Please join us for Shabbat worship and Torah study, 9:30 am.
The Torah gives us a model for a healthy transition of leadership in the narrative of Moses and Joshua. That all transitions must start with an ending.
Please join us for Shabbat worship and Torah study, 9:30 am.
Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel said that human beings come to God through both motivations: “A man totally unconcerned with his self is dead. But a man exclusively concerned with his self is a beast.” Human beings naturally engage in this world through both our reflective and transitive selves, from both our ego-driven as well as our selfless-inspired souls. Our challenge is to overcome ego-centrism and selfishness and to actualize the Awe of Heaven. “The greatest beauty,” wrote Rabbi Heschel, “grows at the greatest distance from the ego.”
Please join us for Shabbat worship and Torah study, 9:30 am.
The Israelite’s prolonged wandering in the desert served as a learning-experience: that whether in the desert or once settled as a sovereign nation, their very existence is ultimately dependent on God’s grace, “one does not live by bread alone, but by everything that comes from the mouth of the Lord.”
Please join us for Shabbat worship and Torah study, 9:30 am.
On Shabbat, we actualize the Jewish tradition’s idea of holiness, kedusha. That what constitutes holiness is not a sacred object, place, person, ritual or practice. But rather, we make the distinction between the things that are ours and the things that belong to God.
Please join us for Shabbat worship and Torah study, 9:30 am.
Rabbi David Hartman wrote that the Torah is not a “static, immutable inheritance passed down through an unbroken chain of transmission.” That just as we humans are in an ever-evolving relationship with God to perfect our imperfect world, we are also co-creators with God in completing the Torah.
Imagine that! God gave us His Torah with missing pieces. And God created within each of us the ability re-express His Torah throughout the generations. Our Covenant didn’t end at Sinai and with Revelation. We are in a Covenant to create, to complete the Torah as well.
We are the people of metaphor, memory and meaning. We have important stories. And we plug our everyday realities into these stories. And this is how we give them meaning.
Zion is aspirational. Beyond the physical land, the place. The Promised Land is a place of promise, not yet of fulfillment. Its “inheritance,” its “portion” cannot be assumed. This is the difference between Prophecy and Nevuah. The Greek word, “prophet,” is about predicting the future, one that is sealed and fated. This is in contrast to Navi whose role was not to predict the future, but rather to lead, to inspire a collective change. The future is changeable. Bechirah Chovsheit. Not closed. Not predetermined. The theology of Nevuah is of what could be, not what is going to be.
Our challenge then is to embrace our human destiny to take action. This is the co-creative covenant of destiny where we humans take control of events themselves. Going from passive consumers to active participants to fulfill our own destinies.
Please join us 9:30 a.m. Shabbat morning for study and worship.
The Jerusalem Talmud provides one of the finest formulations of Biblical peace: “The world stands upon three things: justice, truth and peace; and all three are really one: If justice is done, truth is done, and peace is done.”
In other words, only by doing justice can peace be achieved. (Jerusalem Ta’anit 4:2). Peace and well-being can never be attained at the expense of justice and morality.
The Torah’s message of peace is predicated on a complete unwillingness to compromise morality and justice—even if force must be employed to defend them.
Please join us 9:30 a.m. Shabbat morning for study and worship. (Rabbi Tom will be out of town this week. Our members lead parts of the service.
The story of Balak and Bilaam is a call for the embrace of a unified, singular God, who is beyond nature, liberated from the forces of nature, a God who requires human beings to take control of their own lives. A God who believes in humanity and with whom we are in a covenant to complete Creation.
Please join us 9:30 a.m. Shabbat morning for study and worship. (Rabbi Tom will be out of town this week. Our members lead parts of the service.
Peoplehood functioned as a placeholder and a worldview that upheld and solidified the core movements, institutions, and practices of twentieth century American Jewry. Jewish identity appears to be slowly but steadily moving away from a paradigm of Jewish peoplehood toward one of Jewish meaning. In this new paradigm, texts, ideas, values, and practices that answer the question “Why be Jewish?” become the primary portals for Jewish identity.
