In Pirkei Avot – the sayings of our ancestors – we read this line: “Turn it and turn it, for everything is in it.”[1] Ben Bag Bag was speaking of Torah, emphasizing that there is always more than meets the eye. The turning was and is literal, as we turn the Torah scroll just a little bit forward week by week, following the path of its narration and its laws to see what will happen next. It also...Read more...
Admittedly, I don’t remember the last time Shabbat and Halloween fell on the same night. I do know though that I’ve always been interested in what different synagogues do with this confluence.
Some synagogues are doing nothing.
Some rabbis are using it as an occasion for telling a Jewish tale of the supernatural, or a version of “The...Read more...
As we move from the High Holidays into November and a stretch of uninterrupted Religious School sessions, “Ask the Rabbi” is back during Sunday morning Tefillah. I love these times of pulling a question out of the jar and sometimes answering it but just as often, holding the question back out to the kids for their ideas. Our students, for their part, respond with...Read more...
Kosi Revaya. That’s a line from Psalm 23 which means “my cup runs over.” I would amend that to “our cup” this week, as the last of the Israeli hostages held in underground Hamas tunnels in deplorable conditions have finally been freed. To watch them reunite with their loved ones has been to truly witness that cup filling up and spilling over. These are families who fought for the return of their...Read more...
If I asked how many of you love to read, I imagine an overwhelming number of you would answer in the affirmative… enthusiastically so. I’ll ask instead: how many of you love to re-read?
Have I got a book club for us!
Picture it: we’d pick a novel, we’d meet … we’d discuss … and then for our next meeting there would be no need to process our next...Read more...
On January 26, 1988, a musical opened on Broadway that some of you may have heard of. The story centers around a tragic love triangle that takes place near the dawning of the 20th century in and underneath the Paris Opera House. There is the requisite drama and passion and unrequited love, as well as the small matter of a large, crashing chandelier. “The Phantom of the Opera” would go on to...Read more...
The year was 1986. My sister and I were visiting family in San Francisco. It was our first flight without our parents, and our first vacation as teenagers together. We were intoxicated by all of it – Chinatown, the Victorians up and down the hills. So many people outside enjoying the temperate...Read more...
L’Shana Tovah! What a joy it was to celebrate Rosh Hashanah together. May the coming year be one of gladness and growth, as we continue to search out the prayers, the melodies, the spirit and the new directions we need most.
As a famous proverb is fond of reminding us, it’s never too late. It’s never too...Read more...
I began this series of reflections on the month of Elul with words from liturgist and translator Marcia Falk. It seems only appropriate to end with her words as well. The closing of Elul is upon us, and with it, Rosh Hashanah arrives and we begin once more.
“We enter the gates, grateful
for the blessing of renewal.
Let us bless the flow of life
that revives us,
sustains us,
and brings...Read more...
