Rabbi means teacher. Anyone who teaches is always learning.
Adding Sigd to the Jewish Holiday calendar is a way to celebrate where we find ourselves. Now, we can open our minds to the thought that Judaism has evolved differently in different places. Now, we can open our hearts to those Jews whose approach to spirituality is different. Now, we can open our doors wider to interfaith, secular, humanist, and other “types” of Jews.
Originally Published July 2020 on IFFP.net:
July 22nd is the start of the Hebrew month of Av. This month includes one of the lowest points of the Jewish calendar year and one of the highest. Describing it as a rollercoaster seems more apt this year than most.
Did you know that some of the best stories in the Torah, are actually not in the Torah?
I recently returned from a visit to Israel, one that included a visit to Yad Vashem, Israel’s Holocaust Memorial Museum. This was hardly my first opportunity for studying the Holocaust, nor my first visit there. Yet, I came away with something new to me.
One of the first things Hitler did upon coming to power in 1933 was order a one day economic boycott of Jewish businesses. It basically didn’t work. People continued to shop where they were used to, they saw no reason not to, and the impact was minimal. It was after this that the Third Reich began an intensive propaganda campaign to instill anti-semitic feelings in the German people, to teach them to fear and hate the Jews among them that they once liked and appreciated.
It is human nature to classify people into us and other. That is probably a protective instinct. But, it is not necessarily human nature to hate the other. That hate has to be learned. It has to be fostered and fueled.
What can be learned can be unlearned. And each of us can be the teachers. We can teach by example. We can teach appreciation and celebration of our differences at work, at school, and at play. We can recognize the other, we can show our respect for the other and we can embrace those differences. When we teach we also get to learn. We learn about the strength and beauty that differences have and we learn that in finding and treasuring these differences we find unity and purpose.
Every year at our Passover seders we say: Tze Ulmad (Go out and learn)
I say
Go out and teach.
Go out and learn.
today I don’t want it to be that easy. Nothing is easy today. I’ve denied myself physical luxuries, and now I’m denying myself the luxury of a relatively easy explanation.
Common etiquette says that discussing religion or politics in polite conversation is taboo. Along the same lines, the traditional safe topic is the weather.
Not anymore.
While in any rational world the slippery slope does NOT make for a good policy argument, it is however, a good emotional argument. That is really too bad. It is an argument that is based on fear (What if this happens, and that leads to the other, and then more? It will be AWFUL.) Well, sure, if you focus on the irrational end point, who wouldn’t be scared, but the argument is flawed. It is based on little or no evidence, and a reliance that events will occur based on this lack of evidence.
I wouldn’t recognize a measure of barley if you dumped it on my lap. (For all I know you could have given me wheat, or oats, or spelt--whatever that is).
Transforming the synagogue: Video— Finding Faith Online
If Tazria teaches us anything, it’s that ensuring that we demonstrate care and support for those around us is imperative to creating a strong community.
School mandated volunteerism has a place in the education of our kids. Like most things, though, it can become so much more with a little bit of teaching and a little bit of introspection.
Thoughts and prayers has become at best a meaningless shell, and at worst, a snide joke. What if, though, those who said it undertook the true meaning of their words?
