Category: Rabbi’s page

Mazal Tov!

In most synagogues in America and around the world, July 1st is an important day. It is the start of the new fiscal year, when the old budget gives way to a new one, officially marking a transition which would otherwise be left unnoticed. Presidents and synagogue boards begin their new terms. Most Jewish professionals – Rabbis, cantors and educators who work in synagogues – begin their work in new communities, or celebrate the number of years in their current positions.

As I am writing these words, and as I begin the 11th year at Temple Emanuel, I am still aglow from the incredible event on June 23, celebrating 10 years together with all of you. I still cannot quite believe that I have had the honor and the privilege of being the Rabbi of Temple Emanuel for 10 years.

There are no words that can describe my gratitude to all of you – the organizers, the worker bees, those who took time to write most moving messages, and of course all those who came to celebrate. Suffice it to say, this was an amazing evening, and Olga and I are still floating on air!

10 years ago it was a leap of faith for us, and it was a leap of faith for Temple Emanuel. We certainly could not have imagined what blessings awaited us in Orange, and what an incredibly rewarding journey we were going to embark on together. We take pride in how much we have achieved in the last 10 years, and we are so grateful for the partnership that makes TE, our mutual home, such a special community to be a part of.

To all the lay leaders, presidents and officers past and present, and to all of you – THANK YOU! What a joy it is to celebrate the mutual love and blessings today! Mazal tov to Robin Levine-Ritterman as she becomes our new President, mazal tov to the new TE Board and Officers, and a huge thank you to Alan Kliger as he becomes an immediate past President!

Thank you all – we are truly honored and humbled by your love. Here’s to the next decade!

Routines of our lives

Routines are important. We begin to learn the routines almost immediately after we are born: we sleep, we eat and everything in between. Parents of newborn children quickly learn that if something happens once, it is not yet significant – but once a skill or an action is repeated 3 times, that may very well be a new routine.

Judaism values routines greatly: there’s a lot of comfort and meaning in the daily rituals of prayer, weekly rituals of Shabbat; not to mention the annual rituals of Jewish festivals that allow us to pay ever-closer attention to life around us, to our families, to ourselves, and to our traditions.

We have just celebrated the Festival of Passover, perhaps the most symbolic routine-filled occasion of the annual Jewish calendar. Food, family, community, ancient history and modern reality – all of it is intertwined into the special week of Passover, when we celebrate our freedom and our very existence as a Jewish nation (despite, as the Haggadah reminds us, multiple attempts to deny us the right to exist and to be ourselves).

As we said goodbye to Passover, we were once again faced with the terrible news – this time from Poway, CA, where a white supremacist filled with hate opened fire on Jews in the synagogue. A holy soul, Lori Gilbert-Kaye z’l lost her life, and the rabbi and two more congregants suffered gunshot wounds (but are recovering). Thanks to the incredible bravery of the congregants, and ineptitude of the cowardly shooter, a much greater tragedy was averted.

We have been here before. Six months ago, to be exact. We had to figure out how to respond to the Pittsburgh tragedy, the first such devastating attack on a synagogue in American history. We cried, we prayed, and we gathered as a community, surrounded by friends and neighbors of all faiths. We reviewed our safety procedures, and for the first time in our 56 year history, we began keeping our doors locked at all times, even on Shabbat and Festivals. We hugged our loved ones tighter than usual, and we went back to doing what we do best: celebrating our traditions, teaching and learning, feeding the hungry and working to make this world a better place, one step at a time.

On Sunday morning I stood in our sanctuary, sharing words of wisdom and comfort with our school community. I realized that I am getting to be far too experienced at teaching wisdom to kids, through song, while offering comfort to adults between the lines. This is one routine I never expected to develop in my rabbinate. But as Haggadah reminds us, we have seen this before – and we know what our response should be. We will continue to strive to be the better versions of ourselves: to be better spouses, better parents, better children, better members of our community, and better Jews. THIS is our routine.

Am Israel Chai!

Holding a Torah Scroll…

Torah scrolls are very special. It is an incredible honor and privilege to read from the Torah scroll in front of the congregation. It requires skill and effort, and lots of preparation for each such occasion – a labor of love on behalf of the community and of the Jewish people. Holding the Torah scroll does not require a special skill (perhaps some strength is useful), but it can be a truly moving, emotional experience. When holding the Torah, whether for the first time as a bar or bat mitzvah, or for the 100th time, we cannot help but be in awe of the incredible chain of tradition, of hundreds upon hundreds of generations of Jews that cherished their Torah, and passed it on, leaving a small mark that perhaps cannot be seen, but can be felt by us as we accept the Torah from their hands and carry it forward. The sense of continuity, of importance of ritual and of connection with our people’s past is palpable whenever one holds the Torah — a truly awe-inspiring feeling.

As I held TE’s Holocaust Memorial Scroll #1178, and as I marched in a quiet procession of over 70 Czech memorial scrolls, I was overwhelmed for a moment by a different kind of emotion. In my arms I held not only an incredible treasure of the Jewish people that was created and lovingly maintained by previous generations of Jews I did not know, but a scroll that belonged to the destroyed Jewish community of Horazdovice, a community that perished in the flames of the Holocaust. This was not just the Torah connecting me to the Jewish past – this was a moment to acknowledge, once again, that the future of this Torah’s Jewish community of Horazdovice was wiped out by the cruelty of hate and yet somehow, miraculously, the orphaned Torah has survived and found its way into the loving hands of our community, right here in Orange, CT. Scroll after scroll paraded through the room packed with over 800 people from some 80+ synagogues in the Tri-State area, honoring the painful past – and celebrating the miraculous survival of Judaism. I will never forget this moment and this feeling.

TE delegation at the gathering of Holocaust Memorial Scrolls.

I have invited other members of TE who were able to attend to share some of their experiences from that day. I hope that their words can help you experience some of that special occasion:

“Tuesday, February 5th was truly a spiritually and personally meaningful experience for me. Watching the processional of more than 70 Czechoslovakian Holocaust scrolls, with our rabbi carrying our 1850 scroll, was a moving sight. To be there with a group of folks from my TE family made everything even more special and exciting, starting with the difficulty of parking at the train station to our rolling, sometimes party-like conversations on the train back and forth, and our long walks from Grand Central Station to Temple Emanu-El and back. It is such a privilege for our congregation to have been entrusted with one of these rescued, restored scrolls. In addition, it now appears that the scroll we retired in 2007 (to be only displayed) may indeed be able to be restored and put back into use. As one of those lucky enough to have chanted from that scroll during the retirement service, I would feel even more fortunate to once again chant from it in the near future. Any such opportunity would enhance my feeling of connection to those who perished for their beliefs and heritage, and for whom I may speak when chanting.” — Barbara Berkowitz

“Having convinced myself that one of the Czech scrolls must surely have come from the shul of my grandmother Adele Kolish Reyman, I felt that I needed to be at this rare reunion of the Czech scrolls residing in the Tri-State area. Reading and hearing about these scrolls, gently touching the covers, viewing the IDs affixed to the wood, and seeing the solemn walk with the Torahs were profoundly moving experiences.

Who can say that Adele, her four older brothers and their parents did not see one of these very scrolls I was seeing? No one can say it is not there, so it is. I needed to be there.”  — Barbara Miller

“Awesome, proud, sad, memorable, honored, humbled, grateful.

These are some of the emotions that the ten Temple Emanuel members felt as they saw the parade of more than 70 Czech Holocaust scrolls from all over the United States come down the aisle at Temple Emanu-El in New York City on February 5th. This was the largest gathering of the Czech scrolls ever in one place. The Memorial Scroll Trust has 1,564 scrolls on permanent loan to congregations throughout the world. Temple Emanuel’s scroll from Horazdovice came to the Temple Emanuel congregation in 1966 under the leadership of then-Presidents Lois and Paul Levine. It has been used in countless Friday night services, b’nai mitzvah services and High Holy Day services over the last 50 years.

During World War II, the Jews of Bohemia and Moravia were wiped out. The people had been lost, but amazingly 1,564 Torah Scrolls from more than 122 congregations had been saved. Westminster Synagogue became the home to these Czech Scrolls in February of 1964. There they were stored, restored and then sent back out into the world by the Memorial Trust Fund. The evening of February 5th brought 70 of these scrolls and their congregants together for the first time.” — Melissa Perkal

After Pittsburgh…

I often take too long to write my shofar articles, waiting for the ‘right’ moment to put together words that would resonate when the new TE Shofar will reach your home. This month I was quite happy to submit my column in a timely manner, but then… Pittsburgh tragedy rocked our world, and the crafted words had to be set aside…

The shock of hearing the news at the end of the Torah study, the long week filled with grief, the life stories of the victims, their pictures, their funerals… But also the week filled with vigils, and countless messages of support from faith communities, and neighbors, and strangers – Jews and non-Jews, religious and secular, priests, imams, community leaders and ordinary folks. And most importantly: the TE sanctuary filled to the brim on a Sunday morning for asephah (assembly), with parents and children who choose to be a part of the Jewish religious community, the synagogue, with its customs, and traditions and values… And then the first Shabbat with our sanctuary filled beyond capacity with people seeking comfort and community, and with others coming to show support and solidarity… And the Pittsburgh Gazette that printed the opening words of kaddish, in Hebrew, right below their name… And Pittsburgh Penguins that changed their logo for the first game after the tragedy to incorporate the Star of David – as did the Steelers…

I can talk about hatred today, and antisemitism – both are far too real, and need to be taken seriously by all of us, by our society and our country. Growing up outside America, I am not surprised by either of these things – I have a firsthand experience of both, and have physical and emotional scars to show for it. One of the greatest tragedies of anti-Semitic hatred, any hatred really, is when it is followed by indifference, or tacit approval, of the society at large. This last week was tough – but also filled with hope and comfort. We live in the society where this is NOT OK. Our neighbors, our friends, strangers on the street, our police officers, our elected officials, our athletes, all of us rise to say: this is NOT who we are.

This does not mean there’s no hate, or no antisemitism – sadly, it is very much here. We have to be vigilant, as we know from history that we ignore these signs at our own peril… But let us also acknowledge and celebrate the fact that our society at large chose to stand with us in our time of sorrow. And then let us go back to doing what we do best: practice our values and our traditions, celebrate Jewish Festivals and Shabbat, sing and pray, learn and feed the hungry, improve the world – and improve ourselves. Let us do what is in our power, every day: be the best versions of Jews WE can be.

Honoring TE traditions

Over the past few days we have been sorting through some of the archives of Temple Emanuel, and marveling at some of the history, including terrific photos, and a collection of the old Shofar editions, going all the way back to typed up pages from 1966! I flipped to one of the first issues (December 1969), and found a message from then President, Paul Levine:

“Last year after considerable, careful thought we put out a mini-leaflet which we feel is true to the spirit of our congregation. In it we described ourselves as “… a new temple for creative judaism”. It was no accident that “temple emanuel” and its description appeared in lower case letters. This device signified to us that the institution was no more important than its congregants… An institution such as ours must serve the needs of its members. But the rabbi, officers and board are not all-wise in guessing the needs of the members. Realizing this, last summer Rabbi Winer, together with an officer or board member visited nearly every congregant’s home to solicit views and ideas. Many worthwhile innovations followed. One or two ideas flopped. But if we profess to be “a new temple for creative judaism” we must continue to be willing to change where desirable. Therefore, I solicit your ideas and your help in carrying them out. Our temple is a very precious concept. Let’s care enough to have it serve us properly.”

Having stumbled upon this paragraph by accident, I have been returning to it, day after day, and pondering the legacy of our early ‘pioneers’. While we no longer spell Temple Emanuel’s name in lower case letters, we remain committed to the principles of ‘creative Judaism’, and especially to our identity of a community, rather than an institution. We remain governed by committed lay leaders who do not presume to be all knowing, and continuously encourage ALL members to share their vision, as well as their energy, in making TE the kind of a community we all need it to be.

The first summer I arrived at Temple Emanuel I was blessed with an incredible opportunity to get to know my new congregation. All throughout that first summer, TE members took turns in leading Shabbat services, sharing their favorite tunes, their passion for Judaism and Shabbat, and their wisdom in making the words of the weekly Torah portion come to life. Many have continued to share their talents with TE community since, but mostly on the weeks when I am out of town: working at camp, attending a conference or taking a family holiday. This year, I’d like to begin changing that – and I can find no better inspiration than the words of Paul Levine!

I’d like to invite all TE members to partner with me, and with each other, in leading the services at Temple Emanuel on a regular basis, not just when I am away from the bimah. I’d like to learn from you and your take on the weekly Torah portion. I’d like to be guided by you with regard to your favorite tunes. I’d like to partner with you in making TE Shabbat that much more special every now and again. I promise to help you make educated choices with regard to the service, to help with music, playing and singing, and to be a true partner in the holy work. I know that many of you are up for this challenge, and I can’t wait to have these experiences with YOU! Call me, text me, email me – and let’s find a date for YOUR Shabbat!

The month of Elul as the doorway to the High Holy Day Season…

The arrival of the month of Elul in the Jewish calendar is always tinged with both excitement and sadness. The summer is beginning to wind down, and even though we may still have a few weeks of summer weather, fall is on the horizon, and with it the return of a ‘regular’ routine for many of us. Kids go back to school, commuters go back to battling the usual traffic volumes, and sooner or later the evenings become cooler as well.

In the Jewish calendar, the arrival of the month of Elul is a signal to switch spiritual gears. It reminds us that Rosh Hashanah is on its way, followed closely by Yom Kippur – and thus, there’s no better time to begin the process of introspection, also known as ‘heshbon hanefesh’ –  accounting of the soul. How was my last year? Did I reach the goals I set out for myself? Did I remember to be kinder, to act justly, to color my actions in this world with Jewish values?

Did I fail? (I know I failed – I am a flawed human being!) And more importantly, when I did fail, how did I respond? Did I seek to fix my own mistakes? Did I acknowledge my failures and look for ways not to repeat them? One of the fundamental ideas we begin to consider with the arrival of Elul is how we can strive to rise above our flawed human nature;  to become a better version of ourselves. We begin this spiritual work ahead of time, and we continue throughout the festive season of High Holy Days, culminating in a day-long observance of Yom Kippur.

I always look forward to the High Holy Days with excitement. This year especially I look forward to seeing so many TE members together in one room, celebrating our ancient traditions with a brand new Machzor (prayerbook) for Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur. May our journey of introspection this year bring us new insights into our own lives. May our holy day celebration be filled with meaning and joy.

Shanah Tovah, a sweet, happy and joyous 5779 to you all!

Israel is 70!

Some of us may remember the world BEFORE Israel came into being. Some of us remember when Israel became a fragile reality. Many, if not most of today’s Jews live in a world where Israel has always been there. What a powerful statement it is: for nearly two thousand years, for the first time Israel is not just a dream, but also a reality for the majority of Jews living today!

Sure, Israel continues to live in a complex reality and a tough neighborhood, and much as we would like it to be otherwise, its existence continues to be threatened by those seeking to destroy the Jewish state. While it has managed to make peace with most of its immediate neighbors, Iran continues to wage proxy war against Israel from afar. It is also true that Israel continues to struggle with internal complexities: secular vs. religious identity; multiple and varied communities, including Israeli Arabs and other minorities and how they fit into the picture of the Jewish State; pluralism of Jewish religious expression; growing income inequality; social justice, gender equality – these are just the tip of the iceberg, questions that most modern democratic societies need to tackle, as does Israel. And of course, the unresolved complexity of the Palestinian narrative, as well as Israel’s continued presence in the areas of the West Bank that everyone, including the majority of Israelis, would like to see as a peaceful and independent neighbor someday.

Talking about Israel is not easy. It evokes passion in all of us, and we have a variety of different opinions, formed by our personal history and our individual politics. I feel like this year we have made a huge leap forward at Temple Emanuel – with the help of iEngage curriculum we began to learn not just the facts, but also how to engage those facts in an honest way that acknowledges the complexity, while allowing all of us to have and share our personal opinions without insisting that only we know the ultimate truth. Our Scholar in Residence has allowed us to continue the conversations, and I know this is just a beginning. And of course, we look forward to this year’s TE trip to Israel, which will take our learning and our engagement with all of its complexity to a completely new level.

This year we also celebrated Israel at 70 with a wonderful Shabbat service, Israeli dinner, and Israeli dancing – what a wonderful way to round up the special year! Something tells me this will become an annual tradition 🙂

Happy birthday, Israel – chazak chazak, v’nitchazek!

Fragile Dialogues in the 21st Century

As I write this column, our nation continues to reel from the pain of another devastating school shooting, this time in Parkland, Florida, that claimed 17 lives. As always happens after such tragic events, we engage in fierce debates and discussions, in person and increasingly online, on how best to prevent such tragedies. As always, there is not much listening going on in these debates – but quite a lot of shouting. The issues are real, the pain is real, and the frustration is real. It is hard to talk about difficult issues, amidst communal and national pain, when we are so divided in our opinions. It is obvious that people are finding it increasingly hard to even acknowledge the humanity of anyone holding an opinion that differs from his own. And yet also we must acknowledge that unless we find a way to listen to each other, and to really hear each other, the solutions to this and many other of our problems, will continue to elude us.

Over the last five months some 40 plus TE members have engaged in learning about the 100 years of modern Jewish history, 1917 through 2017, through the study of pivotal events in the history of the State of Israel with the help of the materials prepared by the faculty of Shalom Hartman Institute in Jerusalem. As we deepened our knowledge and understanding of the historical events of 1917, 1947, and 1967, we also considered some of the fundamental ideas of Zionism, as well as the challenges. We were most inspired by the way multiple (and diverse) opinions were presented and debated by the Hartman faculty in the Round Table discussion of each lecture. Having dramatically different ideas, and disagreeing, perhaps vehemently, does not have to stand in a way of listening and engaging in a conversation, however challenging it may be.

As you will see elsewhere in the Shofar, our Scholar in Residence this year is Rabbi Larry Englander, a wonderful teacher and a colleague, who co-edited the recently published ‘The Fragile Dialogue: New Voices of Liberal Zionism,’ a collection of essays presenting a wide variety of modern liberal Zionist ideas and challenges. While we will have an opportunity to learn so much from Rabbi Englander during his time here (see the full list of events in the Shofar and online), I am particularly looking forward to continuing our conversation on how to have these ‘fragile dialogues,’ addressing some of the most difficult, most challenging questions of our generation. I look forward to this continued journey of learning and listening with all of you and with Rabbi Englander on April 12-14, as well as during a special session on April 8th where we begin to look at the ideas presented in the book. In the meantime, I wish you a Chag Pesach Kasher v’Sameach – Happy Passover, and I look forward to seeing many of you at the TE Seder (first night, March 30) and the Passover Morning Service on March 31st.

‘The Fragile Dialogue’ is available for purchase at a discounted price of $15 through TE website and at the office.

Sacred Communities Matter

TE Team at 2017 URJ biennial

At the recent URJ Biennial in Boston over 6000 Reform Jews from all over United States, Israel, UK, and a number of other countries spent five days together learning, singing, discussing and debating, praying and engaging, reconnecting with old friends and making new ones, and celebrating Shabbat together. The Boston Biennial was doubly special for me, as it was a chance to revisit the location of the very first biennial I got to attend as a newly ordained rabbi from London back in 2001.  A lot has changed in my life and in our movement in the last 16 years, but I was especially excited to come to the biennial surrounded by the biggest TE delegation yet – we had our own minyan!

In her speech, Daryl Messinger, the Chair of the URJ, described her passion for our movement and posited, “Sacred space, sacred ritual, and sacred relationships matter today more than ever. No virtual reality could create the caring and connection that our Movement’s clergy, professionals, and lay leaders do every day in congregations and communities throughout North America.” I spend my life building and sustaining the sacred community, a task that requires true partnership with our leadership and all our members. However, we do not live in a vacuum, and so we look for every opportunity to enhance our work, extending the boundaries of our sacred community to include our movement, our local Jewish community and Federation, and the wider Jewish world. We seek every partnership and build relationships that allow us to foster the sacred community we need to be better Jews and better human beings.

Our religious school helps engage children and their parents, from the very young age all the way through high school – and we hope that the parents will also have an opportunity to find their own place in the TE community, engage in learning, be inspired, and enjoy a more fulfilling Jewish life. Our kids love Hebrew school! But we couldn’t do this alone, and so we seek the sacred partnerships to deepen the experiences our kids can have in Hebrew school. URJ summer camps are very much our partner in that endeavor, creating a ‘bubble’ of a sacred community of kids and teens, offering an opportunity of summer experience of communal Jewish living, something that is quite impossible to create during the year… URJ Eisner, Crane Lake, and SixPoints Sci-Tech Camps are very much our partners in the daily work, and I am so grateful for their presence in our region! Camp Laurelwood and JCC Day Camp offer additional local summer opportunities for Jewish life beyond Hebrew school.

Camp, especially sleep-away camp, is expensive. Over the years, TE has proudly offered small scholarships to our campers to help defray slightly the cost of URJ camps. This year I am delighted to report that after many years of discussions and encouragement, the Jewish Foundation of Greater New Haven now supports the ‘One Happy Camper’ grant, offering up to $1000 per child going to camp for the first time (this is NOT need-based), as well as offers the need-based Jewish camp scholarships that now extend to URJ Camps Eisner, Crane Lake, and Sci-Tech! This is indeed great news, and I very much hope that many more TE families will consider sending their children to a Jewish camp this summer. I will once again be returning to serve on faculty of URJ Camp Eisner this summer, and I look forward to seeing many happy faces of TE campers and CITs!

 

 

 

From the Rabbi’s Desk…

TE school having fun in the sukkah!

The chagim (festivals) are over, the regular year is moving full steam ahead. The building is buzzing with learning: kids in Hebrew school, adults in Mishnah class and iEngage series, committee meetings, Men’s club, Sisterhood – TE is full of energy this fall!

  This year’s Shir Magic will span an entire weekend of music with our Musician in Residence Alan Goodis, with Friday night and Shabbat morning services, special Hebrew school program on Sunday morning and especially the Saturday night concert (not to be missed), all in memory of our beloved Rabbi Jerry Brieger z’l – mark your calendars for Nov 10-12 and get the tickets for Saturday night November 11th concert online ahead of time!

 

This year brings lots of important dates to our attention – Nov 2nd marks the 100th anniversary of the Balfour Declaration, followed shortly by the 70th anniversary of the UN partition plan vote, and next April we get to celebrate the 70th anniversary of the modern State of Israel! With the iEngage series we have began to slowly unpack the complexity of the last 100 years of Jewish history and identity in Israel and beyond, and I am delighted to see that well over 40 TE members have signed up for the series this year, an absolute record for a multi session education class!
There’s lots of special programs still ahead, and the year will culminate with a special TE Travels trip to Israel with our guide and master educator Julian Resnick next summer, July 14-26! The sign up is now ready. Many of TE members have already expressed their commitment to the trip, I hope YOU will consider being part of this Jewish journey!
Look forward to seeing you all at our special Shir Magic weekend Nov 10-12, as well as Shabbat Chanukah celebration on Dec 15th!