January 2008 - Making a Separation

Shabbat is an important day for us as Jews. It is the central point of our weekly calendar, and at synagogues around the world we gather together to welcome it, sometimes with pomp and circumstance, sometimes with joyful singing, and other times in reflective meditation. However we may welcome Shabbat, the rituals for welcoming Shabbat are similar in any style.

While we come together so well to welcome Shabbat, we too often miss the opportunity as individuals and as a community to come together to say goodbye to Shabbat. This opportunity is a brief service known as Havdalah, which means separation. Havdalah separates Shabbat from the rest of the week. It reminds us that while all days are good, Shabbat is special and needs to be savored to its final moments.

On Sunday mornings in our religious school we begin the day with Havdalah as a way of marking a separation from the week that was to the week that is now beginning. It also allows us to acknowledge the end of Shabbat together in a meaningful way.

The symbols of Havdalah are three. The first is that of wine (grape juice for our religious school!). Just as we rejoice in bringing in Shabbat with wine, we rejoice in having celebrated Shabbat by making the wine the very last thing we taste on Shabbat. Wine, of course, has always been a symbol of joy for Jews, and by including it in our Havdalah service we are reminded that w can find great joy in the week to come.

The second symbol is the one that is entirely unique to Havdalah, that is the spices. The spices are a reminder of the incense used to accompany the sacrifices on Shabbat in the ancient temple. More so in the modern day they allow us to leave Shabbat with a sense of its sweet smell and hold on to that sense of sweetness through the rest of the week.

The final symbol of Havdalah is the candle. Just as we begin Shabbat with light, we end it with light too. This candle is a special braided candle of 6 wicks that come together as one flame, evoking the image of the six days of the week coming together to give us Shabbat. Additionally the fire is a reminder of the very first light that God created as we re-enter into our days of creation once again.

In the fourth blessing of Havdalah, in which we bless God for creating a distinction between that which is sacred and that which is ordinary, the light of the fire and the wine come together as we douse the candle by dipping it in wine or pouring the wine over it. This marks the formal end of Shabbat as we listen to the sizzle of the flame as it is extinguished. After that blessing we continue with prayers that next Shabbat may indeed be the first day of the eternal Shabbat that will mark a time of peace for all.

The Havdalah service brings together all our senses, we taste the wine, smell the spices, see the flame and listen as the flame goes out, and we reach out with out sense of touch both to handle the variety of symbols and toward each other as we say goodbye to Shabbat.

Beginning this month, we will have an opportunity to come together, monthly at least, to say goodbye to Shabbat and to participate in this sacred ritual along with enjoying a wonderful dinner with your B’nai El family. Once a month a different member of our community will host “Havdalah Club” when we will gather at someone’s home and then enjoy dinner together at a family-friendly restaurant in the host’s general neighborhood. There is no charge for this; you simply pay for what you eat at the restaurant. During months when the sun sets later we will first meet for dinner and then go to someone’s home for Havdalah. Please let me know if you would like to host.

Our first official Havdalah club will be on the 19^thof January at 5:15 p.m. at the home of George and Colleen Isele. Following the Havdalah ceremony, we will dine at Houlihan’s restaurant on the corner of Mason and Olive Street Roads. Call the Temple office for more information.

June/July, 2007
Summer Travels

The summer is always a wonderful time of the year. Despite the heat and humidity in St. Louis, I have found it especially pleasant to be here during the summer. Between Forest Park, Baseball games at Busch (and our own softball games at B’nai Amoona field), the wineries along Highway 94, plenty of Golf and so many other opportunities in the area, it’s a wonder that anyone gets anything done around here in the summer.

The summer is, however, the time that we have more freedom in our schedules. Children are off from school and maybe off to camp. Activity at work even slows down a little. At Synagogues in general activity slows down for the summer .
The Jewish calendar helps with this. From Shavuot, which is in early June at the latest, until the High Holy Days, the only significant event on the calendar is Tisha B’av, an observance of mourning to commemorate the Temple in Jerusalem (our services will be on July 23, at 9 p.m.).

So while a lot of planning needs to occur to be ready for the High Holy Days, the resumption of Religious School and all of the great programming that B’nai El will have for you in 2007-2008, the summer gives me the time to get away a little for some relaxation and refreshment so that I can be ready for a busy year.

I want to share a little bit of my travels with you so you know of the types of opportunities that I have and why I’ll be in the office a little less this summer. By the time you read this, I will be off to Oconomowoc, WI, to attend the Hava Nashira musical conference. This is my second year at this conference where I get to learn from wonderful people; musicians such as Debbie Friedman, Danny Nichols, Peter and Ellen Allard and a host of others both faculty and my fellow participants.

Last year I came back from Hava Nashira with some great ideas for the congregation, and I look forward to bringing back more from this wonderful and spiritually renewing weekend. Because of its proximity to Milwaukee I also get the opportunity to take an extra day and catch a ball game with my parents at the home of the first place Brewers (sorry, couldn't resist).

During the middle of July, I get the pleasure of serving on the faculty of Goldman Union Camp Institute (GUCI), a truly wonderful place to send your children for a two week or four week session. I will help the staff plan Judaic programming, teach the High School Seniors group, help plan services for the entire camp and much more. I also get to be in a place I consider another home, where I can spend two weeks working with kids, reaching out to the community,
and taking on a little bit of relaxation to come back into full High Holy Day prep mode.

As we move into August, Rachel and I will be taking Ari on his first trip to Milwaukee where he will meet all of my parents’ friends and a few relatives who could not make it down for the bris. Over Labor day we intend to
get back to Baltimore and see all of Rachel’s family now that Ari is a bit older than he was at Pesach.

Summer is a great time to refresh, renew and relax a bit. Once the High Holy Days roll around I will be as busy as ever. I hope that each of you will have the opportunity this summer to enjoy the beautiful city we live in and to renew yourselves so that you can be at your best in whatever you may do.

Have a refreshing, safe and wonderful summer.

Rabbi Daniel Plotkin

April, 2007
Softening Our Hearts

As we celebrate Passover this year we will gather with family and friends. For our community Shabbat of Passover Seder (April 6, 6:30 p.m. – still time to call for a reservation). While we are together for this festive holiday, we will tell the story of God’s miracles that freed our people from slavery in Egypt. One of the parts of the story we will speak about is how Pharaoh hardened his heart against freeing the Israelite slaves.

This hardening of the heart on the part of Pharaoh leads to the ruin of his family and the people over whom he ruled, along with the utter devastation of his army (and the human cost of that). If just once he had said yes during the earlier plagues, the later, much worse, plagues would not have occurred. Even after letting the Israelites flee, his heart hardened again perhaps out of habit, our sages suggest. For whatever reason, however, Pharaoh was unable to soften his heart and see the Israelites as fellow human beings.

Therefore, along with the other numerous lessons of Passover, we can learn the importance of softening our heart toward others. This means a sense of compassion toward the less fortunate, a concern for other peoples in other places of the world who are suffering, and a caring for our own people, wherever they may live. Softening one’s heart in this way is relatively easy, as usually a donation or a vote is the most we can do (although there are ways to do much more as well).

Ironically, it is far easier to soften our hearts toward an AIDS victim in Africa, a homeless family still in the aftermath of Katrina, or a terror victim in Israel than it is to soften our hearts in our own lives to the people we see and interact with on a day to day basis. We all too often hold grudges, feel a sense of bitterness toward someone, or simply withhold communication from someone about important matters. These actions are the type of things that, when they go unresolved, can destroy families, friendships and communities.

This Passover, consider how Pharaoh hardened his heart and lost everything that was important to him. Consider the person or people from whom you have distanced yourselves and ask if that is necessary. Even if you are scared that an important conversation may hurt the person in some way, if you enter into it with softness in your heart, the outcome will ultimately be positive for both of you.

When you seek out the hard places in your heart and work to soften them, the process builds on itself. You will find yourself less likely to have hard places in your heart and be more available to the people in your life. You will also find it easier to build a relationship with God as you have opened yourself to other people, who are made in God’s image. Let go of that grudge, let go of things long past, free yourself from the hardness of heart that separates us from one another as we celebrate the season of our freedom. Next year may all of our cities be Jerusalem – a city of peace.

March, 2007
The Blessing of New Life; The Blessing of Community

Recently Rachel and I were blessed to begin a new chapter in our lives. The birth of Ari Brian on January 28, changed our lives in ways I am still yet to imagine. A trip out of the house is now far more than grabbing a jacket and going, our dinner must be planned around his dinner(s) and sleep, as all parents know, we get it when we can.

These changes, however, are mere inconveniences when compared to the richness and fullness that Ari will bring to our lives. In these first few weeks we have already seen him grow and change, we have learned what it means to put aside our own wants and needs and be fully focused on another, and we speak of the future, knowing that with God’s help, Ari will be a part of that future and his needs must be considered as equal in the major life decisions we will make.

It is truly a blessing to have him in our lives. We look forward to seeing him continue to grow, develop a personality and pursue those things that become his passions in life. We will guide him and help him as he develops and then someday we will reap the rewards of him going out into the world and making us very proud of how we have raised him.

We have also seen another great blessing in our lives, and that is the blessing of community. Since Ari’s birth we have been able to witness directly what makes B’nai El such a wonderful community. Through the overwhelming number of B’nai El members who showed up at the Bris, and the great number of gifts and donations that we have received celebrating this event, and the numberless offers for babysitting we have been given (although I detect some enlightened self interest from these offers!) we have seen how members of B’nai El reach out to one another and care for one another in times of need.

This community of B’nai El, the family that we have been and are now, is a true blessing. It is our hope to have the opportunity to raise Ari as a part of this community so that he too will be able to understand the blessings that it brings to our family and, hopefully, to yours as well.

Last month, in writing about our new Mission Statement, I wrote about what spiritual growth means. I wrote that it is the process of making connections, primarily the connection with God, directly and by way of study, worship, family and community. I also wrote, echoing the assumption inherent in our Mission Statement that engaging in Jewish life is both a way toward spiritual growth and an outcome from spiritual growth.

This idea echoes the rabbinic precept of, “Mitzvah goreret mitzvah,” loosely translated: the fulfillment of one commandment leads to the fulfillment of more commandments. What our rabbis were trying to say is a well known psychological principle that good habits beget more good habits (the opposite is also true according to both psychology and our ancient sages).

Therefore, it is reasonable to say as we engage in Jewish life, and see spiritual growth within ourselves, we will be more likely to engage in further activities of Jewish life. This is why the initial engagement in Jewish life is such an important step for our spiritual growth as Jews.

Engagement is more than attendance. We have all (myself included) attended services, classes, or even Jewish social events where we just don’t feel engaged in the proceedings. We may understand what is happening, we may even be participating by standing up at the right time in services, looking at the handout in a class or speaking with others at the social event. But that is not engagement; that is going through the motions.

Engagement means that we put ourselves fully into the situation at hand. It means that during services we join in the singing with full voice, looking at the English of a Hebrew prayer that we know by rote, and finding places of connection, moments in the service where we can say that our lives are even just the tiniest bit better for having come. It is my goal, and the goal of the ritual committee that every service will have those moments for everyone who desires them.

Engagement means that we put ourselves fully into the situation at hand.

Engagement means that during a study session or class, we wrestle with the texts and topics. It means that we don’t simply take one opinion as the only possible opinion, we challenge and question, creating a dialogue out of what may have started as a monologue. It means that if our interest is developed in a certain topic to go out and learn more, wherever those resources may be located.

Engagement means that at a congregational dinner or social event, we don’t just sit and speak with people we already know, but we make an effort to reach out to those who may be in a new or unfamiliar surrounding. It means that we take the time to get to know our fellow members of the B’nai El family. It means that when we find out someone is having a tough time, or conversely has something to celebrate, that I, as the Rabbi, find out so that I can privately address a difficulty, or publicly announce a simcha so we can all celebrate together.

If you are willing to get your self engaged, you will quickly see how true the words of our rabbis are. If you are unsure of how to become more engaged, speak with me, I will be glad to sit with you, find out where your interests lie and put you together with the right types of activities that will lead to a sense of further engagement and spiritual growth.

I look forward to working with many of you to help you become more engaged in the activities at B’nai El and in Jewish life in general. We have a congregation rich in opportunities and a community full of possibilities. All it takes to realize them for yourself is you.

January, 2007
Spiritual Growth: What does it mean?

On the front page of this website, you can read the new mission statement passed by the membership of the congregation. The creation of the mission statement was a product of way too many people to mention here, it truly represents the input and work of the entire congregation.

While there are many nuances to the statement, there is one pair of words that is integral to making it a unique statement of who we are and what we hope to be as a congregation. Those words are: “spiritual growth.” The mission tells us and those looking at us that B’nai El creates opportunities for spiritual growth in order to engage us in Jewish life. It’s wonderful to say, but to make spiritual growth happen we have to understand what it is and how to achieve it.

Spiritual growth is a bit of amorphous term, it is hard to define, but in order for our mission statement to have any meaning we must to a degree. Spiritual growth comes from a sense of connectedness. Exactly what we should be or need to be connected to in order for us to achieve spiritual growth is different for each person but ultimately it comes down to connecting to something outside of or even within ourselves that links us to a sense of the divine, that is God, however defined.

Spiritual growth is about forming and growing connections, but the path to those connections must come from within each and every individual.

Some people want or need that direct link – study of theology, philosophy and meditation that seek out certain truths. For others an apparently indirect connection is more fulfilling or easier to grasp. This indirect connection may be through community, joining together for special days, special events and helping others. For others the connection may come through study, learning about and from our sacred texts and traditions that have been passed through the generations. Others may seek that connection through traditional and non-traditional ritual and liturgy, using spoken or sung words and actions to connect to our tradition and our future.

For most, if not all of us, however, what we need and desire is a mix of all these ways of forming connections to the divine. The mix is different for each of us, and B’nai El is dedicated to bringing in as many different programs and opportunities as possible in our current situation.

Spiritual growth is about forming and growing connections, but the path to those connections must come from within each and every individual. No one can tell us how to create those connections for ourselves. Our individual paths will be unique to ourselves, even as we might use the paths of others as a model or inspiration. True spiritual growth must start from within, finding and defining the ways that we ultimately reach outside of ourselves and create the connections that provide the ultimate nourishment to grow in our lives.

December, 2006
Why Hebrew?

This is a question I am occasionally asked. Only a minority of our congregants can read Hebrew and few (if any) actually understand it much beyond the word “Shalom.” Despite this, the Hebrew in our services and the Hebrew instruction in our BERAH program is growing. Why can we not just pray in English and spend our children’s educational time on more general Jewish topics? The answer is simple. Hebrew is our language. It is the language of our people from the beginning of our people’s history. It is one thing that bonds Jew to Jew in all lands and at all times. If we traveled back in time to a 9th century synagogue, we probably wouldn’t recognize much of what was going on, but when the familiar words of the V’shamru were recited, we would know that these people are our people.

Recently our congregational president and his wife, Jim and Janet Singer, had the opportunity to attend a service in Buenos Aires. While they couldn’t understand the Spanish at all, they heard the Hebrew (even if they didn’t understand the Hebrew) and knew that there was a sacred connection between Jews all over. Of course if you take a trip to Israel, where you can see the Hebrew language as a living language of our people not only a language of prayer and text, it is clear how the Hebrew language played a role in uniting and strengthening the early settlers in creating the Jewish State.

Hebrew is our lifeblood; it is what connects us to the Jewish people across the generations and across the oceans.

Hebrew is a beautiful language and it is a very creative language. It is based on three-letter root words that have a core meaning and then using different vocalization, prefixes and suffixes to create a wide variety of terms and words. In this way modern Hebrew was able to create new words out of old roots that appear in the Bible, linking the ancient and modern language.

This is why we teach and emphasize Hebrew at B’nai El. It is a link to our people through history and around the world. During prayer there will always be translation and usually transliteration available for those who do not read or understand Hebrew. We will also maintain a good amount of English in our services as we have. I am not about to give a sermon in Hebrew or expect that the whole service is conducted in Hebrew. But the use of Hebrew, even when we don’t understand what exactly is being said, connects us to our people in ways English never can. We may not notice that connection most of the time, but when we find ourselves in an unfamiliar Jewish situation we will definitely be glad that we have the anchor of Hebrew connecting us to our people.

Learning Hebrew is an important part of Jewish literacy. In the future (if not already) part of being a well educated Jew will be the ability to read Hebrew, even if you don’t fully understand it. That is why we are making the teaching of Hebrew a priority for our children and you will see increased opportunities to use and learn Hebrew at congregational services and even other events. If you are interested in learning Hebrew, let me know and we can set up a guided independent study program to help you learn.

Hebrew is our lifeblood; it is what connects us to the rest of the Jewish people across the generations and across the oceans. Without it we lose part of our unity as a people and our ability to feel at home as a Jews wherever we may find ourselves. With it we can remain strong as a people and enrich our lives even more through prayer, study and community.

October, 2006
Rejoicing in The Torah – Like You Never Have Before

In a classic early-80’s comedy film, Top Secret!, the main character has found his way into an East German prison cell occupied by a scientist forced to make a horrible weapon for the communist regime. The scientist says that he must be finished with his work by Sunday or face death (trust me, it’s a funny movie!). The main character exclaims, “Sunday! That’s Simchas Torah!”

The line is funny because it is so unexpected. But if he had said Yom Kippur, Hannukah or even Passover it would have lost some of the humor. The relative obscurity of Simchat Torah (Simchas is the old Ashkenazi pronunciation) when coupled with all of the other major holidays that we have at this time of year makes the joke all the more unexpected.

Fortunately, no one is being forced to do anything so dangerous on Friday, October 13 this year (fear of the number 13 is Christian in origin – it’s a good number for us Jews!), but it is indeed Simchat Torah. It is the day on which we conclude the holiday of Sukkot and celebrate in our ability to continue our cycle of learning for another year. We will additionally celebrate those who are new to learning as we recognize those students who are new as independent learners in the BERAH program. They will be called to the Bima to recite the Shema and will be given a special gift on behalf of the congregation.

Simchat Torah is a wonderful way to conclude our holiday season.

Besides the wonderful consecration ceremony, this Simchat Torah celebration will be different from any others experienced at B’nai El ever before. Our celebration begins at 7pm. It will take us on a journey trough the Torah. We will move from place to place in our building (tracing the history of our own building ad well as the Torah) and around our property as we sing and dance our way from one torah scroll to another. We will start with a reading in Genesis and move through the books until we reach Deuteronomy at which point the celebration will break out our front doors with singing and dancing with our Torah scrolls. (All of the outdoor parts are weather permitting of course, rain will stop us, but the cold will not – so dress warm if necessary.)

We’ll then return to our sanctuary where we will unroll the entire Torah and read from the end of Deuteronomy and the very beginning of Genesis, renewing once again our cycle of Torah learning. After that we will formally enter our new Religious School children into the community of learning and then enjoy wonderful snacks and sweets for our oneg. Of course in all our festivities we won’t forget to celebrate Shabbat, our day of rest.

The service and celebration is hard to describe, you have to come and be willing to get into the spirit of the celebration, the songs and the dancing, to truly understand what it will be all about. After the austere fasting and repentance of Yom Kippur, a celebration of Simchat Torah of this type is a wonderful way to conclude our holiday season.

September, 2006
To Cover or Not to Cover: that is the Question

Some years ago, I’m not entirely sure when, but it was before my ordination as Rabbi in 2002, I made a ritual decision for myself that many have regarded as peculiar. It has been my practice, while leading services and even while participating in services as a congregant to wear a tallit (prayer shawl) but not a kippah (Yarmulke, head covering). What makes this a peculiar practice is that most people who choose to wear a tallit also wear a kippah. While it is rather normal to see someone in a kippah and no tallit (we have many B’nai El members who make this choice during services), the other way around is highly unusual.

I justified this particular practice by saying that the command to wear the fringes, that is a tallit, is found in the Torah, while the command to cover our heads is not. It is a later adopted custom. Therefore, I found it important, at least in prayer, to follow the Torah command, but that it was not necessary to cover my head as there is no such commandment.

There are times that I wear a kippah. Anytime I am in a conservative or Orthodox congregation I do so out of respect for mihag hamakom (the custom of the place). Additionally I have a kippah I keep in my car that I wear at funerals and at hospital or nursing home visits as a way of identifying myself to both the staff and the people I am seeing.

Even with all this said, I continue to think a lot about the idea of the head covering, the kippah, and what the meaning behind it is. I did some research and found out some very interesting things. For some Jewish scholars, it is precisely because non-Jews do not cover their head that they feel Jews should do so (if this were true it might be convincing, but its really only Christians that don’t cover their heads, Muslims, Hindus and many others scrupulously cover their heads with coverings much larger than a kippah).

More convincing, is that this custom originated among Babylonian Jews, and many of the great sages in the Talmud are praised for keeping their heads covered as a sign of humility before God. During these ancient the kippah became a sign of a pious individual and over the centuries it was adopted for all Jews (in France and Germany in the 12thcentury there is evidence of bare headedness among Jewish men, but not after that).

The Reform movement, wanting to create a Judaism that blended it with the mainstream of German and American culture declared that since in those cultures taking off one’s hat is a sign of respect, Jews should follow that custom. Plus, the early Reform scholars argued, kippah is just a custom, and there is no need to distinguish ourselves in that way anymore. Most Reform Synagogues, including B’nai El, had a policy at one time that no one may cover their heads while praying, including the Rabbis.

In our modern day, there are few, if any, Reform congregations that ban the wearing of kippot, and it is certainly accepted here at B’nai El if a member so chooses. In the Reform egalitarian spirit women are perfectly free to don a kippah as well as men. Some Reform congregations even go as far as to have a basket of kippot at the door of the sanctuary just as conservative and orthodox congregations do (I call those satin numbers “rental kippot”).

The difficult and tragic events in Israel have called me to be more up front about who I am and what I stand for.

In my own thinking, I have come to realize that for myself the kippah can be an important expression of who I am and how I have chosen to live my life. Expanding on the idea of the kippah as an ID badge when I am in a hospital or nursing home, I realized that this is part of my identity and something that I want to proclaim more vocally at all times. Therefore, I have decided as my own personal practice to wear a kippah in most situations, including at services and any time I am in the congregation.

This decision also, in part, has to do with some of the recent events in the world, and especially those events in Israel in the past few weeks. These difficult and tragic events have called me to be more up front about who I am and what I stand for.

There is no room to go into kippah styles and choices and as to why certain Jews wear certain types of kippot. I will be wearing a variety, matching it with my clothing choice much of the time (there is no reason ritual wear can’t look good!). If you would like to learn more about kippah, and maybe learn a bit more so that you can make an informed choice about whether and when you might want to wear a kippah for yourself, I will be glad to take some time with you. Also, you may want to check on the selection of beautiful kippot that can be found in our Sisterhood Gift Shop.

As an important additional comment, you should all know that as long as I am the Rabbi of B’nai El, there will NEVER be a policy requiring anyone to wear a kippah in our building (the same goes for the tallit as well), the choice will always be in your hands, or rather, on your head.

July/August, 2006

Coming Together Spiritually

As I write this I am sitting in Oconomowoc, Wisconsin early on a beautiful Shabbat morning. I am at a conference called Hava Nashira (let us sing) an annual musical gathering that takes place at the URJ’s Olin-Sang-Ruby camp. I came to the conference hoping to learn a bit about creating more meaningful and engaging services for the High Holy Days, but when I leave tomorrow I will be bringing much more home with me.

Last night is still buzzing around in my head. We started with an amazing Kabbalat Shabbat service led by Jeff Klepper and Debbie Friedman, two of the foremost Jewish music composers of the last 40 years, and whose music is a regular part of our services at B’nai El (Mi Shebeirach and Shalom Rav most notably). Because it is a musical conference just about everyone has a beautiful voice (I almost fit in) and many brought rhythm instruments to accompany our service leaders. The pulse of the upbeat numbers and the beauty of the slower pieces was unlike anything in which I have participated.

Dinner was followed by an amazing song session including Jeff and Debbie, but also other major figures in Jewish music. The song session had everyone up and dancing, individuals on piano, flute and saxophone along with the aforementioned rhythm section had the whole room enveloped in an unbelievable energy. Those not playing instruments (my self included) were up clapping and dancing, joining and starting spontaneous dance circles that were composed of people just moved by both the music and a sense of oneg Shabbat, rejoicing in Shabbat, adding all our voices to the melodies and harmonies that filled the room.

Later that evening I found myself invited to a faculty gathering. During this gathering I was reminded of a quote from pirke avot, (often translated as the ethics of our fathers), which roughly says to “sit at the dust of the feet of scholars.” While talking with the faculty, I felt I was living out this instruction of our ancient sages. Despite the fact that I was the only one in the room with the title Rabbi, I was truly learning from, and at one point even teaching to, some of the greats of our generation.

If you allow yourself to be open to the words on the page, the melodies floating in the air, then the experience of a service becomes meaningful.

The evening broke up very late and, despite this, it took me a while to wind down from the incredible, natural, high that I was on . That feeling, that sense of spirit that pervaded the whole evening, and much of this conference, that is what I will bring home that will make the biggest difference at B’nai El. We can have this sense of spirit as well.

A story presented to the High Holy Day learning group spoke about the fact that the most inspiring readings, the most joyful or uplifting music, and the most reflective or thought provoking sermon are not enough for a spiritual and meaningful experience at services. Each worshipper, each individual in the room bears the ultimate responsibility for his or her experience during services. If you allow yourself to be open to the words on the page, the melodies floating in the air, then the experience of a service becomes meaningful for you and the sense of spirit and energy in the room increases.

If you come to the service with a closed mind, or you allow every distraction, noise or the occasional missed guitar chord to remove you from being fully present at the service, then it is difficult to have that experience of spiritual uplift. When you come to services, let yourself be in that moment; sing out as you are moved and let Shabbat come over you and take over your soul. The service should be an emotional experience along with an intellectual and communal experience.

Therefore I invite you to services and let yourself be absorbed by what is going on. Come even if you don’t know the melodies. Come even if you can’t tell an aleph from a gimmel. Come even if you have not been to services in years. Come even if you already join us regularly and know the melodies and the prayers, there will be something new for you each and every week.

When we all, together, allow the music, the words, the rhythms of our liturgy to separate ourselves from the daily difficulties of life, then we have come together, not just as a community of people, but as a community of spirit. I hope you will join me on this journey.

June, 2006

Bar and Bat Mitzvah: An Opportunity for Everyone

Because of the demographic ups and downs in a small congregation such as ours, we will occasionally have a year or so without a Bar or Bat Mitzvah Ceremony of a 13 year old celebrated on our Bimah. It just so happens that B’nai El went into such a demographic lull right as I arrived almost 2 years ago. There is nothing wrong with that, and in fact it gave us a great chance to examine our Bar and Bat Mitzvah policy and create a more standardized system, so that all students in our religious school can look forward to a positive experience when the time comes for them to be called to the Torah for the first time.

That lull is now coming to an end, and we, as the B’nai El family can look forward to seeing more young adults being called to the Torah as Bar or Bat Mitzvah in the coming year. It started just a few days ago, as the entire Sudin family, Jodi and her daughters, Stephanie, Tiffany and Brittany came to the Torah on a special Sunday morning B’not Mitzvah ceremony on May 21. Hopefully you were able to attend or at least read about it in the Jewish Light.

This coming month we are looking forward to another Bar Mitzvah, as Bradley Austrin comes to the Torah on the morning of June 17. This intelligent, soft-spoken young man has been a pleasure to work with through the whole process, and we even had the bonus of being a one-on-one Bar Mitzvah class for several months until others were ready to join us.

Bar or Bat Mitzvah is not just for the young. There are opportunities for adults of any age to become Bar or Bat Mitzvah.

While we are a small congregation, we are not tiny, and it is therefore impossible for any family to invite the whole congregation to all of the festivities. However, all are welcome to attend the ceremony, as it is a public Shabbat service beginning at 10 a.m. (sharp – really, I mean it!) I hope that many will attend to show support for Bradley as he declares his readiness to enter into our community as an adult. As it is one of the first such ceremonies I am conducting as Rabbi of B’nai El, I am looking forward to it with great anticipation. You can read a little more information about Bradley and his wonderful family on the back page.

But Bar or Bat Mitzvah is not just for the young. While they seem to get all the press (and first choice of dates), there are opportunities for adults of any age to become Bar or Bat Mitzvah. All you need to do is talk to me. We’ll develop a plan that meets your learning goals, teaches you to read some Hebrew so that you can, at least, read the most basic blessings, and we’ll choose a date on which we can celebrate.

Why do this? After all, just by waking up on your 13thbirthday you are already Bar or Bat Mitzvah (literally member of the commandment community). The ceremony simply recognizes that the change has taken place. But there are great reasons for going through the ceremony at an older age, even for those who may have gone through the preparation and ceremony at the traditional time.

The first reason is that you may have not had the chance to have such a ceremony. If you grew up in the time period when Confirmation was the major life-cycle event for young adults in the Reform community, you may not have even been aware of the opportunity. Additionally girls who grew up in the more traditional movements may not have had the same opportunities as the boys. If you were in such a situation, you now have a chance to correct that iniquity.

Even if you had a Bar or Bat Mitzvah ceremony, there is a tradition of celebrating a second one at the age of 83. This is based on a teaching that tells us our life is “three score and ten”, that is 70 years, so anything after is considered a “second” life. Therefore when you reach 13 in that second life, you celebrate Bar or Bat Mitzvah again. Just like for those who missed the ceremony at age 13, if you missed it at age 83, you can always do it later.

The other reason you may want a Bar or Bat Mitzvah is simply learning. It is hard to dedicate oneself to a course of learning when it is for its own sake. By setting a Bar or Bat Mitzvah date, you have a goal and an achievement in mind to help motivate your Jewish learning. This works even for those who celebrated Bar or Bat Mitzvah at the age of 13 but feel something was lacking at that time, from the level of learning to not appreciating the time fully enough when you were 13.

As I stated before, all you need to do is come and talk to me and we will set up a plan of learning to enable you to celebrate your Bar or Bat mitzvah. It does not matter if you are 16 years old, 120 years old or anywhere in between, we can make it happen for you.

May, 2006

Next Year is This Year

At the end of our Pesach seders we all say the words, “Next year in Jerusalem.” This phrase has several meanings. The traditional sense of the phrase is that it is a prayer that between this Pesach and next year’s, the Messiah will come and bring us all to Jerusalem. A more modern interpretation of the phrase is as prayer that the messianic era will begin in the next year, and then every city will be a city of peace (in Hebrew – ir shalom, or Jerusalem).

These meanings are both good, and in whatever form we get to the messianic age, (via a personal messiah bringing us all to Israel, or the onset of a messianic age of world harmony and peace wherever we are) I hope that it comes to pass soon. But, just in case it doesn’t, we can understand “Next year in Jerusalem” in a more literal sense: the opportunity to travel to Israel, this coming year, so that next year, when we attend our seders, we can say that we have, at least once, fulfilled these words, we had seen Jerusalem and all of its wonders.

We all have that opportunity this year to make “Next year” into this year. B’nai El, for the first time ever, is sponsoring a trip to Israel. Many of you have heard about it. It has now actually become a reality, people are reserving their spots and getting ready to go.

The Israel experience that this trip, October 26thto November 5th, has to offer will be unique from other trips. It will be a small private experience. We will have our own private guide, ample free time to explore the places we visit, and a flexible schedule while in Israel.

Most exciting, however, is an opportunity that you get with very few Israel trips (especially those 2 weeks or less), the ability to spend two Shabbatot in Jerusalem. When we first arrive on Friday at midday, we will go from the airport to Jerusalem and be able to experience Shabbat in the city of Gold, with services at a beautiful Reform congregation in the heart of the city, . On that first Shabbat morning, as we get the Jet lag out of our systems, we will attend Shabbat morning services at the Hebrew Union College, overlooking the Old City, and we will enter into the Old City later that day.

There is so much to see and experience in Israel, it will be the trip of a lifetime for all!

The second Shabbat, by which time we will have acclimated to the time changes, will be a truly special day, a day to simply live in Jerusalem on Shabbat. You will be given choices of where to go for services and what to do during the day, you can select from those, or just spend the day wandering the Old City, enjoying the multitude of parks near our hotel, or just relaxing poolside or in your hotel room. Whatever will make the Shabbat special and meaningful for you, you can do.

Between those two Shabbatot, we will explore all around Israel. We’ll go up on Masada, swim in the Dead Sea, see the holy city of Sfat, and the modern city of Tel Aviv. We’ll stay on a Kibbutz in the north, and get to drink wine fresh from The Golan Winery after a morning on an Israeli army base. Your evenings will give you time to experience the night life of Tel Aviv, Jerusalem and life on the Kibbutz.

There is so much to see and experience in Israel. If you have never been there, it will be the trip of a lifetime for you. If you have been to Israel before, it has changed since then. I guarantee you will see many new sites, and have a brand new experience, especially with your B’nai El family.

The trip is open to all members of the community, even if they are unaffiliated or affiliated elsewhere, so bring a friend. Non-Jewish travelers are welcome and will have ample time to explore the sites holy to their religious traditions.

There is always a great deal going on is Israel, and our travel partners will make sure that our trip is as safe and secure as if we were going to Chicago or Chesterfield. Call or e-mail the office for more information.

The time is now to make next year into this year.

April, 2006

A Busy Time

Ancient Judaism wasn’t designed this way, but the springtime has become a very crowded time on the Jewish calendar, even more so than the autumn with the High Holy Days and Sukkot. But starting with Passover in the middle of this month we have a staggering six holidays or observances in the course of 52 days.

Of course Passover kicks it all off. We celebrate our freedom to live as Jews, working for ourselves, our families and our communities, freedoms denied to many people around the world. We are thankful that we have enough to eat, and we can express that thanks by giving to both the Jewish Food Pantry and Mazon at this holiday (see page 3 for more info on both).

The Biblical Jewish calendar then continues at the end of the spring with Shavuot, when we rejoice on the traditional day of the receiving of the Torah at Sinai. To mark the occasion of receiving the commandments we celebrate with those who have chosen Judaism in their adult life by way of conversion, reading from the Book of Ruth, the first convert. We also rejoice with those who have chosen Judaism by way of completing their childhood education at the time of confirmation.

Despite the seemingly simple biblical calendar at this time of year, over the centuries we have added new celebrations and commemorations to remember our triumphs and struggles through history. First to be added was Lag B’omer, the 33rdday of counting the period between Passover and Shavuot. It is on this day that legend tells us a plague was lifted from the students of Rabbi Akiva. Therefore it is a day on which we celebrate the great contributions of students and teachers to our Jewish life.

This season, busy as it is, is a wonderful time for us to connect with our Jewish people and heritage.

In the past 60 years three more days have been added to the Jewish calendar. The first is Yom HaShoah, Holocaust remembrance day. This, of course, is a somber day, recalling the 12 million victims of the holocaust, but also the great victory of spirit of the Jewish people both in moments of rebellion against the Nazis and in our continued survivial in the years and now decades since this tragedy. A week later, Yom Hazikaron, is equally somber, recalling the Israeli lives lost to the various wars, battles and attacks over the now 100+ years of Jewish resettlement in the land. Both days are marked in Israel by the sounding of a siren during which everything (including traffic) stops and everyone stands in a moment of silence.

With the closing siren of Yom Hazikaron, the celebrations for Yom Ha’atzma’ut, Israeli Independence Day, begins in Israel and around the world. This is the day on which the British mandate ended and Israel declared itself a sovereign nation. In Israel the celebrations last all day (very similar to July 4thhere) and well into the night. Here in St. Louis we will also have multiple opportunities to celebrate, both here at B’nai El (see page 5 for more information), and in the St. Louis community (see the column to the right).

This season, busy as it is, is a wonderful time for us to connect with our Jewish people and heritage, at B’nai El, in the greater St. Louis community, and around the world. I hope you will take the time to celebrate, remember, and give generously to those in need at this special time of year.

March, 2006

Mission: Necessary

No need to worry; this web page will not self destruct in 10 seconds. But your mission, and I hope you will accept it, is to help B’nai El congregation create a mission statement of our own. This is an exciting time for the congregation as everyone will be invited to partake in the process of creating this mission statement. It will be a time to assess who we are, and to imagine what we can be while remembering our past with affection.

Why, you may ask, do we need a mission statement? A mission statement is an expression of group identity and desire. As we have only taken the very first steps into a new era for B’nai El, it is time to make sure that we are all going in more or less the same direction. A mission statement is an expression of what makes us unique in our larger community.

A mission statement is a rallying point. When we work as a community to develop the statement, we focus on who we want to be. A mission statement allows us to plan programs, events, services, even meetings, around a shared sense of purpose and identity. A mission statement says this is who we are, come and join us.

A mission statement also helps us secure our future, not just financially, but in terms of recruiting new members who will keep the congregation strong into the next generation. The strongest (not the largest, but the strongest) synagogues in this community and around the country have a strong sense of mission, and this ultimately attracts people who share in the values expressed by that mission.

While we all see B’nai El as something special, the process of creating and publicizing the mission statement allows us to express that special-ness to each other and to the community. Therefore it is important that our mission is uniquely our own. This means that if another congregation simply substituted their name for ours, it would no longer make sense. It would mean that if we simply put the name B’nai El on someone else’s mission, it would not fit.

A mission statement says, "This is who we are, come and join us."

The ultimate ingredient in the uniqueness of any congregation is its members. To that end, we will be asking everyone in the congregation to participate in the process of creating the mission statement.

The process will be simple, especially for the majority of our members. Everyone will be asked to attend one parlor meeting with a similar group of members at someone’s private home. If you are unable to make any of the meetings, there will be public sessions at B’nai El that will be open to anyone who desires. At these meetings everyone will be asked to reflect on their experiences at B’nai El and express their desires for the present and future of our congregation. In order to make sure that all voices are heard equally it is best that everyone attends only one meeting.

The information gathered at these meetings will be compiled into anonymous digests and then used in several ways. First, to create our mission statement the officers will see the digests and use the information to craft the final wording, which will then be voted on at a special congregation meeting over the summer. Second, the digests will be shared with the long-rang planning committee as they discuss the issues of our long term finances and our building and land. Finally, once the mission statement is approved, the original digests will help me develop a unified vision along with the officers and board so that we can make our mission a reality.

The mission cannot be effective without input from as many members as possible. I hope that in the coming weeks and months as you are invited to parlor meetings or public membership forums, you will take the time to attend one and allow your voice to be a part of B’nai El’s future.