Finding Our Way Back

[Dvar Torah delivered on 6/8/12]

In Numbers 9: 6-14, we read: 6 But there were some people who were ritually impure from proximity to a corpse, so that they were not been able to make the Passover [offering] on that day; and they came before Moses and before Aaron on that day.

7 Those people said to him: “We are ritually impure from proximity to a corpse. Why should we be kept back, so as not to offer Adonai’s offering at its appointed time among the Israelites?”

8 Moses said to them: “Stand by that I may hear what Adonai will command for you.”

9 And Adonai  spoke to Moses, saying:

10  “Speak to the Israelites, saying:  When any of you or your generations will be ritually impure  from proximity to a corpse,  or on a far journey, any such person shall still [be able to] make the Passover [offering] for Adonai.

11 In the second month on the fourteenth day at dusk they shall keep it; they shall eat it with matzah and bitter herbs.

12 They shall not leave any of it until morning, nor shall they break any bone of it; according to all the statute of the Passover [offering] shall they do it.

13 But the person who is ritually pure, and is not on a journey, yet fails to make the Passover [offering]  --  that soul shall be cut off from her people; because he did not offer Adonai’s offering at its appointed time --- that person shall bear his [or her] sin.

14 And if a stranger shall reside among you, and would make the Passover [offering] to Adonai ---  according to the statute of the Passover [offering], and according to its ordinance, so shall he [or she] do;  one statute shall there be for you --- both for the stranger and for the citizen of the land.”

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The above passage from Parshat Beha’alotekha that we find at Numbers 9: 6-14 is one that I find particularly meaningful.  And I’ve been spinning my wheels the past several days trying to figure out how best to convey to you why it resonates with me so much. 

I guess what strikes me about the law of “Pesach Sheni”/ “Second Passover” is how the Torah here is teaching us about values that I hold so dear ---- about inclusivity, about giving people the benefit of the doubt, about being patient, about being creative..

How do we uncover all of these themes in the text before us?  Well, first of all, we must remember that when we say “Torah” we don’t mean just the words of the Five Books of Moses:  We also mean the rabbinic, medieval, modern and contemporary commentaries that have grown up around them.  And we also mean the evidence of our individual lives that we bring to the text.

In this week’s parasha, we find ourselves camped at the foot of Mount Sinai, where we’ve been hanging out for almost a year, and finally we’re ready to move onwards from this place of Revelation towards the promised land.  But first, we have a new law that seems to be given not at God’s initiative like all the others, but rather as God’s response to the initiative of a few marginalized yet chutzpadik individuals:

It’s around the time of the first anniversary of that first Passover that had been observed in Egypt on the last night before the Exodus.  Now, a year later, Moses has just reminded us (in Numbers 9: 1-4) that it’s time to celebrate Passover again. 

How exciting to be able to celebrate Passover away from the repression of our former taskmasters. 

Ever since then, Passover has remained such a powerful observance.  Why is Passover so powerful?  Because it symbolizes that God is not ONLY the God of the cyclical laws of nature – but that God is ALSO the passionate champion of the downtrodden who intervenes in history on the side of those seeking liberation from oppression. 

Or, for those of us with a more naturalistic approach to faith, Passover symbolizes the power of the human yearning to be free --- and the inevitability that oppressors will be defeated when people of good will join together in pursuit of justice.

To put it another way – Passover – in its aspect of z’man cheyruteinu,  the season of our freedom – teaches us that it’s wrong to think [to quote Ecclesiastes] that “There is nothing new under the sun”  (Ecclesiastes 1:9b).  Rather --- there is progress in the course of history – or – [to quote Dan Savage’s popular youtube campaign:]   “It gets better.”

In our Torah portion, we find a group of individuals who could not participate in the celebration of Passover with the rest of the Israelites on that first anniversary of the Exodus.  At that time, the main ritual component of Passover was the offering of the Korban Pesach, the Passover sacrificial offering – a lamb which after being slaughtered was to be shared among all the people of one’s household, eaten together with matzah and bitter herbs, with no bone of it broken, and with none of it left over by morning. 

In modern Passove seders, the shank bone on the seder plate, which we no longer eat since the destruction of the Second Temple, is placed as a reminder of the Korban Pesach.  And the eating of the Afikomen after the main meal also functions as a substitution for the eating of the Passover offering in ancient times.

But back in the times that the Korban Pesach (Passover Offering) was carried out, the rule, as set forth in the Torah, was that one needed to be in a state of ritual purity in order to take part.  In particular, if one had been in proximity of a human corpse, one could not make the Korban Pesach until returning to a state of ritual purity.   

So, anyway, these individuals come forth and complain --- They had been unable to take part in that powerful Passover ritual at its appointed time  -- but they still want to be able to do so now. 

Moses considers their plight and is granted a new revelation from God that they can do so at dusk exactly one month after the official date for Passover.   And that, henceforth, this Second Passover [on the 14^th of Sivan] will be an opportunity available not just for anyone who had been ritually impure on the official date of Passover, but also for anyone who had been בדרך רחקה  (“on a far journey”) at that time – and that this same opportunity will be available to both native born citizen and sojourning stranger alike.

What lessons do we draw from this?

First of all, we draw inspiration from the fact that the Torah changes the legal definition of Passover to enable more people to be able to participate in it.  [How many other legal institutions can we think of that need similar updating?]

Second, we note that the Torah takes seriously the concerns of the people who have been shut out from participating in Passover.  It doesn’t berate them for not having gotten themselves ready for Passover on time.  It doesn’t presume to judge the circumstances that led to their situation.  Indeed, the midrashic tradition says that the people who were ritually impure when Passover time came around were in that state because they had been engaged at the time in another mitzvah – According to one view in the Talmud, they had been attending to the coffin of Joseph, who we may recall had asked that his bones be taken from Egypt back to Eretz Yisra’el when the Exodus would finally come.     

We too, should be careful not to make judgments about anyone else’s ritual observance.  For all we know, someone who is not taking part in a particular observance along with the rest of us might be busy doing another mitzvah that could be of equal importance.

Finally, there is an important lesson to be learned from the Torah’s addition of the phrase בדרך רחקה  (“on a far journey”).  The plain meaning of that phrase is that a person was physically far enough away from the Tabernacle (or in later eras far enough away from the Temple in Jerusalem) that they couldn’t get there in time to do the Passover offering at its appointed time.  But the Torah scribes known as the Masoretes passed on to us a tradition that we place a special dot on top of the letter hey in the word “rechokah” (“far”). 

Rashi says that this special signal tells us that being on a “far journey” doesn’t literally have to refer to a huge physical distance.  He says that the description could apply even to someone standing right outside the threshold of the Temple courtyard (Rashi on Num. 9:10).  Rabbi Harold Kushner, in his commentary to this verse in the “Etz Hayim Torah Commentary” cites the Jerusalem Talmud (JT Pes. 9:2) to teach that the phrase “far journey” can include a person “who is spiritually distant from God and the Jewish people” and that “[s]uch a person need not feel permanently exiled.”  (“D’rash Commentary” on Num. 9:10, Etz Hayyim Torah Commentary, p. 820).

All of us at one time or another may feel spiritually or emotionally distant from our Jewish heritage.  But the teaching of Pesach Sheni / “Second Passover” reminds us that, no matter what derekh rechokah, no matter what far off journey, we may be on -- emotionally or geographically ---  there is always the opportunity to reconnect with our people and with our people’s highest ideals. 

The eternal message of Passover – of spiritual and political liberation – remains the story of each and every one of us and of all humanity.

Shabbat Shalom

© Rabbi David Steinberg (Sivan 5772/ June 2012)

Shavuot in Israel

As we get ready for the arrival of Shavuot this Saturday evening, I thought readers of this blog might find the following article interesting.  It describes current practices around Shavuot in Israel, especially among the secular and religiously liberal sectors of society there. 

http://blogs.rj.org/blog/2012/05/23/galilee-diary-hearing-torah/ 

I hope to see many of you at our Temple Israel Shavuot observances this Saturday evneing at 7:30 p.m.

Chag Same'ach,

Rabbi David

All the Community

(Dvar Torah delivered Friday evening 5/4/12 - Shabbat Acharei Mot - Kedoshim)

I still receive in the mail each month the bulletin from Temple Beth Israel, in Plattsburgh, New York, where I served as rabbi from 1999 to 2005.  In this month’s article from Temple Beth Israel’s current president Larry Soroka, Larry questions the fact that they have American and Israeli flags on the bima of their sanctuary. 

In my last position before coming to Duluth, at Ohavi Zedek Synagogue in Burlington, Vermont, there were no flags in the sanctuary and it would have been very controversial to introduce them there.

Here at Temple Israel, I’m personally very happy that we have the American and Israeli flags on our bima.  To my mind, the presence of the Israeli flag on our bima reminds us that, as Jews, we are connected by history and faith to the ancestral homeland of our people.  Amid all its achievements and amid all its challenges --  the security and well-being of the State of Israel is of critical important to our Jewish identity.    

And it has long been the Jewish custom to pray for the well-being of the country in which we live, back to the time of the Babylonian exile, as we learn from the words of Jeremiah 29:7 ---

ז וְדִרְשׁוּ אֶת-שְׁלוֹם הָעִיר, אֲשֶׁר הִגְלֵיתִי אֶתְכֶם שָׁמָּה, וְהִתְפַּלְלוּ בַעֲדָהּ, אֶל-יְהוָה: כִּי בִשְׁלוֹמָהּ, יִהְיֶה לָכֶם שָׁלוֹם.	7 Seek the welfare of the city to which I have exiled you, and pray to the Eternal in its behalf; for in its peace shall you have peace.

The presence of the American flag on our bima reminds us not only of Jeremiah’s ancient message, but also of the special blessings that we have as Americans.  For the United States, amid all its achievements and all its challenges, remains unique in the history of the world with respect to the opportunities for integration and security that it has afforded the Jewish people. 

President George Washington famously gave expression to these sentiments in his letter to the members of the Touro, Rhode Island Jewish community in 1790.  He wrote:

"It is now no more that toleration is spoken of as if it were the indulgence of one class of people that another enjoyed the exercise of their inherent natural rights, for, happily, the Government of the United States, which gives to bigotry no sanction, to persecution no assistance, requires only that they who live under its protection should demean themselves as good citizens in giving it on all occasions their effectual support. […]

"May the children of the stock of Abraham who dwell in this land continue to merit and enjoy the good will of the other inhabitants—while every one shall sit in safety under his own vine and fig tree and there shall be none to make him afraid."

How do we apply the teachings of our Jewish tradition to our contemporary situation as citizens and residents of this country?

Parshat Kedoshim, the second of the two Torah portions in this week’s double portion Acharei Mot – Kedoshim, prompts us to reflect on how we are called upon to concern ourselves with the needs of the community.

The parasha begins (at Lev. 19: 1-2): 

א וַיְדַבֵּר יְהוָה, אֶל-מֹשֶׁה לֵּאמֹר.	1 The Eternal spoke to Moses, saying:
ב דַּבֵּר אֶל-כָּל-עֲדַת בְּנֵי-יִשְׂרָאֵל, וְאָמַרְתָּ אֲלֵהֶם--קְדֹשִׁים תִּהְיוּ: כִּי קָדוֹשׁ, אֲנִי יְהוָה אֱלֹהֵיכֶם.	2 Speak to all the community of the children of Israel, and you shall say to them: You shall be holy; for I the Eternal your God am holy.

“Kawl adat bney yisra’el”/ “all the community of the Children of Israel” –   This is a very rare formulation in the Torah.  Usually the text says simply  “daber el bney yisra’el”/ “speak to the children of Israel” – but here, with respect to the commandment to be holy, the text says not just “speak to the children of Israel” but rather “speak to the whole community of the children of Israel.”

The medieval commentator Rashi explains that this means that the mitzvot outlined in Leviticus 19, including such famous ones as

·         Loving your neighbor as yourself  ---  and

·         Not standing idly by the blood of your neighbor --- and

·         Rising before the aged and showing deference to the old --- and

·         Leaving the gleanings of your harvest for the poor and the stranger – and

·         Not falsifying measures of length, weight or capacity

That all these mitzvot were conveyed to all the people together, whereas the other commandments were relayed by Moses to small groups at a time (Rashi on Lev. 19:2).

But, why were these precepts so important as to require that they be spoken in full assembly?  The classic midrash “Sifra” explains that the commandments in Leviticus 19 include a repetition or paraphrase of all of the Ten Commandments.  And Nachmanides, (the Spanish Jewish commentator who lived from 1195 to 1270) further observes that the command “You shall be holy for I the Eternal your God am holy” implies that we should go beyond the letter of the law in seeking moderation in personal behavior and compromise in our interpersonal dealings.  (See Nachmanides on Lev. 19:2)

Holiness/kedushah is thus an overall way of relating to one another, of establishing the social contract for our community, and of coming nearer to God. 

What about this “kawl adat bnei yisra’el” (“The whole community of the children of Israel) of which the Torah speaks, and which Rashi describes as a “hakhel” (“public assembly”) –  a word linguistically related to the word “kehillah” meaning “congregation?”

Two major implications flow from this:

First – That being holy is the task for every person in the community, not just an especially pious few, not just an elite leadership.  Rather, each one of us should seek out ways to be Godly in our own conduct.

Second – Following the teaching of the Sefat Emet – that we should seek the path of holiness with every part of our being, for the Sefat Emet (also known as Rabbi Yehudah Leib Alter of Ger who lived from 1847 to 1905) –taught that the “congregation” or “community” or “assembly” referred to in Leviticus 19:2 also refers to the assembly of 248 limbs and body parts within each person.  (See Rabbi Arthur Green, The Language of Truth: The Torah Commentary of the Sefat Emet, Jewish Publication Society, 1998, p. 186)

Just as in the words of the Shema in Deuteronomy 6 where we speak of loving God, bechawl levavekha, uvekhawl nafshekha, uvekhawl me’dekha --  with all your heart, with all your soul and with all your might.”

Ultimately, the verse: 

ב דַּבֵּר אֶל-כָּל-עֲדַת בְּנֵי-יִשְׂרָאֵל, וְאָמַרְתָּ אֲלֵהֶם--קְדֹשִׁים תִּהְיוּ: כִּי קָדוֹשׁ, אֲנִי יְהוָה אֱלֹהֵיכֶם.

2 Speak to all the community of the children of Israel, and you shall say to them: You shall be holy; for I the Eternal your God am holy.

teaches us that only by coming together as a community can we achieve holiness.  Holiness is not something to be sought in isolation from one another. 

Like Jews of every generation, we face the challenge of applying the words of our ancient tradition to the circumstances of the present day.   The Torah’s formulation “kawl adat bnai yisra’el”/ “all the community of the Children of Israel” originated at a time when our communal life was generally autonomous and separate from those of other communities though --- to be sure – we are also commanded in Leviticus 19: 33-34:

לג וְכִי-יָגוּר אִתְּךָ גֵּר, בְּאַרְצְכֶם--לֹא תוֹנוּ, אֹתוֹ.	33 And if a stranger dwells with you in your land, you shall not do him wrong.
לד כְּאֶזְרָח מִכֶּם יִהְיֶה לָכֶם הַגֵּר הַגָּר אִתְּכֶם, וְאָהַבְתָּ לוֹ כָּמוֹךָ--כִּי-גֵרִים הֱיִיתֶם, בְּאֶרֶץ מִצְרָיִם: אֲנִי, יְהוָה אֱלֹהֵיכֶם.	34 The stranger that dwells with you shall be to you as the native-born among you, and you shall love him as yourself; for your were strangers in the land of Egypt: I am the Eternal your God.

Today we need to come to our own conclusions regarding how the communitarian values portrayed in Torah passages such as those in Parshat Kedoshim apply to our role as citizens of our state and nation. Scripture is clear about the importance of providing for the needs of the poor, and of caring for the earth. 

We are our brothers and our sisters keepers. 

We are placed on the earth to guard it and tend to it – ultimately recognizing that it belongs not to us but to God. 

But how does this translate into individual virtue?  And how does this translate into a societal agenda?

Especially in an election year, we are all aware that this is the stuff of spirited debate – and it’s important that that debate be conducted with civility and mutual respect.

© Rabbi David Steinberg 5772/2012

New Haggadah and Seder music online

At our Temple Israel 2nd night seder we'll again be using the Reform movement's haggadah The Open Door edited by Rabbi Sue Levi Elwell.  New haggadot are published each year and I'd like also to put in a plug for a wonderful new haggadah that you might want to use at your home sedarim, or simply add to your Jewish library. Wellsprings of Freedom: The Renew Our Days Haggadah is the most recent volume in the "Hadesh Yameinu: Renew Our Days" series of prayerbooks edited by Rabbi Ron Aigen, spiritual leader of Dorshei Emet Reconstructionist Synagogue in Montreal.  You can order that book through the website www.wellspringshaggadah.com.  And that website also has a "music" section in which you can find recordings of many beloved seder melodies.   I really love Rabbi Aigen's sensitive mixing of contemporary inclusiveness and classical texts, as well as the aesthetical appeal of the overall layout of this new Haggadah.

Whichever Haggadah you use, may you have a joyous and sweet Passover holiday.  

MORE POWER TO YOU!

Dvar Torah delivered on Friday evening 3/9/12

Thoughts on Ki Tissa (Exodus 30:11 – 34:35)

Most of you are probably familiar with the custom of kissing a Jewish prayer book or sacred text upon picking it up if it has accidentally fallen to the ground.   Actually, there are a number of similar pious customs associated with all Jewish texts that include God’s name in Hebrew within them:

1) Not putting it directly on the ground

2) Not piling it underneath other books of lesser sanctity  (There is a pecking order here: Tanakh is above Siddur)

3) Kissing the book upon closing it when you finish consulting it.

Yet, I can recall that when I was a kid going to Orthodox Hebrew school in Brooklyn there were a few times when I purposely smashed a chumash on the ground and didn’t kiss it upon picking it up.  I did it to prove to myself that lighting wasn’t going to strike as a result.   And, of course, it didn’t.

Well, that’s youthful immaturity for you.  Nowadays, I understand that such pious customs are not magical talismans but rather mnemonic devices.  Observing customs like kissing a dropped chumash when we pick it up serves to remind us of the profundity and importance of the ideas that the book contains. 

I would imagine that many of us “act out” from time to time in similar ways --- challenging conventional received wisdom until we can sort out for ourselves what really makes sense.  The bottom line being that we should use the rituals to access the ideals, rather than worshipping the ritual objects themselves.

Perhaps that’s what is going on when Moses hurls the tablets of the law to the ground in this week’s Torah portion, Ki Tisa.  He has been up on the mountain for forty days and nights receiving God’s teachings.  He now descends from the mountain carrying two tablets carved by God, and inscribed with God’s writing.  But when Moses encounters the spectacle of the people worshipping an idol, a calf made of gold, he hurls the tablets to the ground, smashing them into pieces.

The late 19^th to early 20^th century commentator Rabbi Meir Simcha Hakohen writes in his commentary Meshekh Chochma that Moses smashed the tablets because “[h]e feared that [the Israelites] would deify them as they had done the calf.”  (Nechama Leibowitz: New Studies in Shemot/Exodus, part II, Aryeh Newman, translator, p. 613)

Or, to put it in other words, Moses feared that the tablets might themselves become objects of idolatry. 

Indeed, the sages of the Talmud assert that God approved of Moses’s actions, exclaiming  “Yasher Koach (More power to you), for having broken them!” (Shabbat 87a)

Why was God so pleased with Moses’ action of smashing the tablets?  It wasn’t just that Moses had found a way of teaching the people not to resort to idolatry.  In the midrash collection  Avot de Rabi Natan (c. 700-900 C.E.), Moses’s act of breaking the first set of tablets is portrayed as an act of solidarity with the people in that, in essence, he was ripping up the contract before the people could be held responsible for breaching it. 

After the traumatic episodes of the Golden Calf, the breaking of the tablets, and the civil war and plague that follow, Moses seeks reassurance from God, and God responds in the famous passage about the shelosh esray midot – the 13 divine qualities.  This famous passage, beginning with the words “Adonai, Adonai, El Rachum v’Chanun”/ “The Eternal, The Eteranal, a gracious and compassionate God”  (Ex. 34: 6-7), which we read in Parshat Ki Tisa, is also included in the special prayers and readings for the Days of Awe and the major Festivals.

God also reassures Moses through the giving of the second set of tablets.  This time around, the words on the tablets are still God’s – the content is the same --- but one thing is different.  This time it is Moses, not God, who carves the tablets from the stone. This change reminds us that an effective covenant requires the mutual involvement and teamwork of both parties.  The best agreements, the best relationships, the best learning environments --- require interaction.

In modern life, that’s what democracy is – or at least ought to be – about.  It should be about empowering all people to be part of the process.  Beware of attempts, whether by proposed constitutional amendments or otherwise, to shut disadvantaged or unpopular groups out of the political process or out of the mainstream of society.

Yasher Koach to all who are willing to break down such barriers, as Moses broke those tablets.

Shabbat shalom.

(c) Rabbi David Steinberg, 2012/5772 

The Space Between

(Dvar Torah given on Shabbat Terumah, Friday evening 2/24/12)

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וְהָי֣וּ הַכְּרֻבִים֩ פֹּֽרְשֵׂ֨י כְנָפַ֜יִם לְמַ֗עְלָה סֹֽכְכִ֤ים בְּכַנְפֵיהֶם֙ עַל־הַכַּפֹּ֔רֶת וּפְנֵיהֶ֖ם אִ֣ישׁ אֶל־אָחִ֑יו אֶ֨ל־הַכַּפֹּ֔רֶת יִֽהְי֖וּ פְּנֵ֥י הַכְּרֻבִֽים׃

And the cherubim shall spread out their wings on high, screening the ark-cover with their wings, with their faces one to another; toward the ark-cover shall the faces of the cherubim be.

(Ex. 25:20)

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I have always found it difficult to look people in the eyes --- whether it’s at a job interview, or in a deep conversation with a friend or loved one, or during a pastoral visit with a congregant.  I will myself to do it as long as I can, but it’s uncomfortable for me.  Maybe it’s just because of my vision problems – I’ve worn glasses since I was two years old, had a couple of eye operations as a kid, and I don’t have stereo vision  -- so I’m constantly switching off between using my left eye and my right eye. 

However, I suspect that even if I had perfectly healthy 20-20 vision, I’d still find it difficult.  There is something so intense about staring into someone’s eyes.  It’s like looking at the sun.   In fact,  when I really want to hear what someone is saying,  I do it best by trying to push aside visual distractions,  just as when we cover our eyes in order to aid in hearing and internalizing our declaration of faith:

שְׁמַע, יִשְׂרָאֵל: ה' אֱלֹהֵינוּ, ה' אֶחָד

"Hear O Israel, Adonai is our God, Adonai is One."

But the idea of being “panim el panim”/ “face to face” remains as a paradigmatic example of communication, of connection, of true meeting.  And so God, in this week’s Torah portion, Terumah, instructs that two cherubim  -- two golden angelic figures  --- be sculpted so as to protrude out of the top of the golden cover of the ark containing the Ten Commandments.  In the medieval Jewish commentaries, the two cherubs are described as having the faces of a boy and a girl, and wings like birds – and they are compared to the angels seen in Isaiah’s vision of God’s throne and Ezekiel’s vision of the Chariot.

Parshat Terumah as a whole (Exodus 25:1 - 27:19), among some thirteen of the remaining chapters of the Book of Exodus, is devoted the details of the mishkan, or portable tabernacle, that is to accompany the people through all their journeys.  Tradition sees it as the precursor of the Temple that would be built centuries later in Jerusalem under the reign of King Solomon.  In what is probably the most well-known verse of our parasha, Exodus 25:8, God declares:

 וְעָשׂוּ לִי מִקְדָּשׁ; וְשָׁכַנְתִּי בְּתוֹכָם 

("v'asu li mikdash v'shachanti betocham")

“They shall make for me a sanctuary and I shall dwell within them.”  Not, as we might expect – ”btocho”/ within it (i.e. within the sanctuary), but rather “btocham” -- within or among them.  The actions of the people in building the mishkan and fabricating its contents bring them together in holy community.  Although God is everywhere, the community building project helps the people to be better able to experience God’s presence. 

And within that sanctuary, Torah teaches that God will most palpably be found in the space between the two cherubs – those two humanlike figures of which it says:

וּפְנֵיהֶם, אִישׁ אֶל-אָחִיו

("ufeneyhem, ish el achiv")

“Their faces – one towards another.”  And so it is with us, that when we truly face one another, to quote Buber, “we feel the pulse of Eternity.” 

But those cherubim, while facing one another, at the same time turn slightly downward toward the cover of the ark that houses the stone tablets, as the verse concludes:

אֶל-הַכַּפֹּרֶת--יִהְיוּ, פְּנֵי הַכְּרֻבִים

("el hakaporet yiheyu pney ha-keruvim")

"towards the ark-cover shall the faces of the cherubs be."

And so it is with us:  We strive for the blinding intensity of relationship, yet also  avert our gazes so that we can try to understand it all, to place it into some meaningful context.  

But God is to be found in the space between us when we see and hear one another.

Could we really achieve such a level of sensitivity?  

We’re having a lot of conversations in Duluth these days about recognizing our common humanity with our neighbor  --- and about how racism can hinder such recognition. 

And we’re having a lot of conversations in our State about recognizing our common humanity with our fellow Minnesotans and about how homophobia and heterosexism can hinder such recognition.  

And, each day, in every interaction we have with one another, we strive to face one another, to hear one another, to understand one another – because such meeting is when God can truly be found and experienced.

Of course, we can’t reach that pinnacle all the time.  We often just “go through the motions.” 

But the memory of each such meeting lives within us, and sustains us for the meetings to come.

Shabbat shalom.

© Rabbi David Steinberg, 2012/5772

New Jersey colleagues of whom I am very proud

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Ox7s3J0QLI&feature=email

Rabbi's report delivered to Temple Israel 2011/5772 Annual Meeting

Dear Temple members,

It continues to be a wonderful experience for me to serve as your Rabbi.  Now that I’m into my second year at Temple Israel, I’ve come farther along in getting to know, or at least making the acquaintance of, almost everyone in our Temple community.  I plan to continue to do my best to deepen and expand these relationships in the months and years to come.

Since our last annual meeting, I’ve led or participated in a number of life cycle events for Temple members, their families, and other folks in the local Jewish community including baby namings , a pidyon haben,  weddings,  conversions and  funerals.  Sadly, the latter type of life cycle event has been the most numerous.  However, I’ve also in the past year had the privilege of working with three of our teens as they were confirmed at Shavuot, the holiday known in our tradition as “Zeman Matan Torateynu” (“The Season of the Giving of the Torah”) and welcoming two new students with consecration at Simchat Torah, when our yearly Torah reading cycle starts anew.  In the meanwhile, I continue to teach, from the Bima, in Torah study group, in Hebrew school and in Adult Education.  And I’m particularly happy to be starting to engage in the Bar/Bat Mitzvah preparation process with a new group of prospective 2013 Bnai Mitzvah and with a new group of confirmation students starting a two-year preparation towards confirmation in 2013.  In all of these endeavors, Andrea Buck has been a great professional partner with her excellent work as Youth Education Director.

In the past year I’ve been involved in numerous community events and meetings with individuals and groups seeking to learn about Judaism and the Jewish community, representing our congregation at such events as the City of Duluth’s September 11^th program, the interfaith Thanksgiving service and the CHUM holiday concert.   I’m especially happy that we’ve been able this year to deepen our congregation’s connections with Habitat for Humanity and with the Islamic Center of the Twin Ports, to name just a couple of initiatives.

In general, I have been feeling increasingly at home at Temple Israel and in Duluth, especially after the wonderfully warm installation I experienced here in May, and especially since my partner Peter was finally able to finish his own relocation to Duluth in August. 

This was my first year that I was able to begin really putting my stamp on how we conduct our High Holiday services.  As usual, Mike Grossman and the High Holiday committee did spectacular work, and I’m pleased that our new machzor (generously funded by the Lurye/Kuretsky  family) was such a hit.  And, as I’ve mentioned in recent Bulletin articles, the violin playing and choral conducting of Erin Aldridge, and the participation of the Temple Choir, at High Holidays were beautiful and inspiring.  Also on the ritual front, I’m so grateful to Temple Israel’s talented rabbinic aides, Gary Gordon, Linda Eason and Chris King, who have stepped in to assist with life cycle, service leading and pastoral tasks when I have been out of town for conferences or vacation.  In addition, Deborah Petersen Perlman, Trevor Swoverland, Maureen O’Brien, Sheryl Grana, Mark Weitz and Ben Yokel have also led services or Torah study in my absence and I’m grateful to them as well.  And Danny Frank and Casey Goldberg have been great musical partners in services throughout the year.  ( I’d also like to thank Danny for his musical accompaniment at the CHUM holiday concert last week.)

My priorities continue to be to serve the spiritual needs of the members of our congregation, to teach and represent Jewish culture and tradition within our congregation and in the wider community, and to work with all of you to further our people’s quest for Tikkun Olam  (“repair of the world”).

Through all this, it has been a particular pleasure to work with such dedicated and mentshlikh people as those who serve on our Temple staff:  Andrea Buck, Carrie Kayes, Pauline Russell, Marko Jukic , Marjeanne Tehven, and Dori and Ben Streit.  And it’s a joy to work with such capable and committed lay leadership at both the Board and Committee levels, led by our wonderful Temple president Neil Glazman.  Neil and I are off to Washington, DC next week for the Union for Reform Judaism biennial and I know we both look forward to connecting with Reform Jews from around North America and to reporting back to all of you about what we learn there.

Finally, I would like to thank our outgoing Board members, Ethan Kayes and David Siegler for all of their generous commitments of time and energy.  And welcome and best of luck to our incoming board members Danny Frank and Theresa Neo.   

May they and all of us go from strength to strength in the coming year.

L’shalom,

Rabbi David Steinberg

"Occupying" Shabbat

I really like this dvar torah that I encountered this morning.  You don't have to be Orthodox in your practice or theology in order to find meaning in this (at least that's my reaction to it).

Shabbat shalom,

Rabbi David

http://noamdolgin.blogspot.com/2011/11/why-we-occupy-shabbat.html

Simchat Torah and Consecration - An article from the Union for Reform Judaism

[The following article was published this week as part of the URJ's "Ten Minutes of Torah" listserve.  If you would like to sign up to receive articles like this, please visit http://urj.org/learning/torah/ten/ .  And mazal tov to the children in our congregation who are being consecrated at our Simchat Torah service this evening.]  

What is Consecration? What is its connection to Reform Judaism?
by Barry Shainker

How many of us actually remember our own Consecration service? We were young, probably overwhelmed, and most likely unsure of the event’s significance. Aside from some paper flags, an uncomfortable clip-on tie, and a bunch of kids making a mad dash from the sanctuary to the social hall for cookies, today the only real memory I have of my Consecration is the picture which now hangs alongside the many others in the temple. But the meaning of the event is something that I have acquired over time. Looking back, I know that my Consecration began a lifelong experience of Jewish learning.

Consecration is a uniquely Reform event. According to historian Michael Meyer, the ceremony can be attributed to Rabbi David Einhorn, one of the early leading figures during Reform’s creation in Germany and later in the United States. Rabbi Einhorn was a proponent of placing spirituality over halachah (Jewish law), and so he suggested replacing circumcision with a consecration ritual as the opening event that would confirm a young boy’s life in the Jewish community.^1 2

The ceremony of Consecration marks the beginning on one’s Jewish learning, usually between the ages of 5 and 8, within an organized setting, for example a congregational religious school. When young people begin their study of Judaism, they are honored before the community as a new student and often presented with a certificate marking the occasion and gifts like miniature Torah scrolls. Many congregations will add other rituals to the ceremony such as a special blessing or a recitation of the Sh’ma.

Consecration services often take place at the end of the High Holiday season, usually as part of the congregation’s celebration for the holiday of Simchat Torah, meaning ‘joy or celebration of the Torah.’ The word “consecrate” in religious circles means an association with something holy, and throughout our tradition Jewish learning is considered a sacred task. What an appropriate time, then, to celebrate this milestone in a young person’s life. As the entire synagogue community joins in the hakafah (processional of the Torah) and Torah scrolls are unrolled for all to see, new students see the importance and centrality of this ancient and holy sourcebook. They also have the opportunity to see Judaism as a tradition that is interactive, celebratory, and engaging.

A textual basis for Consecration’s placement on this day might come from a custom of calling all in the community to hear the Torah on Sukkot, which is itself based on Deuteronomy 31:12.³ The text reads as God’s instructions to Moses: Gather the people – men, women, children, and the strangers in your communities – that they may hear and so learn to revere Adonai your God and to observe faithfully every word of this Teaching.”⁴

While the overwhelming majority of synagogues follow this practice, a handful in our movement do not. Some see Consecration as a statement of dedication and therefore recognize their new students on Chanukah, one of most triumphant stories of renewal and survival in the history of the Jewish people. Others look to Shavuot, the spring holiday in which we celebrate Matan Torah, the giving of the Torah to the Jewish people at Sinai, and draw a direct parallel between the start of one’s Jewish education at Consecration and the reaffirmation of it as a young adult at Confirmation.

While most of our young people cannot fully comprehend the magnitude of this milestone, we hope that they will look back on the occasion in the years that follow with a new understanding. Consecration, like so many other rituals in our tradition, is about coming together to as a community to welcome new students and new families. Wherever the ceremony is celebrated on the calendar, we affirm our commitment and dedication to educating our young people in Jewish tradition. And, as we see the hope and spirit in our young people, we renew in ourselves a passion for Jewish learning that we hope to transmit to our children. 

Barry Shainker is currently an Education student at HUC-JIR in New York. He is also Educational Intern at Temple Sinai in Roslyn, NY. 

¹ Meyer, Michael A. Response to Modernity: A History of the Reform Movement in Judaism. Oxford UP: New York, 1999. p. 163 

² At the time, only young boys were recognized with a bris ritual, Consecration, Bar Mitzvah, or any other sort of ceremony. Similar services for girls would only be instituted years later, as the women’s liberation movement gained acceptance in Reform.

³ Knobel, Peter S. ed. Gates of the Seasons: A Guide to the Jewish Year. CCAR Press: New York, 1983. p. 135. 

⁴ Translation from JPS Tanakh, 1999 ed.