This past week’s Parsha opens as follows (Bereshit 28:10):
וַיֵּצֵ֥א יַֽעֲקֹ֖ב מִבְּאֵ֣ר שָׁ֑בַע וַיֵּ֖לֶךְ חָרָֽנָה:
So, we begin with the words “And Yaakov went out from Be’er Sheva and went/came to Charan.” Rashi and others pose the question of why the first four words are needed. Why, that is, do we have to worry about where Yaakov came from at this point, as if we have been paying attention we know his location from the previous text? The only real information we really need is his next location, right? What is the significance of these words as we know that they cannot be extraneous, not according to the good teachings and voices of our classical commentaries?
So, we look at this as we consider Yaakov as a person. We are taught that Be’er Sheva was the place and history and heritage of Yaakov and that it will be in Charan and the environs where Yaakov will move on and become Yisrael, claiming a new and distinct destiny as the father of a nation, of which we are a part. We all understand this in terms of our own lives which are increasingly mobile and filled with so many chapters of different professional activities, relationships, locales of where we live and so on.
I often repeat the saying attributed to Madame Chiang Kei Sheik, who said something to the effect of the following: We are all the sum total of everywhere we have been, everyone we have known and everything we have done. I think that this lesson can be found in the inclusion of these four little words at the beginning of this particular Parsha.
We all have many chapters of our lives that go with us wherever we go as part of our baggage – the real baggage, not the clothes we wear, but the experiences and challenges that form our personality in the most fundamental way. While some of those experiences may indeed be painful, they are part of the reason we become who we become. To be sure, in the earlier chapters of Yaakov’s life there are some actions that could be seen as questionable at best and deplorable at worst. Yes, we know that G-d conveyed the relationship between her two sons to Rivkah and that destiny’s purpose was to be served as envisioned as G-d, but we learn, as Pirke Avot teaches, G-d knows all and the human being chooses. That is to say, that we believe in the gift from G-d to the human being of free choice and our ability to choose is in no way limited or mitigated by the notion that all is revealed and known to G-d. These two elements of our reality are simultaneously operative and not causative. Looking at some of these choices in Yaakov’s life and his later position of being the father of our people and named Israel as such, there are clearly incidents that reflect prices to be paid for misdeeds in his life. Some commentators and many people who learn the text of these stories cite that, for example, maybe Laban switching Rachel and Leah was deserved (payback?) for Yaakov “switching” who he was and taking advantage of Yitzchak’s impairment to procure the birthright.
We often ask the question, but wait, if G-d intended such and such to be so, and if one acts in a less than honorable way and G-d’s plan is realized, doesn’t this justify all actions? You know, this is “the end justifies the means argument” with which we are all so familiar. This, to be sure, is a difficult and complicated question – trust me, I spend hours, days, weeks, and months mulling this over with my high school students on a regular basis as well as in my own head.
That being said, maybe we do need to look at our motivations for doing what we do. What if we KNOW we are fulfilling some greater good yet forgiving ourselves simultaneously for the less-than-honorable means we use to do so? As we learn, G-d does know all, the omniscient being that G-d is. Further, maybe our wrong intentions come from some type of lack of maturity, thinking about our contemporary society and all the buzz about how the brain development in young adults is not complete until their mid twenties (and many question that) and yet decisions that are life changing and formative are made before this point.
So, Yaakov, foolish, flawed Yaakov came from Be’er Sheva to become the much more mature and respected Yisrael of Charan and later of an entire people and region. Yet, those experiences from his younger and formative years helped to make him such. May our experiences from our past, wherever we came from and whatever we did, do the same for us and may we remember the important lessons they bring us!
Tuesday, December 6, 2011
Monday, November 7, 2011
Advice from the Avraham Stories on Parenting
We have just read Parshat Lech Lecha and now are in the week of Parshat VaYera. During these Parshiot, we see Avraham making difficult decisions, taking important initiatives in interacting with others and determining that he wanted a completely different life for himself, his household and his children. He wants to set a new tone for living and does so intentionally and carefully, with the guidance and under the instruction of G-d. His household has to know about these things – his faith in G-d, his taking of initiatives, his gracious hospitality, his desire to fight the causes of those who cannot fight their own in the case of Sodom and Gemorah and so much else. According to more than a few of our classical commentaries it is this very taking of initiative that sets Avram (later to be called Avraham) apart from the generations that preceded him. While Noach, whom we are told is a righteous person in his generation, is told by G-d that all people will be destroyed due to their corrupt nature and that he should go build an ark and save himself, his family, and specified animals, he does exactly what he is told – no less but no more either. Avram, on the other hand, challenges and bargains with G-d for the possible souls of Sodom and Gemarah that are not tainted, and begins the well known passage of “Will you save 50 souls? 45 souls? 40 souls? 30 souls? And so on until it is clear that there are not even 10 worthy souls to save in these misguided communities.
The very wording of “Lech Lecha,” meaning “go for your own sake, for your own benefit” is telling (and this same formation will be used this coming week in the narrative of the Akeida). G-d WANTS Avraham, it might seem, to take this initiative and try to build a better world as a result of his novel attempts to change and see things differently. To be sure, this must have had a most profound effect on his household – on his children and the future generations that would come from him. After all, we still use these stories to teach many important lessons about how we should live.
Additionally, we have to acknowledge that even Rashi reluctantly relents that Yishmael is ultimately blessed in his life and with an inheritance due to the fact that he lived in Avraham’s household and must have learned something from the positive behaviors and values that identified this family. Rashi acknowledges the value of this parenting, even within his clear dislike for Yishmael.
One of my favorite books is “The Sibling Society” by Robert Bly, who speaks about the trend in American culture and society to abdicate responsible parenting by not working to set examples nor acting in a way that will set a constructive tone for how our children will act in the future. Bly suggests that we all relate to each other as “siblings” and not as “parents who teach by example and children who learn by watching and engaging.” Our children often agree that this is the case, indicating that “respect and awe” for parents, teachers, and authority are no longer really treasured or practiced values in our lives today, in too many cases. How are our future generations supposed to learn how to be responsible and take appropriate initiatives if they are not part of households in which this is intentionally and specifically modeled and taught?
This, I think, is a most important lesson of Avraham Aveinu, translated as Abraham our Father. Abraham takes these chances in his life to do better and to want better – for himself, his household and his children. We should use the lessons of Avraham’s life lived, our Father, to rethink how we take initiatives to parent and prepare our children for the life they will live. We should remember this as a most important aspect of our Jewish teachings and heritage and consider the ramifications for ourselves and the children we are in the process of teaching and educating.
The very wording of “Lech Lecha,” meaning “go for your own sake, for your own benefit” is telling (and this same formation will be used this coming week in the narrative of the Akeida). G-d WANTS Avraham, it might seem, to take this initiative and try to build a better world as a result of his novel attempts to change and see things differently. To be sure, this must have had a most profound effect on his household – on his children and the future generations that would come from him. After all, we still use these stories to teach many important lessons about how we should live.
Additionally, we have to acknowledge that even Rashi reluctantly relents that Yishmael is ultimately blessed in his life and with an inheritance due to the fact that he lived in Avraham’s household and must have learned something from the positive behaviors and values that identified this family. Rashi acknowledges the value of this parenting, even within his clear dislike for Yishmael.
One of my favorite books is “The Sibling Society” by Robert Bly, who speaks about the trend in American culture and society to abdicate responsible parenting by not working to set examples nor acting in a way that will set a constructive tone for how our children will act in the future. Bly suggests that we all relate to each other as “siblings” and not as “parents who teach by example and children who learn by watching and engaging.” Our children often agree that this is the case, indicating that “respect and awe” for parents, teachers, and authority are no longer really treasured or practiced values in our lives today, in too many cases. How are our future generations supposed to learn how to be responsible and take appropriate initiatives if they are not part of households in which this is intentionally and specifically modeled and taught?
This, I think, is a most important lesson of Avraham Aveinu, translated as Abraham our Father. Abraham takes these chances in his life to do better and to want better – for himself, his household and his children. We should use the lessons of Avraham’s life lived, our Father, to rethink how we take initiatives to parent and prepare our children for the life they will live. We should remember this as a most important aspect of our Jewish teachings and heritage and consider the ramifications for ourselves and the children we are in the process of teaching and educating.
Tuesday, October 18, 2011
What do Bergholz, Ohio, Ramat Beit Shemesh, Israel, and Anderson Cooper have in common?
So, on Sunday morning after Yom Kippur (which I really do hope was meaningful for everyone), I sat with my coffee and caught up with the news. First I looked at my new issue of Jerusalem Report (still my favorite magazine of all!) and read about what is going on in Ramat Beit Shemesh, specifically with the new Orthodox girls school that is located in proximity to a group of self identified ultra-Orthodox Jews who also have taken it upon themselves as self identified judges to watch and guard the level of religious observance and specifically modesty of all that walk within their view. There are wars going on in this community and this has been going on for some time with the “Burka ladies” who have decided to don this Moslem-identified garb claiming that no one is dressing modestly enough, even in the Orthodox circles. Now, parents are worried about the safety of their children and there has to be ongoing guards around and in proximity to the school property to protect the children and their families from potential abuse and harm. These parents are members of families that lived in the larger Beit Shemesh neighborhoods long before the influx of the new self identified ultra-religious element began to appear here. Now, these initial residents of Beit Shemesh are feeling that they cannot live the life they came to live in this wonderful community they helped to build up. This is Orthodox Jews against Orthodox Jews. Let us all sit for a moment, breathe, and digest the enormity of the problem here.
I have written often about the ongoing “gallop to the right” and the increasing extremism and radicalization of all of our religious and observing communities. We see it in the Moslem world; we see it in the Christian world; and from where I sit, live and pray, I see it most in the Jewish world. How sad! Didn’t we all just spend 25 hours admitting our flaws to G-d, undressing our souls and crying out for forgiveness….. for, among other misdeeds and wrongdoing, for embarrassing others, for haughtiness, for not seeing the pain of others, etc.? Did this mean nothing?
So, shaking my head and crying inside, I opened the Sunday newspaper, only to be confronted by a headline from Eastern Ohio concerning a conclave of 18 families who left the Amish fold within the general community and moved to Bergholz, a neighborhood in Jefferson County, Ohio. Members of this conclave have been breaking into Amish homes in the larger Amish community of which they were once part, and vandalizing. The worst of what they are doing is the extremely shameful act of cutting men’s’ beards and cutting the hair of their wives. The growing beard and hair of the woman do not get cut in the Amish world once people are married. One man stated that he was so ashamed of this act of violence against him that he wished his attacker had killed him. The community is reluctant to press charges against their attackers as it goes against the grain of their beliefs. They are now living in fear and feel that their daily rhythm of life has been harmed significantly. This too is within the Amish world, though in this case, the perpetrators no longer see themselves as part of the sect.
Then to top off my day, I watched an Anderson Cooper special on Bullying at night. This was about children who are afraid to go to school, who are damaged for life and how the school systems and the professionals who are supposed to keep the children entrusted to their care safe and out of harm’s way are at a loss. Towards the end of the hour, it was agreed by all members of the panel that Cooper had assembled that parents need to parent, and cannot NOT look at what their children are doing in bullying other children. The Columbine incident was evoked with the question, how can a teenager have an arsenal of weaponry under their bed or in a garage in the home IN WHICH THEIR PARENTS LIVE and the parents do not know? As a parent, I myself have no idea about this and remember reacting exactly in this way when it happened.
Of course, when the parents are the ones terrorizing other members of your Orthodox community and girls cannot attend their schools without fear of being attacked; and when parents are the ones who break into homes and embarrass and humiliate members of their own community as is happening in Easter Ohio, we begin to understand that parents of those that bully may be passing on the tradition of exactly the behaviors that their children exhibit.
What a sad statement for our society. Of course, it is not so rampant that this is in front of all of us, but if we believe in our connection to all Jews and to all human beings, then we MUST be concerned and not keep our eyes closed to such actions.
I have written often about the ongoing “gallop to the right” and the increasing extremism and radicalization of all of our religious and observing communities. We see it in the Moslem world; we see it in the Christian world; and from where I sit, live and pray, I see it most in the Jewish world. How sad! Didn’t we all just spend 25 hours admitting our flaws to G-d, undressing our souls and crying out for forgiveness….. for, among other misdeeds and wrongdoing, for embarrassing others, for haughtiness, for not seeing the pain of others, etc.? Did this mean nothing?
So, shaking my head and crying inside, I opened the Sunday newspaper, only to be confronted by a headline from Eastern Ohio concerning a conclave of 18 families who left the Amish fold within the general community and moved to Bergholz, a neighborhood in Jefferson County, Ohio. Members of this conclave have been breaking into Amish homes in the larger Amish community of which they were once part, and vandalizing. The worst of what they are doing is the extremely shameful act of cutting men’s’ beards and cutting the hair of their wives. The growing beard and hair of the woman do not get cut in the Amish world once people are married. One man stated that he was so ashamed of this act of violence against him that he wished his attacker had killed him. The community is reluctant to press charges against their attackers as it goes against the grain of their beliefs. They are now living in fear and feel that their daily rhythm of life has been harmed significantly. This too is within the Amish world, though in this case, the perpetrators no longer see themselves as part of the sect.
Then to top off my day, I watched an Anderson Cooper special on Bullying at night. This was about children who are afraid to go to school, who are damaged for life and how the school systems and the professionals who are supposed to keep the children entrusted to their care safe and out of harm’s way are at a loss. Towards the end of the hour, it was agreed by all members of the panel that Cooper had assembled that parents need to parent, and cannot NOT look at what their children are doing in bullying other children. The Columbine incident was evoked with the question, how can a teenager have an arsenal of weaponry under their bed or in a garage in the home IN WHICH THEIR PARENTS LIVE and the parents do not know? As a parent, I myself have no idea about this and remember reacting exactly in this way when it happened.
Of course, when the parents are the ones terrorizing other members of your Orthodox community and girls cannot attend their schools without fear of being attacked; and when parents are the ones who break into homes and embarrass and humiliate members of their own community as is happening in Easter Ohio, we begin to understand that parents of those that bully may be passing on the tradition of exactly the behaviors that their children exhibit.
What a sad statement for our society. Of course, it is not so rampant that this is in front of all of us, but if we believe in our connection to all Jews and to all human beings, then we MUST be concerned and not keep our eyes closed to such actions.
Monday, October 10, 2011
HaPoresh Sukkat Shelomecha -- Spreading the Tent/Sukkah of Peace
Sukkot is approaching! I love Sukkot, I mean really LOVE SUKKOT, in the same way that I absolutely LOVE PESAH! You could say I am a Yom Tov junkie, and I am particularly enamored with the calendar when it gives us three days of Yom Tov and Shabbat tied together. Good bye world, I say, for the next 72 hours! Wow, who gets to do that in this day and age?! While my friends are often ready to throw things at me and wish some sort of (not too serious) bodily harm because I am all smiles when they are often at the eye rolling stage, I just cannot think of any reason to not be so in love with extra time with my family, hanging out with friends, preparing and eating great food, and so forth. My greatest challenge during this time is to not put on weight – not such a bad life, really!
So, we build and eat in (and some of us, literally reside in to the best of our ability) these temporary huts, which are to remind us simultaneously of G-d’s protection of us and our fragility as human beings who create and build things that are themselves fragile, as any one of us who have had our Sukkah fly down the street know all too well!
We are taught that the SCHACH, the roof of the Sukkah should be sturdy and thick enough to “protect” us but at the same time allow us to see the stars in the sky. What a beautiful way to think about who and what we are as human beings and remember that
G-d and all that G-d created are part of our lives and so much bigger than we with our human limitations are. Looking at the stars during our shared and festive dining experiences really communicates that to me.
I also think about how peaceful the stars look, notwithstanding the times we race through Kiddush and Motzei and then retreat to our beautiful dining rooms inside our comfy houses because rain, thunder and other natural elements – also much bigger than we are – make it so that our starlit dinner will not happen! We are taught that when G-d promised Avram (later to be renamed Abraham) that his children and generations that will come from him will be as multitudinous as the sands of the shore and as glorious and numerous as the stars in the sky, the sands speak to who we are as a community and collective while the stars are meant to gaze at and consider ourselves as individuals and the sparkle that each of us individually can bring into the world.
We say the phrase used in the title of this post as part of a Bracha in our ongoing dovenning (prayers): Blessed be G-d, Lord of the Universe who spreads the tent of peace over us. Notice that the same word SUKKAH is used here. Our huts and coverings, our SUKKOT, that we use and in which we dwell for the duration of this glorious holiday is to allow us to gaze upon the stars, not the sands. We look into the beautiful sky to see peaceful and lovely twinkling. May all of the SUKKOT we build this holiday be filled with this sense of peace and well being AND may we all remember the blessings of our “tents of peace” as we exit from this series of celebrations in the Jewish calendar and enter the rest of the year, beginning with Mar Cheshvan (called bitter Cheshvan because of no specific or special celebrations except for Rosh Hodesh and Shabbat), bringing and spreading the tent of peace in our own way, through caring and bringing peace in every way we can into the world (that really big tent) that G-d created for our benefit.
Chag Sameach to all!
So, we build and eat in (and some of us, literally reside in to the best of our ability) these temporary huts, which are to remind us simultaneously of G-d’s protection of us and our fragility as human beings who create and build things that are themselves fragile, as any one of us who have had our Sukkah fly down the street know all too well!
We are taught that the SCHACH, the roof of the Sukkah should be sturdy and thick enough to “protect” us but at the same time allow us to see the stars in the sky. What a beautiful way to think about who and what we are as human beings and remember that
G-d and all that G-d created are part of our lives and so much bigger than we with our human limitations are. Looking at the stars during our shared and festive dining experiences really communicates that to me.
I also think about how peaceful the stars look, notwithstanding the times we race through Kiddush and Motzei and then retreat to our beautiful dining rooms inside our comfy houses because rain, thunder and other natural elements – also much bigger than we are – make it so that our starlit dinner will not happen! We are taught that when G-d promised Avram (later to be renamed Abraham) that his children and generations that will come from him will be as multitudinous as the sands of the shore and as glorious and numerous as the stars in the sky, the sands speak to who we are as a community and collective while the stars are meant to gaze at and consider ourselves as individuals and the sparkle that each of us individually can bring into the world.
We say the phrase used in the title of this post as part of a Bracha in our ongoing dovenning (prayers): Blessed be G-d, Lord of the Universe who spreads the tent of peace over us. Notice that the same word SUKKAH is used here. Our huts and coverings, our SUKKOT, that we use and in which we dwell for the duration of this glorious holiday is to allow us to gaze upon the stars, not the sands. We look into the beautiful sky to see peaceful and lovely twinkling. May all of the SUKKOT we build this holiday be filled with this sense of peace and well being AND may we all remember the blessings of our “tents of peace” as we exit from this series of celebrations in the Jewish calendar and enter the rest of the year, beginning with Mar Cheshvan (called bitter Cheshvan because of no specific or special celebrations except for Rosh Hodesh and Shabbat), bringing and spreading the tent of peace in our own way, through caring and bringing peace in every way we can into the world (that really big tent) that G-d created for our benefit.
Chag Sameach to all!
Tuesday, October 4, 2011
Between Tisha B’Av, Elul and Rosh HaShanah ... and Yom Kippur
By the time I write these words and you read this small piece, we are all preparing for Rosh HaShanah and the onslaught of fall Hagim. Now how exactly did this happen? And keep in mind that this year the holidays are coming “late” though, of course they are always right on time!
Nonetheless, last year at this time we were already in the middle of the very season that will begin in yet another week and a half. Along with this extremely pensive time in the Jewish calendar, we also begin many new undertakings – new school years, new academic goals, new rhythms of life while we leave the more relaxed pace of the summer behind and so on. It seems so fitting that this should be the time of self examination and taking accounting of what we want from life and what life wants from us.
As we proceed through Elul and listen to the call of the Shofar each morning, we are reminded of our own need for the preparations necessary to approach the about-to-come awe inspiring days. We have moved from mourning over the community calamities associated with Tisha B’Av and are now concerned about our own lives and our personal goals and hopes for growth and improvement.
Judaism clearly teaches that these are not antithetical to each other nor are they mutually exclusive of each other; rather, how we function as a community and how we live as individuals are inextricably tied together. For, we as individuals join together to make a community! Even in the ongoing language of the Torah and Prophets, we see this as there is a continual dynamic between the use of the plural as well as the singular to refer to ALL of Israel – we are simultaneously a collection of individual and distinct parts while simultaneously all joining to form a larger and more effective single entity.
I am always aware that on Yom Kippur I retreat into a bubble, while the community and those around me move further away and I turn totally introspective. Nonetheless, as I do this, so much of the focus of all of the prayers and readings in which I am totally immersed is about community. The reading of Jonah during the afternoon of Yom Kippur when we are totally depleted and empty in so many ways, reminds us that we CANNOT escape the group and our responsibility to it. I think that this is one of the most powerful reasons that we remain to make a minyan for Maariv and run to begin building our Sukkah right after we finish the serious and lengthy experience of self evaluation that Yom Kippur brings. We begin our new individual year by being an active and contributing member of our community.
Community building and cooperative ventures are the end goal for the Three Weeks that culminate in Tisha B’Av during the heat of the summer when we commemorate the destruction of our Second Temple because of the lack of such. Similarly, that last Shofar blast at the end of Yom Kippur brings us out of our individual pensive cocoons and reminds us that as individuals we will only be truly strengthened and effective as members of the collective – the community.
May G-d, The Creator of All, strengthen and bless us all in the coming year, both as individuals and as members of the wonderful collective that binds our destinies as one. Shanah Tovah U’Metukah.... and by now, I should say Gimar Hatimah Tovah to all.
Nonetheless, last year at this time we were already in the middle of the very season that will begin in yet another week and a half. Along with this extremely pensive time in the Jewish calendar, we also begin many new undertakings – new school years, new academic goals, new rhythms of life while we leave the more relaxed pace of the summer behind and so on. It seems so fitting that this should be the time of self examination and taking accounting of what we want from life and what life wants from us.
As we proceed through Elul and listen to the call of the Shofar each morning, we are reminded of our own need for the preparations necessary to approach the about-to-come awe inspiring days. We have moved from mourning over the community calamities associated with Tisha B’Av and are now concerned about our own lives and our personal goals and hopes for growth and improvement.
Judaism clearly teaches that these are not antithetical to each other nor are they mutually exclusive of each other; rather, how we function as a community and how we live as individuals are inextricably tied together. For, we as individuals join together to make a community! Even in the ongoing language of the Torah and Prophets, we see this as there is a continual dynamic between the use of the plural as well as the singular to refer to ALL of Israel – we are simultaneously a collection of individual and distinct parts while simultaneously all joining to form a larger and more effective single entity.
I am always aware that on Yom Kippur I retreat into a bubble, while the community and those around me move further away and I turn totally introspective. Nonetheless, as I do this, so much of the focus of all of the prayers and readings in which I am totally immersed is about community. The reading of Jonah during the afternoon of Yom Kippur when we are totally depleted and empty in so many ways, reminds us that we CANNOT escape the group and our responsibility to it. I think that this is one of the most powerful reasons that we remain to make a minyan for Maariv and run to begin building our Sukkah right after we finish the serious and lengthy experience of self evaluation that Yom Kippur brings. We begin our new individual year by being an active and contributing member of our community.
Community building and cooperative ventures are the end goal for the Three Weeks that culminate in Tisha B’Av during the heat of the summer when we commemorate the destruction of our Second Temple because of the lack of such. Similarly, that last Shofar blast at the end of Yom Kippur brings us out of our individual pensive cocoons and reminds us that as individuals we will only be truly strengthened and effective as members of the collective – the community.
May G-d, The Creator of All, strengthen and bless us all in the coming year, both as individuals and as members of the wonderful collective that binds our destinies as one. Shanah Tovah U’Metukah.... and by now, I should say Gimar Hatimah Tovah to all.
Tuesday, September 27, 2011
Thoughts about the Mechitza – a Religious and Cultural Entity
We have these friends, Ari and Stacy Goldberg who raised an amazing daughter Rina. Unfortunately Rina was a very sick child and yet her intelligence, both the intuitive reactions of a child and the wisdom of an old soul was beyond incredible. At her funeral this past winter (Rina was 15 when she died), Ari told the following story. When the Goldbergs moved to our community in Elkins Park, Pennsylvania some years ago, for a variety of reasons, they decided to call the Young Israel of Elkins Park their shul. They proceeded to explain to Rina that there would be separate seating of boys and girls and that she would sit with Ima while Abba would sit with the boys, as this was not the case in their previous dovenning (prayer) community. They then explained that there would be a divider, the Mechitza. Ari continued that they were unsure of how Rina would respond to this new phenomenon. After she saw it, she was exuberant and claimed that she liked the statement of “Girl Power!”
This story has stayed with me and added an important dimension as I have watched the continuing drama of the Mechitza unfold in our various Orthodox congregations. I want to specify that for the purposes of this discussion I am not discussing the Yeshiva or the Right (more Haredi type) part of Orthodox spectrum, but rather those of us in the Modern Orthodox world in its widest breadth.
Having grown up as a clearly observant Halachic Jew in the Conservative movement (yes, many communities like this existed pre 1975), I remember Conservative shuls that had separate seating options, the low and reasonable (meeting the standards of Halacha) Mechitzas in the Orthodox shuls in which I found myself and of course have very specific memories of the “Mechitza-in-the-round” of Lincoln Square Synagogue during my college years. My world was NOT the world of Ner Yisrael, Black Hats, and floor to ceiling separations between men who were active and women who were passive and barely present. Rather we were all observant of Halacha while interacting with each other as appropriate. This is my history; this is my context!
So, today I am somewhere between amused, confused, and just plain baffled regarding the increasing height and separation wielded by the Mechitzot that people build….. and I am NOT talking about the Yeshiva world! I once had the experience in a Community Jewish Day School where a few young men wanted to build a “bigger and better” Mechitza than the one that was there and as a result the Mechitza in this school now separates and divides more than the one at the local Orthodox Jewish High School in the same community.
People want the most and the biggest and the thickest Mechitza! People hate the Mechitza! People are confused about the Mechitza! Is this political, religious, historical, cultural or some combination of all of the above?
So, now I will continue with a story about a very different Mechitza. In Yerushalayim, the shul of choice for most of our family is Shira Hadasha. They have what we affectionately call “the moving Mechitza.” After so much thought and scholarly study and exploration and learning, this congregation makes the distinction between those things that we do because of obligation (chiyuv) and who has the obligation in certain aspects of the service such as Kaddish and other Devarim she B’Kedusha – thus requiring the needed Minyan of men, davening Shaharit, and so on. In such situations, one is halachically bound to make a distinction between those with the chiyuv (in this case, men) and those who do not have the same level of chiyuv (women). This makes sense in terms of the Mechitza.
True, there are many other explanations – women and men should not look at each other (definitely a problem those years ago at the Mechitza-in-the-round shul in New York), people will talk (don’t even get me started on the lack of success the Mechitza has on this score!) and so many others, some legitimate issues and others, well…. Let’s just say some of the explanations have as much to do with Halacha, I mean actual Halacha, as the decision made in one Israeli community for women to wear Burkas to practice the modesty that is part of our law!
So, in dovenning at Shira Hadasha, given that they push so many limits within the frame of Halacha in terms of what women can and will do in the public domain (i.e. participate in those part of the service dictated by minhag more than chiyuv, give Divrei Torah, make announcements – which by the way, one President of a Modern Orthodox shul recently told me was against Halacha, you can imagine my surprise on that one! --, and just be present and visible and valued as part of the Kehilah), I wonder sometimes about the moving Mechitzah, closed when chiyuv separates the group and open appropriately when it does not.
And then I finally got it, after 10 years of dovenning in this wonderful space. It’s Rina’s voice in my head saying “Girl Power!” Yes, we can come together as men and women, both separate and equal, respectfully and halachically. This was the original idea I grew up with when Modern Orthodox (just called Orthodox in those days, plain old Orthodox!) and Halachic Conservative Jews learned, prayed and lived together in shared Jewish spaces. Funny enough, I meet some of those people from my long ago past in Baltimore from time to time. Guess where… Yes, you guessed, at Shira Hadasha on Emek Refaim in Jerusalem!
This story has stayed with me and added an important dimension as I have watched the continuing drama of the Mechitza unfold in our various Orthodox congregations. I want to specify that for the purposes of this discussion I am not discussing the Yeshiva or the Right (more Haredi type) part of Orthodox spectrum, but rather those of us in the Modern Orthodox world in its widest breadth.
Having grown up as a clearly observant Halachic Jew in the Conservative movement (yes, many communities like this existed pre 1975), I remember Conservative shuls that had separate seating options, the low and reasonable (meeting the standards of Halacha) Mechitzas in the Orthodox shuls in which I found myself and of course have very specific memories of the “Mechitza-in-the-round” of Lincoln Square Synagogue during my college years. My world was NOT the world of Ner Yisrael, Black Hats, and floor to ceiling separations between men who were active and women who were passive and barely present. Rather we were all observant of Halacha while interacting with each other as appropriate. This is my history; this is my context!
So, today I am somewhere between amused, confused, and just plain baffled regarding the increasing height and separation wielded by the Mechitzot that people build….. and I am NOT talking about the Yeshiva world! I once had the experience in a Community Jewish Day School where a few young men wanted to build a “bigger and better” Mechitza than the one that was there and as a result the Mechitza in this school now separates and divides more than the one at the local Orthodox Jewish High School in the same community.
People want the most and the biggest and the thickest Mechitza! People hate the Mechitza! People are confused about the Mechitza! Is this political, religious, historical, cultural or some combination of all of the above?
So, now I will continue with a story about a very different Mechitza. In Yerushalayim, the shul of choice for most of our family is Shira Hadasha. They have what we affectionately call “the moving Mechitza.” After so much thought and scholarly study and exploration and learning, this congregation makes the distinction between those things that we do because of obligation (chiyuv) and who has the obligation in certain aspects of the service such as Kaddish and other Devarim she B’Kedusha – thus requiring the needed Minyan of men, davening Shaharit, and so on. In such situations, one is halachically bound to make a distinction between those with the chiyuv (in this case, men) and those who do not have the same level of chiyuv (women). This makes sense in terms of the Mechitza.
True, there are many other explanations – women and men should not look at each other (definitely a problem those years ago at the Mechitza-in-the-round shul in New York), people will talk (don’t even get me started on the lack of success the Mechitza has on this score!) and so many others, some legitimate issues and others, well…. Let’s just say some of the explanations have as much to do with Halacha, I mean actual Halacha, as the decision made in one Israeli community for women to wear Burkas to practice the modesty that is part of our law!
So, in dovenning at Shira Hadasha, given that they push so many limits within the frame of Halacha in terms of what women can and will do in the public domain (i.e. participate in those part of the service dictated by minhag more than chiyuv, give Divrei Torah, make announcements – which by the way, one President of a Modern Orthodox shul recently told me was against Halacha, you can imagine my surprise on that one! --, and just be present and visible and valued as part of the Kehilah), I wonder sometimes about the moving Mechitzah, closed when chiyuv separates the group and open appropriately when it does not.
And then I finally got it, after 10 years of dovenning in this wonderful space. It’s Rina’s voice in my head saying “Girl Power!” Yes, we can come together as men and women, both separate and equal, respectfully and halachically. This was the original idea I grew up with when Modern Orthodox (just called Orthodox in those days, plain old Orthodox!) and Halachic Conservative Jews learned, prayed and lived together in shared Jewish spaces. Funny enough, I meet some of those people from my long ago past in Baltimore from time to time. Guess where… Yes, you guessed, at Shira Hadasha on Emek Refaim in Jerusalem!
Wednesday, September 14, 2011
Remembering AND NOT FORGETTING 9/11 in our Jewish community
I was absolutely stunned this weekend. Through personal experience and a few questions asked, three Orthodox shuls within a few miles of each other in my larger community made ABSOLUTELY NO MENTION of the Tenth Anniversary of 9/11. The Rabbis did not include any reference in their Divrei Torah nor was anything said in the announcements. It should be stated that in one other Orthodox shul in the area, I know mention was made. I am fairly certain this was not even a question in the non-Orthodox shuls in our larger community; it clearly was not in the communities I know about. My concern is that there are probably too many examples of other shuls (whatever the number, it is too many) in the first category and not the second in the larger Orthodox world.
I really do not understand this and would love for someone to explain this so I do not feel so badly. Here we are living in the United States of America, free to worship as we please, free to write, think, vote and do as we please and on September 11, 2001, our freedom and relative sense of well being were profoundly threatened by radicalists who will and do give their very lives in their attempts to take all of this away. Their influence is felt and threatening throughout the world and the catastrophic result of their coordinated efforts on this particular day (and it must be said this is not to the exclusion of too many others, to be sure) cannot be underestimated. Is everyone simply not as shocked, not as concerned and not as horrified as I and others I know are?
I have always been taught and have taught my children that as observant Jews, they also have responsibilities to this country and to the life it has allowed them to live. Our wonderful and amazing son, Brian, who is adopted from the Former Soviet Union, is acutely aware of this and voices his gratitude to this country as follows "You (that would be me, his mommy) and Abba adopted me and brought me here, but the United States has allowed me to have a life that I never would have had in Russia" or words to that general effect.
I feel strongly and know that so many others do as well that we as observant and conscientious Jews have an obligation to be just as careful about who we are as Americans and as human beings. On ALL THREE COUNTS, something incomprehensible and terrifyingly horrible happened during a bit over an hour on the previously beautiful sunny morning of September 11, 2001 - and that CHANGED our lives irrevocably. I do not believe I am being overly dramatic. I know people who died -- they were relatives of friends, former students of mine, friends of friends, parents of students and beyond that, they were Jews, Christians, Muslims, members of other religious communities, Americans and members of other nationalities, and most of all they were all members of the HUMAN FAMILY to which I belong. I still feel shivers when I think of what happened, when I drive by the site of the former Twin Towers, when I hear or see a reference to this event.
I remember exactly where I was and what happened when we heard about the Six Day War in 1967. I know people older than me feel the same about the Declaration of the State of Israel. Those of us who remember the death of President John F. Kennedy as the loss of our innocence are defined as a generation -- with a significantly different memory bank that those who are but a few years younger than us.
I know for a fact that September 11, 2001 is such a generation divider and as the years continue to go by, there will be a marked differentiation of the loss of innocence of those who do remember it and where they were and those who are too young to do so. If those who do not find this event significant enough to mark and remember need something to mourn, then how about this -- the loss of innocence, security and sense of well being of our own children and younger community members.
I do mourn the losses of so much and so many ten years ago on September 11, 2001 and I personally am disappointed in those community leaders who let the ball drop on this one. May we continue to remember those who we lost on that horrific day and May Their Memories Continue to be a Blessing for us all.
I really do not understand this and would love for someone to explain this so I do not feel so badly. Here we are living in the United States of America, free to worship as we please, free to write, think, vote and do as we please and on September 11, 2001, our freedom and relative sense of well being were profoundly threatened by radicalists who will and do give their very lives in their attempts to take all of this away. Their influence is felt and threatening throughout the world and the catastrophic result of their coordinated efforts on this particular day (and it must be said this is not to the exclusion of too many others, to be sure) cannot be underestimated. Is everyone simply not as shocked, not as concerned and not as horrified as I and others I know are?
I have always been taught and have taught my children that as observant Jews, they also have responsibilities to this country and to the life it has allowed them to live. Our wonderful and amazing son, Brian, who is adopted from the Former Soviet Union, is acutely aware of this and voices his gratitude to this country as follows "You (that would be me, his mommy) and Abba adopted me and brought me here, but the United States has allowed me to have a life that I never would have had in Russia" or words to that general effect.
I feel strongly and know that so many others do as well that we as observant and conscientious Jews have an obligation to be just as careful about who we are as Americans and as human beings. On ALL THREE COUNTS, something incomprehensible and terrifyingly horrible happened during a bit over an hour on the previously beautiful sunny morning of September 11, 2001 - and that CHANGED our lives irrevocably. I do not believe I am being overly dramatic. I know people who died -- they were relatives of friends, former students of mine, friends of friends, parents of students and beyond that, they were Jews, Christians, Muslims, members of other religious communities, Americans and members of other nationalities, and most of all they were all members of the HUMAN FAMILY to which I belong. I still feel shivers when I think of what happened, when I drive by the site of the former Twin Towers, when I hear or see a reference to this event.
I remember exactly where I was and what happened when we heard about the Six Day War in 1967. I know people older than me feel the same about the Declaration of the State of Israel. Those of us who remember the death of President John F. Kennedy as the loss of our innocence are defined as a generation -- with a significantly different memory bank that those who are but a few years younger than us.
I know for a fact that September 11, 2001 is such a generation divider and as the years continue to go by, there will be a marked differentiation of the loss of innocence of those who do remember it and where they were and those who are too young to do so. If those who do not find this event significant enough to mark and remember need something to mourn, then how about this -- the loss of innocence, security and sense of well being of our own children and younger community members.
I do mourn the losses of so much and so many ten years ago on September 11, 2001 and I personally am disappointed in those community leaders who let the ball drop on this one. May we continue to remember those who we lost on that horrific day and May Their Memories Continue to be a Blessing for us all.
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