by Jonathan Segal
The year 70 BCE, the most valuable place to the Jewish people was destroyed. The second temple and everything that came along with it was demolished, leaving the Jewish people without a religious center in the world. Although the temple was destroyed, the west wall of the complex remained standing and to this day this wall is remembered as the greatest physical evidence of prosperous Jewish life before the Common Era. Today, the Western Wall stands for many things and for many people. To some people the wall stands for history, loss, or victory while to others the wall stands for the Jewish religion, personal comfort, or even safety. Whatever it stands for, I believe that this wall is the most important physical wall in the world.
My first visit to the Western Wall was one of confusion. I was young and couldn’t quite understand why so many people had come so far to see a few boulders in the shape of a vertical wall. I did notice, however, that this odd pile of rocks seemed to have a special meaning for a large percentage of the people who got the privilege to witness its significance. Unfortunately, the rest of my first experience at this holy sight consisted of being scolded by elderly Chasidic Jews for wearing shorts and dressing immodestly in front of the wall.
After choosing to go to Israel for a semester of school, I knew that I would have many opportunities to visit this famous wall. At this point in my life, I was 17 and for some reason the significance of the wall seemed a lot more evident to me at this time than it had five years earlier. To me, visiting the wall for a second time provided me with an opportunity to share a connection with fellow Jews around the world. It also served as an outlet for many events that had built up to my journey to Israel. My friend Tucker and I approached the wall together, covering our heads with a yarmulke and with a prayer book in our hands. We pushed our way through the black coats and long beards and made our way to the base of the wall.
Standing in front of the wall with one of my best friends after having gone through so much the past year with him, we were both in awe at the effect the Western Wall had on us. We joined together in a prayer for people we know who have passed away, in which we both thought of our friend Mitch, and then slowly backed away from the wall, trying not to turn our backs. To us this wall had been a personal outlet for our feelings and a promise that the rest of our stay in Israel was going to be a fantastic experience.
The Western Wall is vital for many reasons besides personal connections. It is a peace of history and last standing proof of an ancient civilization. It is also a physical wall that separates the Temple Mount from the Jewish Quarter of the Old City of Jerusalem. This helps with things as basic as security. However, security is not the main thing on peoples mind when they face this Wailing Wall. It is the history, the tradition, the thoughts, the prayers, and the notes that overflow the cracks.
Jonathan Segal is a NFTY EIE High School in Israel alum. This piece was written for an 11th grade English assignment following his return from Israel.
Originally posted at Youth and College Israel Programs: The Blog
by Melissa Frey
It was just a year ago when I had the opportunity to be part of the listening campaign of the Campaign for Youth Engagement with WRJ District Presidents during their annual retreat to Kutz Camp. Last year these women shared their unique and powerful stories about a time when an interaction with a young person influenced their lives. While there were many remarkable stories that were shared, there is one that still resonates with me on so many levels.
“As a public school teacher most of my career, it was very common for me to spend time with teens. One of the most poignant interactions I remember was a teen asking me if I actually thought that my work mattered. I responded that I knew that it did, because she was willing to ask the question. That young woman grew up and is now a teacher herself.”
WRJ District Presidents at Kutz
A year later, WRJ District Presidents just concluded their annual pilgrimage to Kutz, having planned, programmed, and dreamed about their goals. As the WRJ readies to celebrate their 100th anniversary, I am reminded of their countless gifts that have helped to influence the youth of our Movement. During a walking tour of camp yesterday, I was able to highlight the direct and indirect ways the work of WRJ has permeated our culture in NFTY and at Kutz, including how our shared values influence camp culture, how Jewish learning and expression is brought to life in new ways through texts like the Women’s Commentary and the Covenant series, and the expansion of our digital media studio, which was seeded by a generous grant from the YES Fund.
While on that tour, we spoke about the listening campaign last year. Some of the women recounted their stories, and stories they heard that impacted them. As we gathered lakeside to take a photo under a perfectly blue sky, it was perhaps articulated most profoundly by WRJ president Lynn Lazar and executive director Rabbi Marla Feldman, “this just feels so right, this is why we do what we do.”
To all of the women who have trail blazed the path of WRJ, whose work has so influenced my passions, of NFTY and Kutz Camp, I wholeheartedly agree. For all of us, this is why we do what we do – because in our souls we know it to be right. As WRJ celebrates 100 years of shaping the lives of Reform Jewish Women, and as we prepare for, in two years, NFTY’s 75th anniversary, and in three years, Kutz Camp’s 50th anniversary, we look forward to many celebrations, supporting one another and lifting each other up in our holy work.
Shavuot is not the first holiday that comes to mind when someone asks me about Jewish holidays. When I’m asked about my faith, I usually talk about Shabbat services and dinner with my family, regaling them with stories about my family’s obsession with making the utmost of the roast chicken we have every Shabbat (it’s an Olympic sport in my family). Yet as we approach Shavuot, more and more I think it exemplifies much of the best that Judaism has to offer.
On Shavuot we celebrate the handing down of the Ten Commandments to Moses at Mt. Sinai with a late night marathon of Torah study while binging on dairy favorites, like blintzes or fruit and cheese. Some offer a more modern twist: cheesecake and The Ten Commandments.
Food and education have long been central elements of my experience with Judaism. But Shavuot is also a holiday commemorating the summer harvest, which provides us with an opportunity to reflect on the words of Leviticus 23:22: “And when you reap the harvest of your land, you shall not reap all the way to the edges of your field, or gather the gleanings of your harvest; you shall leave them for the poor and the stranger.”
In the time of the Israelites, whose society was based in agriculture, it was easy to tell how well-off someone was; the amount of land and food they owned was obvious. Today, hunger is a better-hidden evil. It can be too easy to fall through the cracks—indeed, nearly one in five Americans could not afford enough food last year. Leviticus 23:22 reminds us that today as much as in years past, we all share in the obligation to ensure that no one goes hungry.
As Congress moves forward in shaping the latest iteration of the Farm Bill, which governs critical anti-hunger programs like the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP, formerly food stamps), we must work to ensure that all Americans are afforded the same compassion the Israelites extended to one another many years ago—a solemn commitment that no one should go hungry. Tell Congress today to support critical anti-hunger programs in the 2012 Farm Bill.
by Cantor Deborah Katchko Gray
In the new home of the National Museum of American Jewish History, a Women Cantors’ Network postcard shares space in a display case with one of Bella Abzug’s hats. Never in my wildest dreams could I have imagined such a pairing. Likewise, in early 1982, neither could I have imagined the founding of the Women Cantors’ Network.
During the spring of 1981, as one of only two women cantors serving Conservative congregations, I attended the Cantors Assembly convention. A fourth generation cantor, I’d previously attended the convention with my father when I was a college student. At the time, I was embarrassed and shocked by the reactions of some of his colleagues to the fact that I was singing as a cantor in the Boston area. Their comments are seared in my memory.
“Oh, what will come next? Topless on the bimah?”
“What else will they think of to fill the pews?!”
This time, though, I was delighted to find myself seated at a tableful of women! One of them, Elaine Shapiro, was serving—without investiture—as the first full-time Conservative woman cantor at a congregation in West Palm Beach, FL.
Elaine and I agreed to get together during the convention and invited other women to join us in the hopes that we could organize ourselves into a support group. A dozen of us sat around a table and shared our experiences. Some were studying hazzanut privately because at the time, the Jewish Theological Seminary was not granting cantorial degrees to women who had not completed the full course of study at its College of Jewish Music—the same curriculum that was providing religious accreditation to its male cantorial graduates.
Following the convention, I invited all of these women to a gathering at my temple in Norwalk, CT. I also placed ads in Moment magazine, The Jewish Week, and other publications to spread the word. In May of 1982, 12 women from all over the country came to Norwalk for our first meeting. The Women Cantors’ Network was born.
Today, in addition to a postcard next to Bella Abzug’s hat in a display case at the National Museum of American Jewish History, the WCN boasts almost 300 members and a not-to-be-found elsewhere nurturing and caring environment. Our listserv is a lifeline for many cantors, and our annual conventions are full of heavenly light, song, and friendship for everyone.
Although the status of women has changed in the Reform and Conservative cantorate during the last three decades, there always will be a need for the WCN, and we do not discriminate based on education, job experience, pulpit size, salary, ordination, certification, degrees, or even gender! We welcome all who are nurturing, caring, musical, spiritual and loving—virtues that are not solely feminine.
It is my prayer that our WCN will continue to attract cantors, prospective cantors, writers, musicians, choir directors, and rabbis—men as well as women—whose spirit is moved by our people’s sacred music. Each one who attends brings beauty and kindness, an open heart and soul to share, and, sometimes, even a shoulder to cry on. I pray, too, that 30 years after its founding, our Women Cantors’ Network will continue as a beacon of light and hope, song and story, love, and laughter for us all.
Photo of the first Women Cantors' Network conference in Norwalk, CT; the author is on the far left.
Women Cantors' Network conference in Chicago
Deborah Katchko Gray serves as hazzan at Reform Temple Shearith Israel in Ridgefield, CT, and prides herself on working with a rabbi who appreciates, enhances and elevates worship and constantly tells the congregation how lucky they are to receive beautiful and moving Jewish music on a weekly basis.
By Rabbi Sharyn Henry
This week we complete the reading of Vayikra, Leviticus. In Ashkenazi congregations there is ritual that takes place each time we complete the public reading of a book of Torah. After the Torah reader reads the last words of a book in the Torah, before the recitation of the final blessing of the person doing the aliyah, the entire congregation, followed by the reader, recites aloud, “Chazak, chazak v’nitchazek—Be strong! Be strong! And may we be strengthened.”
We have to imagine that the rabbis who originated this tradition had a reason for it, although the closest thing to an explanation I have found is a source. There is a strong link between this phrase and the words spoken to Joshua and to the community by Moses on the last day of his life. Twice on that day Moses charged Joshua in front of all Israel, “Chazak v’emematz—Be strong and courageous” (Dt. 31: 7 and 23). As the mantle of leadership was passed from Moses to Joshua, the people were likely to have felt vulnerable at a moment of so much change. It was a time when the rules weren’t necessarily clear and there was uncertainty about what the future would bring. Moses’ words brought comfort and support to a fearful people.
The white space at the end of one book of Torah and the beginning of another is a moment of transition. By reciting the words, Chazak—be strong, we remind ourselves that Torah is always with us. In times of transition, especially, Torah and Jewish tradition gives us strength. The last phrase of the formula, “v’nitchazek—may we be strengthened” is of critical importance. We are important sources of strength for one another in times of uncertainty and transition.
The tagline of the Women of Reform Judaism is “stronger together.” These words, an echo of the charge of Moses to Joshua, is much more than a tagline; we are stronger together. As we move from one book of Torah to another, as we move into and out of spaces of uncertainty and transition in our public and private lives, may we encourage one another and build upon the strengths, visions, and dreams of one another. Chazak, chazak, v’nitchazek. May we be strong and may we strengthen one another.
Rabbi Sharyn Henry serves at Rodeph Shalom in Pittsburgh, PA.
In several days time, we will celebrate Shavuot, which commemorates God’s revelation of Torah at Mount Sinai. As part of our commemoration, we will join together as one community, stand again at Mount Sinai and receive the Torah all over again.
In her groundbreaking book, Standing Again at Sinai, published more than 30 years ago, Judith Plaskow calls upon Jewish women to reclaim scripture rather than discard it because of its patriarchal nature. Her inspiring words challenge each and every one of us to stand again at Sinai and reclaim Torah for ourselves—regardless of our gender, sexual orientation, or life experiences that may distance us from or create tension with our ancient, sacred texts.
I have always been profoundly moved that the rabbis associated the Book of Ruth with Shavuot. This moving story describes the bonds shared by women who overcome tribal-national differences to stay together and support one another. Famously and powerfully, Ruth tells Naomi, her mother-in-law:
Where you go I will go
Where you lodge I will lodge
Your people will be my people
Your God my God
And so it goes that Ruth becomes part of the Jewish people and, like the rest of us, stands at Sinai and receives Torah. What moves me most about the story, however, is that Ruth finds herself at Sinai primarily because of the bond she shares with Naomi.
In 1978, thousands of years after we first stood at Sinai, Rabbi Alexander Schindler began an outreach revolution. As president of the Union of American Hebrew Congregations (now the Union for Reform Judaism) Rabbi Schindler called upon our Movement to reach out to the non-Jewish spouses who increasingly were within our families and congregations. He went so far as to throw open the gates of Jewish living to those he called “unchurched.” In the spirit of the Book of Ruth, Rabbi Schindler believed that many, many souls would find meaning, purpose, and connection in the Jewish community—and their entrée would be through the people with whom they shared love and bonds that were stronger than tribal-national differences.
It was truly a revolution. Think of the hundreds of thousands of girls and boys, women and men who, through Outreach, have found the joy of Jewish life, even though members of their families of origin are not Jewish. Think of the number of rabbis, cantors, and Jewish professionals and leaders who are Jews-by-choice or grew up in interfaith households. Just as King David himself was the future progeny of Ruth, so too have the souls we have drawn in over the last several decades contributed countless generations to the Jewish future.
Now, as we prepare once again to stand at Sinai, amongst a diverse, mixed multitude that has found a home among us, we will again read the Book of Ruth. Again, we will hear Rabbi Schindler’s call to reach out, giving us yet another chance to ask, “Who among us might find their way into Jewish life?”
Recently, URJ incoming president Rabbi Rick Jacobs called upon synagogues to “reach out to the uninspired,” challenging the whole of the Jewish community to think boldly and well beyond the walls of the synagogue to meet people where they are. Rabbi Jacobs’ charge renews Rabbi Schindler’s vision and echoes across the generations from Sinai and Ruth until today. Who are the waiting-to-be-inspired women and men to whom we will reach out and ask to join the Jewish people? Who are the people with whom we share bonds so strong that when asked, they will respond: Your people will be my people, your God my God?
Originally published in Ten Minutes of Torah
by Rabbi Rick Schechter
It’s the black sheep of the Jewish calendar—unfortunately. Shavuot, the Feast of Weeks, is a holy day often overshadowed and overlooked in the contemporary Jewish world.
How could this have happened? It had such an auspicious start. The Torah considers Shavuot a major Jewish festival—right up there with Passover and Sukkot. In ancient times, it was thus distinguished as one of the three pilgrimage festivals in which all of Israel would travel to Jerusalem to celebrate. Even more so, after the destruction of the Jerusalem Temple in 70 C.E., the ancient rabbis renewed and deepened Shavuot’s meaning: it is not only a major spring harvest festival, it is the very anniversary of God’s revelation to the entire Jewish people at Mount Sinai. Shavuot commemorates the giving and receiving of the Torah, the Jewish people’s greatest treasure. What could be more important than that?!
So why isn’t Shavuot celebrated more widely today in America? The reasons are many. Always occurring in late May or early June, it has to contend with Memorial Day weekends and student graduations, finals, and absence from schools.
If that weren’t enough of an uphill battle, Shavuot also has to vie for attention among a crowded Jewish holy day spring season—including many modern-day commemorations. Shavuot comes seven weeks after Passover, five weeks after Yom Hashoah (Holocaust Remembrance Day), four weeks after Yom Hazikaron (Israeli Memorial Day) four weeks after Yom Ha’atzmaut (Israeli Independence Day), and one week after Yom Yerushalayim (Jerusalem Day, celebrating its reunification in 1967). It’s not easy being Shavuot.
And then there’s the issue of Shavuot’s seeming twin: Simchat Torah. Every year, back in the fall, we’ve already rejoiced and danced with the Torah, celebrated its wisdom and message, and unrolled it for all to see.
For all these reasons, what need then of Shavuot?
The simple yet profound answer occurs in our Passover haggadah, when it says, “our freedom from slavery was not complete until we received the Torah, which gives our lives purpose and meaning.” In other words, Egypt leads to Sinai. Passover leads to Shavuot. Liberation leads to a life of Torah. We will always need Shavuot because it forever completes our spiritual journey and story.
This year Shavuot occurs on Saturday night, May 26-Sunday, May 27. Chag Sameach!
Rabbi Rick Schechter is the rabbi at Temple Sinai of Glendale, CA.
Originally posted at Rabbi Rick’s Blog
by Rabbi Neil Hirsch
While at this past year’s URJ Biennial, I attended the launch of the movement’s Campaign for Youth Engagement. As I heard the different stories, as colleagues and friends stood up and spoke of what’s going on with teens in their congregations, it resonated with my own experiences, and I realized that we all share in our struggles together. We have students and families dedicated to Jewish education that leads up to the bar and bat mitzvah experience. What about the day after the students become b’nai mitzvah? Our movement is facing an 80% drop-off rate after b’nai mitzvah. It is long past time to re-energize and rededicate ourselves to our youth.
I looked at others from my congregation, Temple Shalom in Newton, MA, who were with me at the launch, and one said, “We need our own Campaign for Youth Engagement.” He understood, the onus is on us to inspire our youth. Our congregations seem to be the front lines of this campaign.
Since that realization at Biennial, we have gotten to work.
We began with a couple of insights: Engaging our youth is a project that requires partnerships among parents, professional staff, and the youth. And, we know we have to take baby steps if we want to succeed. We need to be engaged in strategic action, rather than getting caught up in the process of planning. With each small step forward, we would be both reflective on that step, and inspired to define what could come next.
After those insights, the first step to take seemed obvious. We lacked that group of parents who were dedicated to working on youth engagement. We were in need of a group of parents, dedicated to their children’s Jewish experiential learning. There had been a youth committee for many years, but it had been some time since they had met for any substantial purpose. Both our lay and professional leadership agreed that a group of parents dedicated to engaging our youth in Jewish communal life could guide us into new and exciting times.
And so, our youth committee was retired by name, and a new task force was appointed. Temple Shalom now has a Task Force for Youth Engagement. What is in that name? Yes, we have brought our congregation in line with the direction of the movement. More significantly, in our name is our organizing principle: This group is all about figuring out how our youth can best be an integral part of our vibrant Jewish community.
This task force, comprised of new, emerging leaders in our congregation, is working to define our next steps. We do not yet know what will come of our own Campaign for Youth Engagement. We have reinvigorated ourselves to this work, exemplified in the simple act of renaming our group, and we have a great group of parent-leaders ready to roll up their sleeves to begin. I’m confident that we have set ourselves on a meaningful path.
Rabbi Neil Hirsch serves Temple Shalom in Newton, MA. He received his Masters in Hebrew Literature in 2009 and ordination in 2010 from the Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion in New York City.
On Monday, May 28th, we observe Memorial Day in the United States, a time to remember the sacrifice of our Armed Forces in defense of our country. The prayer below, written by Rabbi Matt Friedman and originally published on this blog last year, may be read during your Shabbat Services next week.
Let us ask God to protect, heal and comfort those who serve. And let us, by praying, raise our own awareness, sense of responsibility, and appreciation for those who defend our country.
“A Prayer for Memorial Day”
by Rabbi Matt Friedman
Eloheinu v’Elohei avoteinu v’imoteinu – Our God and God of our ancestors,
Watch over those who defend our nation.
Shield them from harm and guide them in all their pursuits.
Grant their commanders wisdom and discernment
in their time of preparation and on the battlefield.
Should battle erupt may their victory be swift and complete.
May the loss of life for any of your creations be avoided.
Grant healing to those who are wounded
and safe redemption to those who fall into enemy hands.
For those who have lost their lives, grant consolation
and Your presence to those who were close to them.
We also ask that you stand with our President and all our military leaders.
Guide them in their decision making
so that Your will is implanted within their minds.
May it be Your will that world hostilities come to a rapid end
And that those in service are returned safely to their families.
We pray that freedom will dawn for the oppressed and
Fervently we hope that the vision of Your prophet will come to be,
“Let nation not lift up sword against nation nor learn war anymore.”
May this vision come to pass speedily and in our day,
Amen.
Learn more about how you can support the men and women in our armed forces by visiting the Religious Action Center’s Support Our Troops page.
by Rabbi Jeff Goldwasser
Not long after I arrived in Florida, a congregant told me about the Treatment Center where he works as an administrator, a place for people whom the criminal justice system has deemed to be mentally ill or mentally incompetent. He asked me if I would be willing to visit the Center to talk with its few Jewish residents. I told my new congregant that I would be honored to help his residents.
There was a long process before I could be approved to volunteer at the Center. I made my first trip to visit its residents during Passover last month. I visited again today, meeting with three adult Jewish men who have been found “not guilty by reason of insanity” (NGRI) by a Florida State Court.
There is a lot of misunderstanding about the insanity defense and what happens to people who are determined to be not responsible for their actions due to mental illness. Many people believe that defendants who are found NGRI are allowed to walk out of the courtroom and reenter normal society. Nothing could be further from the truth.
The three men I met with today all have been charged with violent crimes. After being found NGRI, they were sent to the Treatment Center, or other similar facilities. Technically, the Center is not a prison, but it might as well be one. It is a maximum security facility with lots of guards, lots of tall fences with razor wire, and lots of heavy metal doors that can only be opened by a security guard watching over a video monitor. Trying to escape is a bad idea. The facility is surrounded by nothing but miles of flat land with little cover, and plenty of alligators and poisonous snakes.
The biggest difference between this facility and a prison is that the residents (that’s what they call them) receive psychotherapy and medications to treat their illnesses. They also receive training on how the legal system works. This is especially important for residents who have been determined to be “not competent to proceed to trial” (NCP). The goal of the Treatment Center is to make them competent, so the Center teaches them about the charges they face in court, what those charges mean, and how the court system will deal with them.
It is understandable that the three Jewish men with whom I met today are not very happy about being in the Treatment Center. They are glad not to be in a state prison, where there is more violence and where their mental health problems would go mostly untreated. Their fondest hope is to be transferred to a lower security facility, or, even better, to a halfway house where they could begin a transition to freedom. That day could come in a few years for some of them, maybe sooner, or maybe never. Not knowing how long they will have to wait for freedom is very difficult for them.
I spent about an hour with the men today. We talked about this week’s Torah portion (Behar-Bechukotai), especially the part about how all Hebrew slaves in ancient Israel were released during the jubilee, which came every fifty years. The idea of having a definite date of liberation, even one many years in the future, would be appealing to these men.
I also answered their questions about Judaism. For the most part, they asked the same types of questions I hear all the time from people who want to know more about Judaism. One resident asked me if the tattoo on his shoulder would prevent his body from being buried in a Jewish cemetery. (No, that’s a myth.) Another resident asked, “When did Israel last have a Jewish king?” (First century c.e.). “Could there ever be another king of Israel?” (Depends on whom you ask).
The conversation got to be the most interesting when we talked about divine reward and punishment. It is not surprising that these men wanted to know what Judaism teaches about God’s punishment for sin. Does Judaism teach that sinners are punished with hellfire? Why do good people suffer in this lifetime? Do we live in a just universe? Does God not care about the suffering of the innocent?
If you are sitting in a prison after the state has told you that you are not guilty and that you are not responsible for your actions, these questions become rather poignant, wouldn’t you say? People with mental health problems often feel like they live in a metaphoric prison—held captive by a mind that inhibits normal interaction with other people, distrusted and scorned by people who fear them. In addition to that, these men live in a real live realty of razor wire and locked doors. Well, it’s enough to make anyone crazy.
Clearly, the Treatment Center is the right place for these men, even if it is depressing for them to be confined without much freedom. They are receiving treatment for their illnesses. They are safe. They are being cared for by a professional staff that treats them with courtesy and all the dignity possible under the circumstances. They even get visits from local clergy, if that helps.
Still, no one would volunteer or choose to live in the Treatment Center. According to the state of Florida, these men did not willfully choose to do the things that got them here. Yet, here they are. And, I have to add, it’s a good thing, too.
Do we live in a just universe? I’m not sure anyone can answer that question for these men. I’m just grateful for the opportunity to help people who could really use some.
Rabbi Jeff Goldwasser is the rabbi of Temple Beit HaYam in in Stuart, FL.
Originally posted at Reb Jeff.
Shavuot means a lot of things: We read the Book of Ruth, a story that took place during the harvest. We stay up all night studying Torah in a tikkun leil shavuot. We traditionally eat dairy meals with treats like blintzes and cheesecake. And if you’re active on social media, there’s another way to celebrate Shavuot, too: by tweeting #Torah to the top!
Originally started in 2009 by Rabbi Shai Gluskin, Tweet #Torah to the Top is an effort to spread the teachings of the Torah and the discussions surrounding them to as many people as possible by organizing a collaborate effort to tweet on Erev Shavuot.
Tweet #Torah to the Top has since gained traction, becoming an annual event among Jewish tweeters. This year, because Erev Shavuot falls on a Friday, we’ll be tweeting Torah to the top on Thursday, May 25th (erev Erev Shavuot, if you will).
Rabbi Mark Hurvitz has a few suggestions for those who might be stuck on how, exactly, to tweet about Torah:
I think this is a great way to encourage awareness of Torah. I’m sure we each have many simple “Torah thoughts” that can be expressed in 133 characters. (Don’t forget to leave room for the final space and #Torah, that’s 7 more characters.) If you think that 133 characters is not enough for a profound thought from Torah, consider that the following sentence is only 102 characters (also from “Hillel the Tweeter”): If I am not for myself, who will be for me. if I am for myself alone, what am I. And if not now, when?
Or consider these:
This cool tool from the Central Conference of American Rabbis “shreds” blocks of text into Twitter-friendly portions and adds #Torah to the end of each so your tweets show up in the broader conversation. Or maybe you’re more comfortable writing a poem about Torah or starting a discussion about your favorite passage? That’s fine, too! Do what’s comfortable for you, and join in virtual Torah study with Jews from across the world.
One of the goals of this project is to see the hashtag #Torah “trend” on Twitter during that day. (For the non-tweeters among you, that means making Torah one of the most talked about topics on Twitter during that time period – a real feat when we’re competing with the entire Internet for just a few top spots!) Still, as Rabbi Hurwitz notes, it is also meant to be a learning experience. He suggest that rather than simply asking, “Did we get #Torah to trend?” participants might also ask one another,
Confirmation and b’nai mitzvah have been front and center on this blog for the past few weeks, what with Rabbi Carole Balin’s post on the 90th anniversary of the first bat mitzvah, Barry Shainker’s appreciation of the role of confirmation in Reform Judaism, and then the thoughtful comments on Shainker’s post by rabbis Fred Guttman, Andy Koren, and Joel Abraham.
As I commented on Rabbi Balin’s post, the early Reformers deserve high marks for the institution of confirmation as a replacement for bar mitzvah, even though over the long haul their innovation did not “take.” Mr. Shainker pointed out confirmation extended, typically by two or three years, the years of Jewish education a youngster received. More important, it was applicable to girls as well as to boys; and it was a communal event rather than putting a spotlight on an individual.
And by making the wondrous connection between the acceptance of Torah at Mount Sinai on Shavuot and the acceptance of Torah by teen-agers at confirmation on Shavuot, those prescient rabbis even found a way to fill seats in their sanctuaries on the least observed of the shalosh regalim, the three festivals. (At least some did. In my once Classic Reform congregation, to the consternation of those who believed that confirmation on Shavuot had been proclaimed at Sinai, confirmation had often been held on the nearest Sunday morning, which at that time was the best-attended of the weekend worship opportunities.)
Today, confirmation is a shadow of what it once was. When my son was a religious school student 35 years ago, not all the boys in his religious school classes were aiming at observing a bar mitzvah, and none of the girls. But by the time I became president of that congregation, some 15 years later, both bar and bat mitzvah had become virtually universal.
As president, I was approached by Associate Rabbi Donald Rossoff, now Senior Rabbi at B’nai Or in Morristown, NJ, and religious school principal Barbara “Cookie” Gross, soliciting my support in implementing the radical proposal that we move confirmation from 10th grade to 12th grade. They pointed out that all of the kids in the high school/youth group (you couldn’t be in one without being in the other) had had b’nai mitzvah ceremonies; and those that didn’t drop out immediately after tended to stay until high school graduation, and thus couldn’t see any relevance or significance to an intermediate ceremony.
What was Temple Sholom’s secret weapon that kept those teens throughout high school? Don and Cookie tied it to the youth group trip to Israel, which was held every three years. To be eligible to go on the trip, you had to be in the high school program. If you had just missed a trip, you hung on the extra years so you could go; if the trip’s timing let you go early in your high school career, you bonded so much with your traveling companions – both adults and peers – that you wanted to keep the connection.
Although I understood and liked the idea, I foresaw it as being potentially very contentious and divisive. Accordingly, the three of us sat down with Senior Rabbi Fred Schwartz z”l to map out a strategy to make it happen. What we did was to make everybody a stakeholder, and thus have the proposal examined not just in the Religious School Committee, but also in the Worship Committee (because of its presumed impact on Shavuot services) and in the House Committee (because of its presumed impact on facility utilization) and by the Sisterhood (because of their role in gifting each confirmand). By the time we actually brought the proposal to the Board for action, everyone had been exposed to the issue, had had time to geet used to it, think about it and discuss it, and we believed we had the votes to move forward with it.
We were right. The motion passed almost unanimously, but two members of the Board asked to be recorded as having been in opposition.
I would not have been surprised by opposition from those whose mantra was “this is the way we’ve always done it.” But the two naysayers were both people I considered as Jewish education maximalists, and thus their opposition was a puzzlement. However, after the meeting, each came over to me to explain himself. Ed said originally he had favored the motion, until someone pointed out that the idea of adding two years to the confirmation process had originated with the students. He didn’t want it thought in the community that policy was being made at Temple Sholom by teenagers. Norman’s negativism came from a totally different direction. Confirmation, he said, is a very goyish (gentile) concept, and we shouldn’t be moving it, we should be getting rid of it altogether!
In actuality, Norman’s position came to pass; after a year or so, the term “confirmation” was dropped, along with the Shavuot connection, and the high school graduation ceremony became part of a Shabbat evening service toward the end of May. That’s also the minhag at Beth Emet, my current congregation, where the Friday night ceremony for 12th graders is called Kabbalat Torah (receiving Torah). Being a relative newcomer, however, I don’t know when 12th grade was established as the terminal point, nor when the C word left the congregation’s vocabulary, nor if and when a separation from Shavuot took place. (I know the congregation had confirmation, because class pictures are on display in the religious school corridor.)
The important point, however, as others have said, is that whenever the Jewish coming-of-age ceremony takes place, and whether it is an individual or a group event, our challenge is to make it a beginning and not an end point. I’m proud of having been part of possibly the first congregation to institute 12th grade confirmation, and to have done so by recognizing that retention is relationship-based. We used to call ourselves “the people of the Book.” But at any age, our Jewish connection to the Book is tied to our connection to people; and the way we foster Torah is by fostering community.
Next Wednesday, May 23, will be a big day for our family.
That night, my wife, Dana Gershon, the outgoing president of The Rashi School’s board of trustees, will be honored at the school’s annual dinner. Dana has been president of the board for two years and, with four daughters, all of whom are Rashi students, we spend a lot of time at 8000 Great Meadow Road in Dedham, where we’re all part of the wonderful kehillah that is Rashi. Needless to say, between meetings, classes, sports, parent-teacher conferences, plays, t’filah, and more, it’s very often where our family hangs out.
What a wonderful opportunity that evening will be for me, as a husband and a father, to celebrate the people I love.
What a wonderful opportunity it will be for us as a family to celebrate the school we love.
That celebration, though, will only happen after a day at The Rashi School. Instead of hanging with Dana and the girls as I usually do there, I’ll be spending the day with incoming URJ President Rick Jacobs, NATE President Lisa Barzilai, PARDES Executive Director Jane West Walsh, and other leaders from the Union, the CCAR and HUC-JIR. We’ll be joined by 10 HUC-JIR students, future rabbis, cantors and educators who were selected from a host of applicants to visit Rashi for a week of experiential learning about Reform day school education in the 21st century. They’ll attend classes, participate in t’fillot, and confer with teachers and administrators as part of the Reform Day School Externship, jointly sponsored by Rashi, the URJ, HUC-JIR and PARDES: Day Schools of Reform Judaism.
I’m excited to introduce my colleagues to Rashi and to show them the power and potential of Reform Jewish day schools as we meet with students, parents and administrators, and attend the school’s Memorial Day commemoration. Even more exciting to me, though, is that 10 HUC students—my future colleagues—will, over the course of a full week, see this power and potential firsthand. I am confident that by the time they return home, they’ll have acquired a deep understanding of many facets of Reform Jewish day schools that they’ll share with fellow students now and incorporate into their future work as rabbis, cantors, and educators.
Prior to my appointment as senior vice president of the Union for Reform Judaism, I spent a decade as a community organizer, first at Boston’s Temple Israel and more recently as the founder of the Union’s Just Congregations initiative. One of the central tenets of community organizing is to build capacity for the future. Without a doubt, Rashi’s Reform Day School Externship is capacity-building at its best.
What a wonderful opportunity that day will be for me, as a rabbi and a community organizer, to share and celebrate the work I love.
by Ruby Macsai-Goren
As a typical teenager, I do a lot of extra-curricular and academic activities, attend high school, and spend lots of time with my family and friends.
However, I spend minimal to no time learning about Israel. I know very little about Israel; my knowledge is extended to what I have learned from my years in Hebrew school and what I know from my Middle Eastern History class.
While I have had the limited opportunity to learn about Israeli politics, I have no idea what the culture and land itself is like.
I am incredibly excited to travel with NFTY to Israel to learn all about Israeli culture, people, climate, land, terrain, and many more things that I would never be able to truly understand without visiting Israel. Visiting such a beautiful country is one of the things I am most looking forward to.
Additionally, I am very excited to spend time with other Jewish teens. I don’t belong to a youth group at home, so this trip will be one of the first times I am surrounded by kids my age that all share the same religious background. I am also ecstatic to make new friends, and I know my Israel trip will be a memory I will keep for the rest of my life.
I know my group will be a great team of kids. I’m sure we will have a blast traveling, hiking, camping, shopping, and learning while on this trip. I expect to learn more about Israel as a place and to get to know what life as an Israeli teen would be like. In addition, I can’t wait to find out all about the beautiful land in Israel. All in all, I am incredibly excited and cannot wait for this upcoming summer!
Ruby Macsai-Goren is a 2012 NFTY in Israel Participant from Evanston, IL.
This is the first in a series of profiles of participants who will be joining us this summer in Israel on NFTY in Israel, KESHER Taglit-Birthright Israel, and the NFTY-EIE High School in Israel. We asked people to share what they are expecting, anticipating, and most looking forward to. If you’ll be joining us in Israel this summer and would like to write for this feature on our blog, send us an email at rjisrael@urj.org!
Originally posted at Youth and College Israel Programs: The Blog
by Bobby Harris
Last week I was in Israel attending the Jewish Agency for Israel’s Summer Staff Seminar where, together with many of the URJ Camp Directors, I met with and helped to prepare the Israeli staff who have been hired to come and work at our URJ camps this summer. During the seminar, we provide the Israeli staff the opportunity to participate in a camp like Shabbat service that might take place at one of our camps. I was asked to present a D’var Torah, and I chose to relate the Parsha to everything that we have done at Coleman over the past five years to advocate for the release of Gilad Shalit who was returned to his family last fall after being held for 5 years in captivity by Hamas.
Hanoch Greenberg, Bobby Harris, and Ronen Ganel Visit with Gilad Shalit
Ironically, just three days later, I was surprised and amazed to find myself visiting with Gilad in an apartment in Tel Aviv. Eitan Winerich, a former Coleman Shaliach and Basketball specialist from 1998 and a family friend of the Shalit family, arranged for the meeting to take place. During the meeting, I had the opportunity, along with Ronen Ganel and Hanoch Greenberg (two longtime Coleman staff members from Israel), to speak with Gilad about movies, travel, the NBA, and Camp Coleman.
At the end of last summer, I told the Coleman community that if we keep on working for his release and never forget, that one day, maybe even by next summer, Gilad might be able to celebrate Shabbat with his family or even with us at Coleman – you never know.
D’var Torah- Delivered May 4 at Kibbutz Shefayim to 2012 URJ Israel Delegation
In the Torah portion of this week, Emor, we read “when you reap the harvest of your fields we need to leave the corners of our fields.” In order for us to have bountiful fields and a fruitful harvest , experience has taught us that we need to plant everything in its proper season. We also have learned how to work with various types of soils and what to add to them in order that they may yield a rich harvest.
The story of the Chinese Bamboo Tree told to me by my friend and colleague Rabbi Mark Covitz illustrates the connection between patience and agricultural success. It seems that when the Chinese Bamboo Tree is planted, watered, and nurtured for an entire growing season it doesn’t outwardly grow even an inch. Then, after the second year, a season in which the farmer takes extra care to water, fertilize and care for the bamboo tree, the tree still does not sprout. So it goes as the sun rises and sets for four solid years. The farmer and his wife have nothing tangible to show for all of their labor trying to grow the tree.
Then, along comes year five.
In the fifth year the Chinese Bamboo Tree seed finally sprouts and the bamboo tree grows up to eighty feet in just one growing season!
To enable wonderful things to happen very often requires patience, hard work, and usually struggle. It is in this spirit of recognizing that great things can happen even when we think that they may never happen- even after 5 years, when we are about to give up.
I want to show you a photo that looks like it could have been taken in Israel but was actually taken in Cleveland, GA, a town of 1907 people.
This past summer, our Mishlachat [Israeli staff] at Camp Coleman stepped up and educated a community of 800 children and 200 staff from all over the world about an Israeli prisoner of war that few if any of them had ever heard of.
Outside our Dining Hall at Camp Coleman we set up a tent for Gilad Shalit, modeled after the tent that was created here in Israel, to remind people of Gilad’s captivity and to advocate for his release from the hands of Hamas.
The campers all learned about him, wrote letters of support to his family, petitioned the UN for his release, raised money to support organizations dedicated to educating about his plight, and held a a silent march–which believe me, in the 50 years of camp might be the most silent that camp ever was. This march is what is captured in the photo, and we also videotaped the march. Make no mistake about it, it was the Kavod [respect] that our Kehillah [community] has for the Mislachat that made this silence and this Kavod for Gilad possible. After the march, many of the campers came up to me and many members of the delegation thanking us for teaching them about Gilad…IF the story had only ended there, DAYENU.
But it doesn’t. During the summer our video specialist, David Chernak, accompanied our NFTY teens on their pilgrimage to Israel and showed Gilad’s parents a video clip of the march that we had at camp. He told the parents that all ages of kids learned about Gilad’s situation and showed them a book of letters that the kids wrote to them. Gilad’s father told David to say “Todah Rabah to Camp Coleman” for doing what we did. While David was with Gilad’s parents he taped them watching the march at Coleman (which had occurred just a few days earlier). David emailed the video clip back to us at Coleman, and the Coleman kids and staff actually had a chance to see firsthand that Gilad’s parents genuinely appreciated their concern. But the story does not end there, as you know, because Gilad was released in October, and on October 11, I received the following Facebook message from one of the members of our delegation:
Hi Bobby,
In this special day for the Jewish people around the world i wanted to say a big thank’s to you! When i see the hundreds of coleman members- campers and counselours from all over the world publishing status of happiness and excitement for the returning of the kidnapped soldier Gilad Schalit i have to confess it makes me feel like we did something important. Thank you for the opportunity of bringing this important topic to the Coleman family!! It’s a holiday for the Israeli nation and the jewish people around the world!! And the Coleman family!
Just Thank’s it means a lot!!
Shana Tova
So, in more ways than one, the journey comes full circle – for this Shaliach, for Gilad, and for Israel.
So, even when all hope seems lost, certain truths and certain connections can not be broken or lost. These truths and connections actually define who we are- in this case as North Americans, Israelis, and as Jews.
Across space, across time, if we are patient and work toward it, we can sometimes find the way for wonderful things to happen. As it is written “to save one life it is as if we have saved the entire world.”
Bobby Harris is the Director of Youth and Camping Services for the Southeast Region of the URJ, and a Certified Camp Director from the American Camping Association. Bobby has been the Director of Camp Coleman since 1992 and has directed camps since 1986.
Originally posted at Summer Central: URJ Camp Coleman’s Blog
Once, a man threw a party and invited his friend Kamtza. The messenger made a mistake and delivered the invitation to the man’s enemy Bar-Kamtza. When Bar-Kamtza showed up the host tried to convince him to leave and Bar Kamtza tried to convince the host to let him stay; in the end he was forcibly evicted. He said: “Since the leaders of the community were present and didn’t intervene, I’ll get my revenge on the whole community by inciting the emperor against them.” And so he did; thus was the destruction of the Temple and the loss of our sovereignty the result of gratuitous hatred.
-Babylonian Talmud, Gitin 56a (abridged)
So who could have prevented our destruction? The messenger? The host? Bar Kamtza? The leaders? The emperor? All of the above?
Several years ago an Arab family, the Zabidats, applied for membership in Rakefet, a middle class community of 170 families a few miles from Shorashim. They were rejected and appealed to the Supreme Court, which found in their favor, arguing that if a community does not have a specific and clear religious or ideological character (i.e., Orthodox, or vegetarian, etc.) it may not refuse someone the right to lease state land for a homesite. General Jewishness is not an acceptable criterion for violating the freedom of residence. This outcome left many residents of Rakefet angry, and the story is not over, as the Zabidats are still only in the planning stages for their new home.
On the day before this past Memorial Day (which is the day before Independence Day), the Zabidats, who are both architects, came to make measurements on their lot in Rakefet. They found a large Israeli flag hanging on their next-door neighbor’s fence facing their property. During the weeks before Independence Day, flying the flag is a big part of the national culture – public buildings fly huge ones, many people hang them around their houses, and kids at intersections sell little flags that attach to your car. The Zabidats took it down, folded it neatly, and took it to the Rakefet office, saying that they preferred that people not hang flags on their property without their permission. ”We are good citizens,” they said, “but we are not Zionists, and choose not to fly the flag on Independence Day on our property.”
The response was fast and furious. The residents of Rakefet were quick to point out that this provocative act proves that they were right to try to prevent the family from joining the community. The mayor of Misgav county, which includes Rakefet, issued a statement: “Taking down the flag is an unacceptable act. We can accept no explanation for it. The flag of the state is the flag of all of us. This act constitutes a moral and ethical lapse.” On the other hand, the national newspaper Ha’aretz carried an editorial on the incident, arguing that “Whoever hung that flag in the Zabidats’ yard was guilty of brazen trespassing and of undermining freedom of speech. And the real moral and ethical lapse was forcing a clear symbol of Jewish nationalism on the Zabidats…”
Was the flag hung as a provocation? Was taking it down a provocation? Where is the boundary between moral lapse and political stupidity? Is it not possible to decline to be provoked by provocations? Is anybody around here interested in the common good?
And who will we say could have prevented our destruction – the Zabidats? The Supreme Court? The neighbors? The mayor? The leftist press? Those of us who read the paper and turn the page? All of the above?
Originally published in Ten Minutes of Torah
About 200 Jewish activists, rabbis, and communal leaders gathered in New York City for the Jewish Organizing Institute and Network for Justice’s (JOIN for Justice) recent National Summit. At the summit, JOIN for Justice honored the URJ’s Senior Vice President Rabbi Jonah Pesner with the Tekiah Social Justice Award.
Rabbi Pesner was honored for his work as a pioneer in the field of Jewish organizing and particularly for founding Just Congregations, the URJ’s groundbreaking community organizing effort. During his 20-year career, he has engaged thousands of synagogue congregants to join together in successful campaigns for health care access, affordable housing, public education, gay and lesbian rights, and rights for nursing care workers.
Photo courtesy of JOIN for Justice
Speaking at the ceremony were Rabbi Rick Jacobs, president of the URJ; Rabbi David Saperstein, director of the Religious Action Center; and Rabbi Jennie Rosenn, Program Director, Jewish Life and Values, Nathan Cummings Foundation. Rabbi Rosenn’s remarks follow.
It feels most appropriate to be honoring Jonah in this sanctuary today. In 1996 I joined Jonah’s class for our final year of rabbinical school here at HUC. It just so happens that my most vivid memory of Jonah is of him sitting right there in the first row of that middle section. His hair down to his shoulders, he had a sort of, well, groovy air about him. Jonah had grown up in the bosom of the Reform movement, and was for all intents and purposes the quintessential poster child for the movement.
Though we respected each other from a distance, we really didn’t know each other well. Upon ordination, I went off to be a Hillel Rabbi at Columbia University, and Jonah became an Assistant Rabbi in Westport, Connecticut. And I think it is safe to say, we didn’t expect to see each other again outside of the occasional rabbinic conference.
Fast forward seven years. I had just come to the Nathan Cummings Foundation and as part of developing the field of Jewish social justice, I was thinking about how to grow congregation-based community oOrganizing beyond the handful of synagogues that did organizing back then. Everyone I talked with about it kept telling me about Temple Israel, this synagogue in Boston that really “got” organizing – and no one could tell me about Temple Israel without mentioning in the same breath a remarkable young rabbi named Jonah Pesner.
Around this same time, it became clear to me that the Reform Movement was key to bringing congregation-based community organizing to a larger scale. I began to have conversations with Rabbi Eric Yoffie, the then-president of the Reform Movement, and with Rabbi David Saperstein, Director of the Religious Action Center – conversations about what it would mean to introduce organizing to many more congregations across the country. I would say they were intrigued and skeptical in about equal measure.
It was not until Jonah came into the picture as a trusted Reform rabbi beloved by his community that Eric and David could fully get on board. And quite honestly, it was not until Jonah took a huge leap of faith leaving Temple Israel to start Just Congregations that the Nathan Cummings Foundation could fully get behind it. Over the last decade, first locally and then on the national stage, Jonah has played an absolutely pivotal role in the burgeoning of organizing in the Jewish community.
In a few minutes, David will speak about Jonah’s impact on the Reform Movement’s social justice work. But I just want to preface that by saying that beyond engaging scores of Reform synagogues across the country in organizing through Just Congregation, Jonah has been an inspiring teacher and mentor to seminarians, working with Jeannie Appleman and Meir Leikin, to train several hundred rabbinical students who in turn are engaging their communities in meaningful social change, joining together across lines of religion, race, and class, all while strengthening the fabric of their congregations. Just as Jonah has been central to the seminary training, so too JOIN for Justice has been blessed to have Jonah’s leadership at the helm.
Indeed Jonah’s leadership has been instrumental to making real the vision of a Jewish community that is developing leaders, building power, and bringing our world closer to wholeness. But what is it about Jonah that makes him such an exceptional leader and someone so many of us learn from? Is it his charisma? His passion? His incredible loyalty? Is it Jonah’s impressive ability to access to his inner preacher? Or how deeply he feels things? Is it his ability to be “relational” at a moment’s notice? Or who knows, maybe it’s the frequency with which he is moved to tears?
I am sure none of these things hurt!
But I actually believe that the power of Jonah’s leadership rests in no small part in the way in which his activism and Jewish life are authentically tied up with one another. This week’s Torah portion, Kedoshim, sometimes referred to as the holiness code, is unique in the way in which it indiscriminately mixes ritual mitzvot with social mitzvot.
In the same passage, we are told not to wear clothes made of two kinds of material and that we should leave the fallen fruit of our vineyard for the poor and the stranger. We are told the proper way to offer a sacrifice to God, what today has become prayer. And we are instructed that the wages of a laborer should not be held until the next morning.
Implicit in this quick succession of laws is the assertion that religious life and work of social justice are most powerful when woven together.
We are cautioned in this week’s parsha not to let organizing become a religion or let ritual distract us from acting justly.
And indeed Jonah’s life is a profound embodiment of the intertwining of the two. Every organizer’s fundamental tools are themselves and their stories. What is most powerful about Jonah’s stories are the way in which his commitment grows from a deep combination of the ethical and the religious. His is an activism growing out of faith and a faith that points towards action in the world.
To know Jonah is to know what it means to lead from a place of deep power that emerges from this union. It is why we honor Jonah this afternoon for his tremendous leadership and it is why we are inspired by him to look inside ourselves to find that place of meeting – that place where our spiritual lives meet our lives as activists. For it is in this place that transformation of ourselves, our communities, and our world is truly possible.
Thank you Jonah for giving us this opportunity to celebrate and honor you, our colleague, our teacher, and my friend.
I was blessed to have had the opportunity to become a rabbi and serve the Jewish community in a time when the doors to the rabbinate were open to women. As we celebration the 40th anniversary of Sally Priesand’s ordination, I am acutely aware that this was not always the case. Rabbi Priesand and the generation of pioneering women who came before me pushed through closed doors and laid out a welcome mat for women like me. We owe them a debt of gratitude for their perseverance.
I am also reminded of the generations of women who came before them – women to banged on the doors, nudged them ever so slightly, and loosened the hinges of those closed doors. They may never be feted the way we mark the milestones of Rabbi Priesand’s ordination, but surely they deserve a nod from us at moments like this.
As early as 1875 there were women studying at HUC, though the question of ordination did not arise for several decades. Nonetheless, one woman of the era was renowned as a spiritual leader and preacher: Ray Frank (1861-1948). A journalist from Oakland, California, she found herself in Spokane, Washington during the High Holy Days in 1890 and discovered that there was no synagogue. She took it upon herself to preach on Yom Kippur and galvanized the community members to organize a congregation. She continued to preach in communities along the West Coast of the U.S. and Canada for the next ten years. Frank briefly enrolled at HUC in 1893, through without the intent of seeking ordination. At the time, Isaac Mayer Wise wrote in the American Israelite: “we glory in her zeal and moral courage to break down the last remains of the barriers erected in the synagogue against women and wish her the best of success.”
It was some thirty years later that the question of women’s ordination arose. In 1921, HUC student Martha Neumark sought a pulpit placement during the High Holidays, sparking the debate about ordination of women. Eventually, both the Central Conference of American Rabbis and the HUC faculty affirmed, in theory, the idea of women’s ordination. Unfortunately, the HUC Board of Governors voted to prohibit the ordination of women and Neumark left the College before completing her studies after eight years.
The first woman privately ordained was Regina Jonas (1902-1944) of Berlin. She felt her calling at an early age and pursued rabbinical studies, though initially she only received a teaching degree. In her thesis on the topic of women’s ordination she began, “I personally love this profession and, if ever possible, I also want to practice it,” and she concluded, “Almost nothing halakhically but prejudice and lack of familiarity stand against women holding rabbinic office.”
In 1935, Jonas was privately ordained and for several years she was employed by Berlin’s Jewish community, visiting hospitals, preaching at liberal synagogues and offering lectures, often filling in for rabbis who had been imprisoned or emigrated as the Nazi threat grew stronger. Jonas continued to serve the community even after she was conscripted into forced labor in 1941 and deported to Theresienstadt in 1942. Like so many others, her story ends in Auschwitz.
With a shortage of rabbis during World War II, women took on greater roles in congregational life, including leading worship and preaching. Paula Ackerman (1893 – 1989), rebbitzin of Temple Beth Israel in Meridian, Mississippi, was among these women, often filling in for her husband. When her husband died in 1950, she was invited by the congregation to take over as the spiritual leader of the congregation, and did so for the next three years. Agreeing to take the position, Ackerman wrote, “If I can just plant a seed for the Jewish woman’s larger participation – if perhaps it will open a way for women students to train for congregational leadership – then my life would have some meaning.”
And then there was Sally…
My grandfather raised three independent daughters. Long before many women worked outside the home, my mother and her sisters had careers. Until each married, they worked in the family business. One aunt went on to have her own business, another worked for aerospace division of McDonnell Douglas, and my mother spent most of her career working in the apparel industry. All were strong women who balanced family, career, and community responsibilities.
My grandfather also wanted his daughters to have access to Jewish education and to be able to participate fully in Jewish life. So, back in the 1920s, though raised in an Orthodox home, he and my grandmother joined a Reform congregation, Temple Ahavath Sholom in Brooklyn. They were active members, and my mother often spoke of her connection the temple. During their lifetimes, my mother and my two aunts were all active in their Jewish communities. They joined and supported synagogues and communal organizations.
While my mother was a member of our temple’s Sisterhood, she was not a particularly active member, nor a regular attendee of Shabbat services. Worship had not moved her, and for a number of years she even felt estranged from Judaism. That changed when our temple engaged a woman rabbi. Shortly after ordination, Rabbi Joan Friedman took the pulpit of Temple Judea in the Bronx and became my mother’s rabbi. For my mother, having a woman on the bimah was transformative. For the first time in her life, it seemed that worship became important to my mother, and she enjoyed going to services. Week after week, my mother would call me and tell me about Rabbi Friedman’s sermons. Even though my mother complained about its weight, when Rabbi Friedman introduced Gates of Prayer, my mother loved the new prayer book and bought her own copy to keep at home. When Rabbi Friedman moved to another pulpit, my mother was very sorry to see her leave.
A few years later, I would join a synagogue led by a woman rabbi, Margaret Moers Wenig. My mother became very fond of Rabbi Wenig and she would attend services with me whenever possible. On the High Holy Days, she would divide her time between Temple Judea, and Rabbi Wenig’s temple, Beth Am. My mother especially loved Rabbi Wenig’s sermons.
I am not sure if it was because my mother was a feminist, or if it was because Rabbi Friedman and Rabbi Wenig were able to make Judaism meaningful and relevant to my mother, but synagogue, and especially worship, became much more important to her. It was probably some combination of both. I am sure that my mother loved seeing a woman on the bimah, leading worship. And I do know that their sermons engaged and challenged her.
This was the Judaism my mother had been waiting for.
By Rabbi Marc Katz
The history and theology behind our Jewish holidays can be found most clearly in the panoply of names that the Jewish tradition has used to identify them. The upcoming holiday of Shavuot is no different. From its agricultural roots during Biblical times to modernity, its many names tell a story and teach us how we should feel, act, and connect to God during the festival.
Shavuot gets it most recognizable name from a few mentions in the Bible, most notably Exodus 34:22-23. Appearing in a list of important ritual laws dictated during the giving of the second set of tablets, Shavuot stands as one of three important festivals. God tells Moses, “You shall observe the Festival of Weeks, of the first fruits of the wheat harvest; and the Festival of Ingathering at the turn of the year. Three times a year all your males shall appear before the Sovereign, the God of Israel.”
Traditionally, Passover, Sukkot, and Shavuot were festivals during which pilgrims traveled to Jerusalem to perform specific sacrifices to God. These sacrifices were unlike others during the year primarily because of the joy one was commanded to bring when performing them. We read in the book of Deuteronomy, “You shall rejoice before Adonai your God with your son and daughter, your male and female slave, the Levite in your communities, and the stranger, the fatherless, and the widow in your midst,” (Dt. 16:11). As the text states, the whole community was tied to this ritual. It was a place to see and be seen by others. [Ironically, this is why traditionally those who were blind were exempt from bringing sacrifices (M. Chagigah 2a)]. The beauty of the community coming together around these sacrifices may be one reason the rabbis referred to the holiday primarily and simply as Atzeret, the gathering.
Additionally, the Exodus text points to an important feature of the holiday; Shavuot traditionally was an agrarian holiday that marked the first wheat harvest. These agricultural ties may also be one important reason we read the Book of Ruth during this holiday. There, Ruth and Naomi arrive in Bethlehem during the beginning of the barley harvest, and the agricultural backdrop becomes a central motif of the story. Ruth and her future husband Boaz meet in the field and, according to some interpretations she seduces him on the threshing floor. Although the agricultural background of the holiday lends itself to the names Chag HaKatzir, (Exodus 23:16), the Harvest Festival, and Yom Habikkurim (Num 28:26), the Festival of First Fruits, it doesn’t explain adequately how we ended up with a spring holiday called Chag HaShavuot, the Festival of Weeks.
To understand this particular name, we need to look back to the Book of Deuteronomy (16:9-10). There we read, “You shall count off seven weeks; start to count the seven weeks when the sickle is first put to the standing grain. Then you shall observe the Festival of Weeks (Chag HaShavuot).” The holiday of Shavuot is so named—less for what it symbolizes than to mark the culmination of a seven-week period beginning when the barley grain reaches maturity and ending at the wheat harvest. For our ancient ancestors, this 49-day period was precarious; as the wheat crop began to mature, no one knew whether drought or blight might destroy it. One explanation for the emphasis on the counting of weeks might be the joy of our ancestors when, at the conclusion of the counting, they found that their crops had not failed.
During the rabbinic period, an additional meaning (and name) found its way into the story of Shavuot. Our siddur refers to the holiday as Z’man Matan Torah, the time of the giving of the Torah. The rabbis came to this conclusion about the timing of Shavuot by reading the account of the giving of the Torah in the book of Exodus, “On the third new moon after the Israelites had gone forth from the land of Egypt, on that very day, they entered the wilderness of Sinai” (19:1). Since the rabbis knew that the Passover marking the Exodus from Egypt happened in the middle of the month of Nissan, they were able to count approximately a month and a half (or three moons) between the Exodus and the Jews entering Sinai. Then, adding a few days of preparation before the giving of the Torah, chronicled later in Chapter 19, it was natural to presume that the Torah was given on Shavuot itself, which occurs on the 6th day of the month of Sivan.
To mark this facet of the holiday, we read the account of the giving of the Torah each Shavuot evening. Additionally, we study—many of us all night—as a way to place Torah at the center of the holiday. We call these all-night study sessions Tikkun Leil Shavuot. Another explanation for these all-night study sessions lends a bit a humor to the practice. When Israel was to receive the Torah, they overslept. We read in Shir HaShirim Rabbah, “Israel slept all that night, because the sleep of Shavuot is pleasant and the night is short” (1:57). Noticing that the Israelites were not present, God and Moses began to rouse them. According to this midrash, the thunder and trumpets we find chronicled in Exodus 19, actually were cosmic alarm clocks. Today, to avoid falling asleep on the day that marks the receiving of the Torah, we stay up all night studying.
Whether we call the 6th of Sivan Chag HaShavot, Atzeret, Chag HaBikkurim, Chag HaKatzir, or Z’man Matan Torah, its name is less important than acknowledging that the holiday has a rich and storied history. Each name describes just one aspect of the festival. Today, the holiday’s various components and their associated names come together into one whole to color this ancient festival and give us many entry points to connect to it.
Rabbi Marc Katz is newly ordained by the Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion. He will begin as the assistant rabbi at Congregation Beth Elohim in Brooklyn, NY on July 1st.
Originally published in Ten Minutes of Torah
