowledge is nothing less than the entire human
race. Anyone can contribute to this trove of information — even those less than
qualified. But in the end, the power of numbers enables Wikipedia, more often
than not, to be self-correcting. One recent study pointed out that it rivals
even the Encyclopedia Britannica (also now online) for accuracy.
For millennia, Jewish tradition has evolved in much the same collaborative,
incremental manner, and now it is finding a home in the global
cyber-yeshiva. While rabbis still play a major role, everyone is now
welcome to join in this timeless conversation. As new halachic
questions mount — on subjects ranging from intellectual property rights and
workplace privacy to the forwarding of third-party e-mails, rabbis are weighing
in online; but so is everyone else. On my own blog (http://joshuahammerman.blogspot.com),
I’ve initiated “Masechet Cyberspace,” a “halachic wiki” of sorts, for the discussion of these issues.
Fittingly, “Masechet” means both a Talmudic tractate and a web.
So the three-day Jew is no more. During the rest of the year, she may be
tapping into the Jewish stream in a brand-new way: frequenting the enchanted
Wiki-room.
The Natural and the National
Last week I had
the opportunity to lead a Synaplex Learner’s Service, focusing on how our
prayers transport us to the
While the wonders
of nature can be found everywhere, they achieve their
greatest glory in the
The Pesukey d’Zimra section concludes
with the prayer Nishmat
Kol Chai, “The Breath of Every Living Thing,” known in the Talmud as Birkat
ha-Shir (Blessing of the Song). Subsequent generations picked
up on the idea that every creature prays, each in its own way, simply by
breathing. A few years ago in
Some say that uttering these verses can bring blessing and a deeper
connection to the Land (hence, Perek Shira became
especially popular among Israeli settlers before the evacuation of
In Israel, you don’t look west, you look “seaward,” (yamma)
and similarly, the word south is Negev, because that’s where it is, and the
north, tzafon, means hidden, because northern Israel
is covered with mysterious mountains and dark forests. Abstract natural concepts become firmly
rooted in sacred soil.
In Perek Shira - the lions aren’t merely models
of brute strength but symbols of self control (because they sublimate their
power to coexist in groups). This idea
of quintessential strength and self restraint is profoundly Jewish, homegrown
(see Pirke
Avot 4.1) in the
If you listen closely enough, you just might hear the grasshopper singing
a Carlebach melody.
Wherever I go…I go to
Memories of the March
I
invited teens and adults who have just returned from the March of the Living to
contribute their share their experiences and reactions. My thanks to Dr. Harry Romanowitz and
Danielle Shapiro for sharing the following moving accounts:
A flood of
memories, moments. Too numerous
to list - many still need "processing". Both
internally, and through family, friends, and co-Marchers.
Here are but a
few:
Lowest of low
points:
- Standing in
hallowed ghetto spaces hearing histories of
Of course,
Auschwitz/Birkenau, but, perhaps, even more draining
- Majdanek;
Final farewell and
El Moleh/Kaddish at Treblinka ash pit, followed by
soft, united, uplifting, hand-in-hand Hatikvah at the site of mass killing.
Then, directly off to
Highest of
"highs":
-
Shabbat morning service at Nozyk shul in
- March itself on
Yom Hashoah in
Over twelve
thousand young people (and adult marchers) from around the world. U. S. delegations included L.
A., Ohio, Florida, N. Y., MidWest, etc. Major
contingents from Canada, France, Belgium, Brazil, Argentina, Panama,
Australia/New Zealand, Poland, South Africa, Japan, Israel, and numerous
others;
-
Just boarding El Al jet in
- New
- Wild, wonderful
Yom Ha'Atzmaut eve at
Year's Eve. Followed by fireworks over downtown Jersusalem;
- Same Marcher
groups gathering in
more outdoor partying - Oh, those Brazilians and
Panamanians really have rhythm and boundless energy!
- A dozen Israeli
security guards dancing the hora;
- Followed by
festive, uplifting March through glorious, sun-drenched
- Most touching
moment for me - final night in
One large circle
at sunset Shabbat eve - individuals describing moments, feelings, personal
enlightenment. Some profound, some insightful, some funny, some unable to express
fully.
United all,
hand-in-hand, making Havdalah - separating Shabbat from the week. Symbolically separating ourselves as well. Quickly rushing
to finish packing and prepare for our return home to the more
mundane. Knowing that, just as Shabbat is always there, so too is