by chaneld1621 [➚] · Monday, May 13th, 2013
Shavuot starts tomorrow night (Tuesday, May 14th) ! Here’s a list of what’s happening where. Did we miss anything? List it in the comments.
(obligatory picture of cheesecake)
Austin
Austin’s Annual Jewish Community Tikkun Leil Shavuot
Berkeley
Community Tikkun at the JCC of the East Bay (Includes family programming a supervised space for children to sleep over.)
Larger list of Bay Area stuff
Boston area
Brookline Community Tikkun Leil Shavuot at Congregation Kehilath Israel. (Sessions and teachers here)
Connecticut
Isabella Freedman- Shavuot: This Year’s Revelation and Hazon: Torah of Food
Accessible from NYC
Chicago
Mishkan Chicago: Sha.voo.ote: Revelations in Creativity, Politics, Spirituality & Torah
5773 Lakeview Tikkun Leil Shavuot
DC
Upper 16th St Tikkun (Fabrangen, Ohev Sholom, Segulah, Shirat HaNefesh, Tifereth Israel)
Los Angeles
Shtibl Minyan retreat at Brandeis Bardin campus of the AJU
Community Tikkun at Temple Beth Am
Montgomery County, Maryland
Tikkun Leil Shavuot with Moishe House MoCo and Congregation Beth El Montgomery County
New Orleans
5th Annual Shavuot Tikkun Leil: A Joint Torah Venture among Beth Israel, Gates of Prayer, Shir Chadash
New York
Shavuot Across Brooklyn
Tikkun Leyl Shavuot at the JCC Manhattan (Upper West Side)
Yiddish Farm (New Hampton, NY)
Philadelphia
Community Tikkun Leil Shavuot
Tikkun Leyl Shavuot at Penn
Santa Rosa, CA
Congregation Beth Ami
Toronto
Downtown Tikkun Leil Shavuot
by Kol Ra'ash Gadol [➚] · Wednesday, May 8th, 2013
A couple of days ago, I was interested to see an article on Times of Israel asking the question, “Why is it easy to keep kosher but so hard to diet?”
I have to admit to having wondered myself. He offers the example of a woman who made her diet work for her by using kashrut, “I once heard of someone who wanted to lose weight but was having trouble laying off late night sweets. So what she would do is eat a little piece of meat at night and then she wouldn’t find it difficult to refrain from eating dairy desserts,” and then posits three reasons why he believes it’s easier to keep kosher than diet: Kashrut has a defined list of what you can eat and what you can’t; Keeping kosher is for life, dieting is seen as temporary; and Keeping kosher is highly habitual.
Each of these has its points – as someone who didn’t grow up keeping kosher, but has now for many years, I’d have to say that each of these points makes some difference. Yet, while keeping kosher has a list of things you can and can’t eat, so, in many respects, does dieting (don’t eat sweets, don’t eat fried and fatty foods); most people know that dieting is for life, and, I suspect that if one actually was serious about the dieting, it would also become habitual.
I actually think that the reason kashrut is easier for rather different reasons: it’s a communal effort. True, in many shuls, there are people who keep different levels of kashrut, but generally when people are eating together, there’s some minimal level of recognition for the person’s kashrut – at the very least, picking a restaurant where the person can eat, or making accommodations for them in one’s home. The rabbis were no fools. Americans love to think that everything is about the individual, and, even better, the individual will – but in reality, what we do with other people is an exceptionally powerful force.
by TheWanderingJew [➚] · Thursday, February 28th, 2013
Crossposted from InterfaithFamily’s Network Blog.
“I am worried that our present policy is internally conflicted and thus strategically self-defeating,” the rabbi said. “The idea of refusing to be present for the wedding and then expecting the couple to feel warmly embraced by the Jewish people strikes me as a policy constructed by someone who doesn’t know the mind of a young couple…. I am not exactly clear on the message the Conservative movement is sending out into the world, and I am not sure if it is a viable policy in the long term.”
Rabbi Elliot Cosgrove of NYC's Park Avenue Synagogue
This quote is from Rabbi Elliot Cosgrove, a rabbi of the Park Avenue Synagogue, a Conservative shul in NYC. He’s not talking about a policy shift within his synagogue or the Conservative movement, but sharing his thoughts on conversion and intermarriage, as reported in
the New York Jewish Week (
Time To Rethink Conversion Policy).
He likened [the current approach] to joining a gym, noting that a potential gym member is not told first to exercise, get in good shape and then join. Rather, if the person is willing to join, he or she signs up and then the work begins. Moreover, the rabbi added, this logic is not just one of good consumer policy but is consistent with traditional Jewish teaching.
In one of the most famous Talmud stories, the man who wants to learn all of the Torah while standing on one foot is shooed away by Shammai, who has no patience for him, but welcomed by Hillel.
“First, Hillel converts, and then Hillel teaches,” Rabbi Cosgrove said. “First you join and then, once you are a vested member, you figure out what it’s all about.”
In that way, the rabbi suggested that it might be more effective for Conservative rabbis to first accept converts and then teach them.
This would be a huge shift! Compare it to the usual course of action someone follows if converting within Conservative Judaism: a year of study followed by formal conversion (going to the mikveh, and brit milah or brit hadam if the convert is a male).
Imagine if, when an interfaith couple approached a Conservative rabbi to officiate their wedding, the response wasn’t “I can’t officiate, but consider conversion!” or “I can’t officiate, but you’re still welcome to come to synagogue!” but instead was “Welcome! Let’s bring you into the community, celebrate your wedding, and then, as you and your partner establish this next phase of your lives together, let’s make sure Jewish learning is included!”
“My priority is to create Jewish homes, and everything I do is toward that goal,” he said. When a congregant’s adult child comes to him with a non-Jewish partner and wants to get married, he now describes the yearlong conversion program requirement that is a prerequisite to the wedding. Many of them, he says, never come back, choosing a justice of the peace or other [Reform, Reconstructionist, Renewal] clergy to marry them.
As Rabbi Cosgrove points out, “love trumps religious affiliation, with the result being that few families are immune from the situation of a child coming home with a non-Jewish partner and wanting to be married in a Jewish ceremony.” So the question becomes: how do rabbis keep up? Do you think Rabbi Cosgrove’s idea to convert the partner who isn’t Jewish so that Conservative rabbis can officiate their weddings and then bring them to study would work? Do you have other ideas?
by Rifkele [➚] · Thursday, October 18th, 2012
While building up excitement for their Centennial celebration, Hadassah, The Women’s Zionist Org of America was all abuzz about prayer services at the Kotel with Women of the Wall.
Today, following the arrest of several participants and the violent detainment of Women of the Wall leader Anat Hoffman, Hadassah isn’t saying much at all.
Women of the Wall leader Anat Hoffman arrested at the Kotel
Nobody attends a Women of the Wall service without knowing that being arrested for wearing a tallit or praying aloud is a distinct possibility. At the group’s monthly Rosh Chodesh services, some women choose to save their voices and their prayer shawls for the Torah service that takes place at a nearby location. Others take the risk. Regular participants advise first-timers regarding how to avoid arrest.
It stands to reason, then, that the Hadassah leaders who were building up anticipation for the joint Women of the Wall/Hadassah prayer service on Tuesday evening were prepared for possible police action against the group of 200 women. One might also imagine that they were set to offer a statement in the event that such action occurred. As of now, however, Hadassah has declined to take a public stand on this issue. Their website and Twitter feed (@Haddashorg) refer the public to JTA articles and Women of the Kotel statements. Hadassah leaders remain silent on the violent detainment of Nashot Hakotel leader Anat Hoffman, or the general mistreatment of women who pray at the Kotel.***
Meanwhile, Hadassah plans to present PM Netanyahu with an award named for Hadassah founder Henrietta Szold.
What would Henrietta Szold do in such a case?
Given that she struggled to be admitted to the Jewish Theological Seminary of America and was finally allowed to matriculate together with rabbinical students under the condition that she never ask to be ordained, in all likelihood she would have been at the Kotel, determined to find a way for women to pray there.
At the very least, no doubt Anat Hoffman is correct when she says that the Women of the Wall organization is more deserving of the prize than Bibi is. The vision of Henrietta Szold, whose unique brand of leadership encompassosed the social feminist movement of her day as well as an inclusive, diverse vision of Jewish peoplehood, was much more akin to the work of Women of the Wall than to any aspect of the current Israeli government’s leadership. In any case, the women’s Zionist organization should not be silent now regarding this violation of the rights of women in Zion.
Anat Hoffman in her own words:
Police Shackle Anat Hoffman for Saying Sh’ma at Kotel – The Sisterhood – Forward.com.
*** Update: Hadassah has published a one-sentence resolution regarding this:
In Jerusalem, at the National Business Meeting of the Centennial Convention of Hadassah, the Women’s Zionist Organization of America, delegates unanimously approved a resolution reaffirming its commitment to and support for freedom of worship for women at the Western Wall.
It is worth following the replies to this by Hadassah members, which have a little more bite:
www.hadassah.org/site/apps/nlnet/content3.aspx?c=keJNIWOvElH&b=8347749&ct=12246339¬oc=1
by Rifkele [➚] · Sunday, September 16th, 2012
30 years ago my father died suddenly, shortly before Rosh Hashanah. He was 54 years old. I remember being unable to sit through services that year, refusing to hear the words of the u’netaneh tokef prayer; the ones proclaiming that who shall live and who shall die is all signed, sealed, and delivered. My father was an exemplar of teshuvah and tsedakah: his life’s work was about reconciling people who were hurt and angry at one another, and he believed, fiercely, in justice. And although as a self-defined agnostic, tefila, prayer, had not been a major part of his life, he went to shul every day to say the mourner’s Kaddish after his parents died. And then, because he saw how vital it was to have a minyan for those saying Kaddish, he continued to attend the morning service as often as possible so that others could recite it in a minyan. That is the kind of person he was, and I was devastated and furious that he died so young.
That year I also stopped sending New Year’s greetings wishing my friends to be inscribed and sealed in the Book of Life. What did that superstition matter?
The Book of Life had no meaning for me for several years after that. Then I encountered a teaching by the renowned mystic Rabbi Judah Leib Alter of Gur, known as the Sfat Emet (or Sfas Emes, meaning The Language of Truth), after the title of his signature book. This lesson was filtered through the eloquent translation of my teacher, Rabbi Arthur Green:
The human heart is the tablet on which God writes. Each of us has the word life engraved in our hearts by God’s own hand. Over the course of the year that engraving comes to be covered with grit. Our sins, our neglect of prayer and Torah study, the very pace at which we live all conspire to blot out the life that life written deep within our hearts. On Rosh Hashanah we come before God having cleansed ourselves as best we can and ask God to write that word once again and to seal it up on Yom Kippur, so that the sensation of being truly alive may not depart from us through the entire year.
I understand this to mean that, regardless of how we understand God—or whether we believe in such a Being at all—we have the opportunity to cleanse our hearts of the grit that stems from guilt or grief and interferes with us feeling truly alive.
Perhaps the traditional Jewish spiritual practices of teshuvah, tefila, and tsedakah, when translated as “repentance, prayer, and charity”, do not sound life altering. Today, I understand this text to mean that we have the opportunity to return our truest selves; to find a path to prayer, meditation, or reflection that makes us mindful of life’s myriad gifts; and of using our own gifts to make the world a more just place.
This is what allows us to clean our own hearts and stand open and ready to have the word life engraved upon them once again.
In the year to come, may our hearts be open to the “life” that is written deep within our hearts.
Shana tova…Gut yuntif, gut yor….A good year.
by guestpost [➚] · Thursday, June 7th, 2012
Rabbi Andrew Sacks directs the Rabbinical Assembly in Israel, the organization of Masorti/Conservative rabbis.
The office of the Chief Rabbinate is established in law. The need for such an office is altogether another question.
Only the State and four cities are obligated under law to have a Chief Rabbi. Since there is no agreement as to who should hold the position – we have two; one Ashkenazi and one Sefardi. Except in Tel Aviv where the city council refused to allocate funds for two rabbis – so they have one.
Jerusalem has gone years without a Chief Rabbi. There is lack of agreement as to whether at least one of Jerusalem’s Chief Rabbis must be a Zionist.
All told there are thousands of employees “working” for the rabbinate and for the Ministry of Religions. Hundreds of millions of shekels are allocated.
Last week, for the first time, a decision was rendered that will require regional councils to employee non-Orthodox rabbis. This is an historic breakthrough in a country which, while not employing all Orthodox rabbis, has employed only Orthodox rabbis. As many as fifteen such positions for non-Orthodox rabbis may be filled.
More »
by TheWanderingJew [➚] · Tuesday, May 22nd, 2012
By now I’m sure many of you have heard about today’s monthly Women of the Wall gathering. The short version is that the police, allegedly present to protect the women from those who do not believe they have a right to daven at the Kotel, approached many of the women, said they weren’t permitted to wear talleisim, and took the names and id of three women who’ll be “further investigated.” You can read more about it in the JTA and Jerusalem Post, or check out a blog post by one of the three women (who happen to all be rabbinical students). You can also watch their reaction in this interview on YouTube.
 |
| Police, defying the mechitzah, to teach Deb how a woman ought to wear her tallis. |
It wasn’t long before I spotted the photos on Facebook, counting several friends among them. Based on the two photos included in this post, I decided to talk to Deb (pictured) about her experience today and each month she joins Women of the Wall for their Rosh Chodesh davening.
Right off the bat, Deb made clear that she hasn’t historically connected to the kotel as a place where she’s wanted to daven. However, she finds that the more she goes with Women of the Wall, the more she wants to go. It’s the community Women of the Wall is fighting to create that speaks to her more than the wall itself.
She told me, the group is “called ‘women’ but it’s actually creating a space for all who want to daven there, who have the right to access this public, Jewish space.” The group’s mission states they “seek the right for Jewish women from Israel and around the world to conduct prayer services, read from a Torah scroll while wearing prayer shawls, and sing out loud at the Western Wall – Judaism’s most sacred holy site and the principal symbol of Jewish people hood and sovereignty.” Deb appreciates that they’ve also created a “queer-friendly space,” and that they “call attention to the need for spaces that are friendly and welcoming to all. There are folks who identify as genderqueer and trans who are invited to lead services, read from the Torah, and take on other roles. Likewise, Women of the Wall creates a welcome space for all genders, including male-identifed folks, to participate in the Torah services” that they hold at Robinson’s Arch after they move from the Western Wall.
 |
| Wearing a tallis in a hijab-like manner is apparently permitted. |
When I showed Deb the two photos from Facebook, she said that she feels like she’s being “singled out each month” by the police, because she wears a tallis that is more traditionally considered a man’s, and not a colourful tallis that might be more “feminine.” Today, a policeman asked permission of Anat (co-founder of Women of the Wall) to demonstrate, using Deb and her tallis, how women should properly wear a tallis like a shawl. The idea being that this would avoid the 2001 law that makes it illegal for women to perform those religious practices “traditionally done by men” at holy sites, like reading from the Torah, wearing tefillin or a tallis, or blowing the shofar.
“He folded it up, and put it around me like a fake scarf… Of course I unfolded it and ended up wearing almost like a hijab instead!”
Her other response to the police? She davens extra loud when she’s with Women of the Wall. I asked if that was a way of protesting the police interference, but she corrected me. “The truth is that I’m extra loud so that the women feel a presence. And it’s for the policemen, so they hear the truth of the davening, rather than the protest of the women. Because that’s really why I am there: so that I can pray and sing and so can any other person. I guess I like to think I bring some davening confidence…”
Her confidence, and the monthly return of so many woman (and folks of all genders) reminds us that they’re fighting over a public space. A Jewish space. And women (and those who identify outside the gender binary) have just as much right to pray in public as men.
by David A.M. Wilensky [➚] · Thursday, April 19th, 2012
Crossposted to davidamwilensky.com
In other news I'm topping the charts over at the Forward: The hed on my piece is 'What Would You Call Me?'
Right. So I wrote this op-ed for the Forward about how I underwent a Conservative conversion because I go to a Conservative shul these days, but I came from a patrilineal Reform background and so forth. And in it I suggested that it’s time for the Conservative movement to start accepting patrilineal descent.
Then the internet discharged platoon after platoon of Jew-baiting Jewish commenters with all kinds of nonsense on their minds. There were also some thoughtful comments and a ton of kind emails from friends and acquaintances.
Here’s one of the emails:
I so wanted to comment on your Forward article, but I simply could not wade into the aggravating mess of Jews baiting each other.
So for his benefit and yours, I waded neck-deep into the muck to pluck out the best of the comments — not only at forward.com, but on Facebook and twitter as well. And I’ll respond to a few too.
[I started writing this post yesterday so there are probably even more comments now that I haven't even looked at.]
More »
by Justin [➚] · Monday, February 6th, 2012
Eddie Long, a Georgia based mega-church preacher, has been crowned king… Yup, you read right. Crowned king. King of what? 
Damned if I know. He was crowned king by “Rabbi” Ralph Messer, a self-indulged so-called Messianic Jew (but even the Messianic Jews have disavowed him, now that takes talent) led this obscene ritual at New Birth Missionary Baptist in Lithonia, GA. Videos abound on the web, I didn’t want to give one another view.
Long has claimed ignorance and that he meant no offense. Eddie Long was in the news a couple years ago accused of sexual abuse.
The “rabbi” who conducted this grandiose show claimed that the Torah scroll used to enwrap Long in during the ceremony was saved from Aushwitz-Birkenau; an unlikely factoid considering how difficult it would have been to hide a Torah scroll in those circumstances, but that does not prevent him from abusing the memory of those who perished in the Shoah, claiming that “the dust” may still be on the scroll.
The whole thing just reeks of showmanship, grandiosity and the worst forms of appropriation.
Bill Nigut of the Anti-Defamation League took Messer, Long and the whole affair to task calling it a “fake Jewish ritual.” That is generous, IMHO. Others have chimed in with their own condemnations.
One cannot help but be reminded of Shabbtai Tzvi and other false messiahs.
On the one hand, it’s hard not to laugh at this kind of nonsense; on the other hand it’s hard not to vomit.
by Justin [➚] · Saturday, November 26th, 2011
Scholars of religion have a term for the common practice of adherents to a religious tradition that do not always perfectly fit into the doctrinal teachings of that religion — folk religion. This is in contrast to the normative doctrinal teachings of a religion often dubbed “state religion.” This is most often noted in Jewish history as the drive by the ancient Jewish monarchy of the 6th century BCE to centralize worship in Jerusalem with an organized Temple worship and priesthood. The ‘folk religion’ of the time, however, preferred a sort of blending of local pagan customs and the normative priestly cult. If people were not worshiping idols or eating non-kosher food there would have been no need for the Torah to repeatedly warn against worshiping idols or eating non-kosher food. It’s as the old adage goes, society does not develop laws people are already following.
Since becoming an ordained rabbi, I have rarely been faced with needing to fulfill the role of mar d’atra (Aramaic for, literally, “master of the place”). In that role a rabbi acts as a posek (Hebrew for, literally, “arbiter”) and makes halakhic decisions for her or his community. 
However there is one topic about which I have been asked repeatedly by numerous people in my congregation — Mourners’ Kaddish. To contextualize this, let me say a few words about my congregation.
The average age in my community is probably around 65-70. I have regular attendees who are in their 90s and older. Needless to say, it is an aging congregation. To give you an idea, I recently buried three people in one week. My congregation is made up of many transplants — people who moved to this community from somewhere else. However, many of my congregants are 4th or 5th generation in this community. That being the case, almost everybody who is actually born and raised in this community is related to everybody else even if just as distant cousins. Even though halakhah dictates that people only say Kaddish for one one of the seven relatives whom they must mourn for — parents, children, siblings and spouses — people in my community will often come to shul to say Kaddish for their grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins. Kaddish has become so important in this community that during daily prayer services the names of those who left the world that day throughout the 120+ year history of the synagogue are read aloud and if someone knows who the person was and their story, that story is shared. On Shabbat, the names of those for the entire coming week are read aloud. Most days, although we try, we do not make a minyan — unless someone is observing a yahrzeit. Kaddish is truly the ‘folk religion’ of this little community. More »
by Rebez [➚] · Thursday, November 24th, 2011
Thanksgiving celebrators around the country, here ye. Amidst all your holiday planning and travel, and your decisions on how to spend “Black Friday,” please consider how you might conclude this festive weekend. On Saturday evening, Rosh Chodesh will be upon us. On Sunday morning it is traditional to give praise to the Most High. One way to do this is by Occupying Rosh Chodesh, as some of us are doing this Sunday at Zuccotti Park in Lower Manhattan. All are invited. For more information see below:
What is Rosh Chodesh? This Sunday November 27th we are entering into the darkest month of the year, Kislev. However, during the month of Kislev, we celebrate Hanukkah, the festival of light.
Why be Occupied with it? It’s easy to celebrate when life is pleasant, when victory has been achieved and when the weather is warm. Rosh Chodesh is a monthly celebration fueled by a historical memory of enslavement. No matter where we are in the struggle for freedom and justice, Jewish tradition commands us to find ways to join forces and sing together – to experience the feeling of what redemption will truly taste like.
How will we celebrate it? On the Thanksgiving Sunday, two days after Black Friday, we will welcome the Hebrew month of Kislev with song and praise. In contrast to the melodies used to urge us toward the season of ‘holiday shopping’ we will sing the traditional Hallel / songs of praise sung on Rosh Chodesh. As part of the service, there will also be a chance for some learning and reflection on how Rosh Chodesh connects to the wider Occupy movement. The whole service should last no longer than one hour.
Who is invited? We welcome people of all backgrounds, races, gender identities and religious/faith affiliations.
by David A.M. Wilensky [➚] · Tuesday, October 4th, 2011
Jewschool founder Daniel Sieradski is organizing a Kol Nidrei minyan in at Zuccotti Park, home base of the Occupy Wall Street folks, at 7 p.m. this Friday night.
I don’t believe it’s set in stone yet, but Rabbi Arthur Waskow may be delivering a devar and or leading the service. Sieradski is looking for knowledgeable service leaders. If you can help and you’re interested, get in touch with him on Facebook or twitter.
This will be a service, not to mention a Kol Nidrei, of once-in-a-lifetime coolness. Let me know if you’re coming so I can make sure we say get the chance to wish each other a Gemar Chatimah Tovah.
Check out the Facebook event for details and updates.
Updated, 10/5: Sieradski tell meWaskow is no longer coming for health reasons. Sad times.
by BZ [➚] · Sunday, October 2nd, 2011
(Crossposted to Mah Rabu.)
Happy 5772! Another year, another blog post I don’t really want to write. But I’m writing it anyway, because who else will? Criticizing the Reform movement on its own terms (as opposed to either not criticizing it, or judging it by external standards) is a lonely beat.
An article that everyone has been commenting on lately is “Campus Life 201: Trying Out Frum“, from the Fall 2011 issue of Reform Judaism magazine. The author, a Yale undergrad “raised in a committed Reform household”, tells the story of a week in which she adopted various practices including kashrut, praying three times a day (apparently with a non-egalitarian minyan), praying before and after eating, and wearing long skirts.
More »
by guestpost [➚] · Monday, July 25th, 2011
This is a guest post by Aurora Mendelsohn of Rainbow Tallit Baby.
Has feminism run its course in Jewish liturgy and ritual practice? Jay Michaelson (“Rethinking Egalitarianism: Are We Leveling the Playing Field Too Low?”, Forward, Nov. 5, 2010) described how young Jews, who grew up in progressive shuls, when moving to places with fewer synagogue options, end up choosing vibrant, engaged, child-friendly, non-egalitarian communities over spiritually empty, formal, egalitarian ones.
Danya Ruttenberg suggested (Sh’ma Magazine, “Messy Complexity: On God, Language, and Metaphor”, April 2011) that the goals of feminists over the 40 years—proposing alternative, less male-centric language, allowing people who value feminism to be at home in Judaism, and allowing everyone to explore the female aspects of the divine terms—have been achieved. Ruttenberg writes that the time has come to “stop thinking about language and God” because this focus becomes the totality of experiencing the divine. In a similar vein, Jo Ellen Green Kaiser argues (“Do We Still Need Jewish Feminism?”, Zeek) that within American practice, “egalitarianism has become the baseline practice for the majority of American Jews” and that in non-Orthodox Judaism, egalitarian religious practice and liturgy, the dreams of Jewish feminists have been achieved.
Kaiser also describes the great strides in the modern Orthodox world, as it “edges toward Egalitarianism” with women’s Tfillah (prayer) groups, women offering divrei Torah (sermons) and being ordained as quasi-rabbis. This is a better description of the modern Orthodox world than an op-ed in a major Canadian paper by prominent Reform Rabbi Dow Marmur, which said modern Orthodox groups now make women “full and equal participants in worship” because women were allowed to read from the Torah. He was describing an international modern Orthodox movement in which women are indeed accorded significant access to ritual participation. However, this movement deliberately uses the term ‘partnership minyan’ to describe itself to acknowledge that according to their reading of Jewish law, equal access or status is not possible. (Though one partnership minyan in Israel refers to itself as “an egalitarian Orthodox community”). Neither Kaiser nor Marmur note the strong rejection of these innovations from the large majority of Orthodoxy, such as the Rabbinical Council of America, to the extent that these congregations are considered “non-Orthodox” by the Orthodox leadership and are denied membership in the Orthodox Union.
Recently, I saw a brochure for a local Orthodox synagogue touting its egalitarian advances. I scanned it, intrigued, looking for a women’s prayer group or Simchat Torah celebration, but found that it was referring to their new policy of allowing women to sit on the board. I could not help channeling Inigo Montoya; “Egalitarian…You keep using that word. I don’t think it means what you think it means.” It began to dawn on me that egalitarianism in Jewish practice might be in the eye of the beholder. This uncertainty about what egalitarianism means reminded me of when I attended a college minyan, called “the Egalitarian minyan”. In terms of service leading, what people did, it was totally egalitarian. But to me, who grew up with an egalitarian liturgy, what people said, its use of traditional liturgy was most certainly not.
There are myriad ways for women to enter into public religious practices that were once dominated by men (which shows just how few there once were reserved for women). It is clear women’s roles in public ritual have evolved considerably over the past century. In the timeline of Jewish history, this is quite a short time. It seems equally clear they will also evolve during the next century. Some practices that were heretical a hundred years ago are commonplace and normative now across denominations from Orthodox to Renewal (like a public acknowledgement of a bat mitzvah). To have any meaningful discussion about whether egalitarianism has been successful, how much it may have achieved (as noted by Ruttenberg and Kaiser) or what future directions should be pursued, or how weight should be given to it when it conflicts with other values (as raised by Michaelson), one must first know what egalitarianism is, even if there are multiple answers. Towards this end I have compiled a taxonomy of egalitarianism in Jewish practice (inspired by BZ’s Taxonomy of Jewish pluralism), which looks at four areas of Jewish practice: participation (what we do), liturgy (what we say about ourselves, our ancestors, and God), identity (who we are), and legal status. To assess the merits of egalitarianism, to determine whether its goals have been achieved, or to progress, we must first know where we have come from and where we now stand.
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by Kol Ra'ash Gadol [➚] · Sunday, April 17th, 2011
Those who are familiar with the oddities of the Jewish calendar may be aware that a largish holiday begins tomorrow night (called Passover). Fewer people may be aware that on the second night of Passover begins… well, it’s not a holiday exactly, but it is a holy period, called the Omer.
Beginning the second night of Passover, every adult Jew is supposed to count off the 49 days (seven times seven weeks) that make up the period between Passover and the holiday of Shavuot, the holiday of the giving of the Torah. I have to say, it’s a bit of a pain. Not he counting, which is fine, but remembering to count properly, keeping track of which day it is, and so on. It’s enough of a difficulty that the Jewish legal code has instructions about what to do if you forget to count at the right time, or for a full day. You’ve got to count every day, or you lose your obligation to say the full blessing as you count.
The counting itself is a lovely tradition: each of the weeks represents one of seven traits of God, as does each day, so one develops a spiral of thoughts throughout the counting period (for example the trait of strength during the week of mercy… consider what that might mean as we approach the giving of the Torah… etc.)
Well, I decided that the best way to do this would be a sort of advent calendar, with little treats each day as you opened up the proper box to say the blessing for that day (hey, why should Christians get all the calendar fun?). At one time, I thoght the best way to do this would be through carpentry, but it’s been some time since I had any access to the proper tools,a dn I just didn’t want to wait anymore this year, so for pretty cheap I made one out of things that one could glue together – namely cardboard, cardboard, and , uh, some glue and glitter paper.
Almost everything came from the container store, and it took me about three days to make (including some glue drying time. Not labor intensive, but pretty sturdy anyway).
I’m happy to share instructions with anyone who wants to build one. I used a hard cardboard ornament storage box and three by three folded gift boxes (seven of which fit perfectly across, although you need two ornament boxes cut to size and glued together to get the height as only five rows tall fit, if you pop open the top edge of the ornament box).
The numbers for the days (written out in blue in Hebrew letters) as well as the blessing on the inside (which has the blessing, the day and date – in other words, everything you need for each day… no looking anything up!) are printed on clear sticky labels cut to size.
For your delectation:
(Not sure why the blessing box is shown on its side, just ignore that, it opens upwards (although you can make yours open any direction you want, of course)
I don’t think I”m quite done decorating it – obviously this is pretty simple, but the plus is that the boxes make it so that magic marker will write on them perfectly nicely, so if I go for color, that’s probably the way I’ll go. Stickers work fine too, but I’ll probably eventually go for a large picture that covers the entire front face of the Omer Counter. Happy counting!
XP Kol Ra’ash Gadol
by Raysh Weiss [➚] · Monday, April 11th, 2011
Before you panic, rest assured: we’re not about to start charging you when you read more than 20 posts per month. No, we’re talking about the ever-skyrocketing expense of sending children to Jewish day school in the U.S.
With $7,000 you might be able to fly back and forth to Israel six times, but for the same price you could stay put in Overland Park KS and learn at the Hyman Brand Hebrew Academy for one year. One thousand dollars more will buy you—show them what they’ve won—one year of 1-8th grade education at the Cincinnati Hebrew Day School. If you want to send your child to the Solomon Schechter of Atlanta, be prepared to shell out upwards of $17,000 per year starting with first grade. $26,650 might be a fine price for a Toyota RAV4 Sport, but did you know that for the same price, you can ‘kaneh likha rav’—or maybe even four—and enroll for one year of high school at the Jack M. Barrack Hebrew Academy in Bryn Mawr, PA? $29, 955 would be a steal for a small, foreclosed apartment in a depressed real estate market, but it could also buy you one year’s education at Milken community high school in LA. These numbers don’t even include the usual “give and get” $1,000+ minimums typically imposed upon day school families on a yearly basis.
Ivanka Trump: a convert to Judaism, bearing an uncanny resemblance to the woman who sat three rows in front of my mother, sisters, and I during the high holiday services of my youth. Just throw a giant hat on her, hand her an Artscroll and presto
Some day schools—such as the Ramaz School of NY and the Ida Crown Jewish Academy in Chicago, IL— do not openly
disclose their tuition fees, and perhaps for good reason. Unless you are Ivanka Trump, who wouldn’t want to faint upon seeing these staggering numbers? Especially given today’s economy, how can anyone but the super-rich possibly afford to shell out $20,000 dollars annually to send a child (or, more likely, multiple children) to Jewish day school…for 15 years?
As a day school alum (16 years, but who’s counting) whose entire college tuition (yes, all four years combined, at a private institution which furnished me with an excellent post-secondary education) still cost less than one year of Jewish high school, the irony of this situation is not lost on me. (For purposes of full disclosure: I benefited from a faculty discount for my university tuition.)
Haters in the Cheder
The Jewish Day School tuition crisis has only worsened over the course of the last decade, as aptly demonstrated by the Yeshiva Tuition Talk blog. Check out this meticulously well-researched case study on the surging tuition fees of two orthodox yeshivot in the U.S.
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by Kol Ra'ash Gadol [➚] · Thursday, April 7th, 2011
Over the past several years, we have seen quite a number of Jewish or pseudo-Jewish practices picked up by non-Jews. While this isn’t exactly a novel occurrence – Christians sort of invented it with the creation of their new religion not quite two millenia ago, and Christian “Passover seders” of various sorts have been going on for some number of decades- it’s worth considering how Jews should react to the “democratization” of Jewish practices.
Whether it’s the pseudo-Jewish kabbalah center (whose practices misrepresent kabbalah quite a huge amount) and its superstitious practices, or Justin Bieber saying the Shema before concerts, we can expect to see more of this kind of thing.
To a certain extent, a certain amount of syncretism is inevitable. More »
by shamirpower [➚] · Sunday, March 6th, 2011
At 6:15am on Rosh Hodesh Adar Aleph, I stood at a bus stop on Derech Hevron by Tzomet Habankim. I watched Israelis get on and off the green public buses and waited until a blue and white mini bus pulled up. I boarded the Palestinian bus which runs from the entrance to Bethlehem to East Jerusalem, paying only 5 shekels instead of the regular 6.40 NIS.
It was a quick ride with almost no stops until I rang the bell for Jaffa Gate. I was the only passenger to descend from the bus.
In flowy green pants and a purple skirt, I made may way through the pouring rain toward the kotel. I was grateful to both fit into the hippy Jerusalem culture as well as the serious feminist activist group that was having their monthly meeting of worship, song, and taking a stand.
As I approached the plaza, I heard loud voices of men singing a Shlomo Carlebach niggun. Why were they singing so loud? Was it because of Rosh Hodesh? Was their joy pure? Or could it have been do drown out the women’s voices close by on the other side of the mechitza? Having been at the kotel the week before for Havdallah, straining to hear the words of the blessings, my instinct was that this loud singing was the latter.
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