Thursday, March 1, 2012
Princeton Exhibit
Be Happy
This Wednesday night from 4:30-7 PM we'll be reading the Megillah and enjoying the Purim shpiel from"Diary a Wimpy King" performed by our students. Not to mention the goldfish, games, hotdogs, and hamentashen. In chapter 9, the reason for our joy become clear. We are told that we should transform our grief at almost being annihilated by Haman into rejoicing. We are to make the 14th of Adar a holiday celebrated "in every generation, by every family, in every province and city. It is a day of feasting and merrymaking; a time to send gifts to one another and presents to the poor. These days of Purim shall never cease among the Jews, and shall never perish from amongst their descendants."
Well now that we understand why we're to be happy during the month containing Purim, I'm left wondering what about the next month of Nisan? We'll be slaving away cleaning and preparing for Pesach. Songs of liberation aside, how shall we stay happy then, and the rest of the year? Mary J. Blige gave us an answer when she crooned, "All I really want is to be happy." She says that joy comes from loving someone, and receiving love in return. To that Grammy worthy advice I'll add these two pearls of wisdom: Don't take life or yourself too seriously (so come in costume) and always be on the lookout for things that make you laugh and smile (I guarantee you'll find this year's performance hilarious).
Hag Purim Samayach,
Rabbi Molash Niktolp
Sunday, January 29, 2012
Mindfullness
In this week's parsha, Bo, God commands Moses to hold out his rod over the land of Egypt. God drove an east wind carrying a plague of locusts to all the crops in Egypt, which devoured everything green and darkened the land (Exodus 10:15). Pharoh, who was accustomed to ruling a country that served as the bread basket of the entire Middle East, now had to wonder where his next meal was coming from. Pharoh quickly summoned Moses and Aaron saying, "I stand guilty before the Lord your God, and before you. Forgive my offense, just this once, and plead with the Lord your God that he remove this death from me." Because pharoh lived on the banks of the Nile surrounded by his agricultural lands, when he saw the locusts he knew immediately that he was doomed. However today, we are so far removed from the farm that most of us don't realize that this warm winter we're having means that certain insect populations will be flourishing this coming spring because we haven't had enough frosty nights to reduce their numbers. If you've ever been hungry, you know that we can't take food for granted.
On Wednesday when our students were leaving religious school, we saw the new moon of the Hebrew month Shevat rising over our fields, which reminded us that the new year for the trees (Tu B'Shevat) will be here in a couple of weeks. This gives us an opportunity to focus on the source of our food. We are all becoming more mindful of which foods that we eat are kosher, nutritious, organic, and harvested locally. At our Tu B'Shevat program we'll be saying our prayers to God and thanking him for the produce and fruits of the earth. Every time we put something in our mouth we have an opportunity to say a blessing. In addition to keeping kosher, many of our students have food allergies so we pay close attention to food preparation in our synagogue and school (sorry, Mr. Peanut). Recently I became a Rabbinic Fellow for Hazon, a Jewish environmental society (http://www.hazon.org/). If you go their web page you will find lots of suggestions for ways in which we can become closer to God through what we eat.
On Wednesday when our students were leaving religious school, we saw the new moon of the Hebrew month Shevat rising over our fields, which reminded us that the new year for the trees (Tu B'Shevat) will be here in a couple of weeks. This gives us an opportunity to focus on the source of our food. We are all becoming more mindful of which foods that we eat are kosher, nutritious, organic, and harvested locally. At our Tu B'Shevat program we'll be saying our prayers to God and thanking him for the produce and fruits of the earth. Every time we put something in our mouth we have an opportunity to say a blessing. In addition to keeping kosher, many of our students have food allergies so we pay close attention to food preparation in our synagogue and school (sorry, Mr. Peanut). Recently I became a Rabbinic Fellow for Hazon, a Jewish environmental society (http://www.hazon.org/). If you go their web page you will find lots of suggestions for ways in which we can become closer to God through what we eat.
Sunday, January 8, 2012
L'Chaim
I always thought of l'chaim as the classic Jewish toast and assumed that it meant to life, but it turns out it means that and more. I toasted my family l'chaim last Saturday night over the Havdallah cup, before we went out for New Year's and then again over champagne later on in the evening as 2012 approached. And tonight we will share a l'chaim as we always do at our 8:00 minyan when we raise our glasses and welcome the Sabbath.
It turns out the Ashkenazi Jews got the custom to say savrei maranan to which the response is l'chaim from the Sephardic Jews of the Middle East. They in turn got it from the Jews of Spain in the Middle Ages. In his 14th century Spanish prayer book Rabbi David ben Josef Abudarham sought to explain the province of the custom. He said that it was because Jews waiting to be executed would be given a glass of wine before their capital punishment and we do not want to become condemned prisoners ourselves, and so we say, "to life." Alternatively, Rabbi Abudarham hypothesized that in the Garden of Eden the forbidden fruit that Adam ate was a grape, and not an apple. After Adam ate the fruit of the vine, he was punished with mortality. So we say "to life" before we drink as a counter measure to the Angel of Death.
While I appreciate these rather fanciful explanations, Rabbi Tigay writes in The Forward that the original source of the custom lay in ancient Babylonia, where the Jews spoke Aramaic and they said l'chayei instead of l'chaim. One Jew would raise a glass and in preparation to saying the blessing borai perie h'gofen, he would turn to his friends and say savrei maranan, "Gentleman, what do think? Is everyone ready for the blessing?" And they would answer with the archaic Talmudic expression, l'chayei. "Yes, alright fine."
So as we prepare for this first Shabbat of 2012, let's lift our Kiddush cups and say savrei maranan... l'chaim. TO LIFE!
It turns out the Ashkenazi Jews got the custom to say savrei maranan to which the response is l'chaim from the Sephardic Jews of the Middle East. They in turn got it from the Jews of Spain in the Middle Ages. In his 14th century Spanish prayer book Rabbi David ben Josef Abudarham sought to explain the province of the custom. He said that it was because Jews waiting to be executed would be given a glass of wine before their capital punishment and we do not want to become condemned prisoners ourselves, and so we say, "to life." Alternatively, Rabbi Abudarham hypothesized that in the Garden of Eden the forbidden fruit that Adam ate was a grape, and not an apple. After Adam ate the fruit of the vine, he was punished with mortality. So we say "to life" before we drink as a counter measure to the Angel of Death.
While I appreciate these rather fanciful explanations, Rabbi Tigay writes in The Forward that the original source of the custom lay in ancient Babylonia, where the Jews spoke Aramaic and they said l'chayei instead of l'chaim. One Jew would raise a glass and in preparation to saying the blessing borai perie h'gofen, he would turn to his friends and say savrei maranan, "Gentleman, what do think? Is everyone ready for the blessing?" And they would answer with the archaic Talmudic expression, l'chayei. "Yes, alright fine."
So as we prepare for this first Shabbat of 2012, let's lift our Kiddush cups and say savrei maranan... l'chaim. TO LIFE!
Sunday, December 11, 2011
Jewish Continuity
Jewish Continuity
What good was it if God blessed Abraham and Sarah "with all things" if they had no one to pass their spiritual inheritance down to? You could say they faced the first ever crisis of Jewish continuity. In last week's parsha we saw they had lost hope in ever having an heir, notwithstanding God's promise, "to make of them a great nation." Then, after he is nearly sacrificed on the altar, their prodigal son Isaac shows little interest in marrying or starting a family of his own. Perhaps part of the problem was that his parents forbade him from taking a wife from amongst the local Canaanite maidens, like his half-brother Ishmael did, and there were no Yiddeshe maidlach in the area. In sending his servant Eliezer abroad to find a wife for his scholarly homebody of a son Isaac, Abraham in effect created the world's first concierge dating service!
The Jewish community is as concerned today about the Jewish future as Abraham and worries about the same challenge: how do you make a compelling argument for the value of particularism and tribalism in today's increasingly universal and pluralistic world? Are these values, in fact, mutually exclusive?
Instead of answering this question directly I'll invite you to join me for the 25th Anniversary of Lou Balcher's YJLC, Young Jewish Leadership Concepts, at 5:30PM Sunday afternoon, December 11th, downtown at Congregation Mikve Israel. We can discuss the relative importance of our enduring Jewish values directly with GenY.
Yesterday our synagogue hosted all the congregational Rabbis and Jewish educators from the counties on both sides of the Delaware for an exclusive lecture and discussion (and bagel brunch) with Dr. David Bryfman, a Jewish internet maven. He did not just come to promote J-Date. Rather we talked about bringing virtual resources into the classroom, and sharing more values-laden Torah online. We'll be exploring the quickly changing ways we can engage our children and grandchildren in Talmud Torah and Jewish living at services this Shabbat.
Shabbat Shalom,
Rabbi Shalom Plotkin
By the way...Care to guess the two most common queries on JewishLearning.Com? First, how do I mourn for and bury my loved one in a traditionally respectful way? That's actually another dilemma Abraham faces in Chayyei Sarah, and he buys a cave in Hebron called Marat HaMachpelah. What's the second most asked online Jewish question? The best recipe for hummus!
What good was it if God blessed Abraham and Sarah "with all things" if they had no one to pass their spiritual inheritance down to? You could say they faced the first ever crisis of Jewish continuity. In last week's parsha we saw they had lost hope in ever having an heir, notwithstanding God's promise, "to make of them a great nation." Then, after he is nearly sacrificed on the altar, their prodigal son Isaac shows little interest in marrying or starting a family of his own. Perhaps part of the problem was that his parents forbade him from taking a wife from amongst the local Canaanite maidens, like his half-brother Ishmael did, and there were no Yiddeshe maidlach in the area. In sending his servant Eliezer abroad to find a wife for his scholarly homebody of a son Isaac, Abraham in effect created the world's first concierge dating service!
The Jewish community is as concerned today about the Jewish future as Abraham and worries about the same challenge: how do you make a compelling argument for the value of particularism and tribalism in today's increasingly universal and pluralistic world? Are these values, in fact, mutually exclusive?
Instead of answering this question directly I'll invite you to join me for the 25th Anniversary of Lou Balcher's YJLC, Young Jewish Leadership Concepts, at 5:30PM Sunday afternoon, December 11th, downtown at Congregation Mikve Israel. We can discuss the relative importance of our enduring Jewish values directly with GenY.
Yesterday our synagogue hosted all the congregational Rabbis and Jewish educators from the counties on both sides of the Delaware for an exclusive lecture and discussion (and bagel brunch) with Dr. David Bryfman, a Jewish internet maven. He did not just come to promote J-Date. Rather we talked about bringing virtual resources into the classroom, and sharing more values-laden Torah online. We'll be exploring the quickly changing ways we can engage our children and grandchildren in Talmud Torah and Jewish living at services this Shabbat.
Shabbat Shalom,
Rabbi Shalom Plotkin
By the way...Care to guess the two most common queries on JewishLearning.Com? First, how do I mourn for and bury my loved one in a traditionally respectful way? That's actually another dilemma Abraham faces in Chayyei Sarah, and he buys a cave in Hebron called Marat HaMachpelah. What's the second most asked online Jewish question? The best recipe for hummus!
Tragedy of Bari
The Tragedy of Bari
On this day in history Dec. 3rd 1943 the tragedy of Bari occurred. (I first heard about this when I was in the port of Bari, Italy during my service as a Navy Chaplain 42 years later!) It was like a second Pearl Harbor, but in this case the German Luftwaffe sent over 100 fighter/bombers in a surprise attack against allied shipping destroying 17 ships, damaging 7 more, and killing over 1000 merchant marines. There was a secret cargo of 2000 poisonous mustard gas bombs aboard one American Liberty ship that was blown up that caused 628 people to suffer "mysterious burns". 69 died with two weeks.
What amazes me is that the British historian writing the article says: "The Bari raid produced the only poison gas incident associated with WW2, made worse by the perceived need for secrecy in wartime. " He goes on to report that the ship, "John Harvey, already on fire, suddenly blew up, disappearing in a mighty fireball, casting pieces of ship and her deadly cargo of mustard gas all over the harbor. Mustard gas gives off a garlic odor, and now it combined with oil in the harbor, creating a deadly and volatile mixture. People were noticing a smell of garlic in the air, already doing its deadly work. "
I beg to differ. The only gas incident??? We were allowed to handle an actual gas mask worn by a Jewish slave laborer in Dachau, one of the Nazi death factories, during our synagogue's tour of the Holocaust Museum at the Klein branch JCC recently. Does the gassing of millions of Jews with Zyclon B gas by the Germans and their allies in the death camps not count as an incident? What about the gassing of "imbeciles" who were forced into specially rigged "vans" so that the exhaust gasses would kill the human "cargo?" Perhaps the author decided that since the Germans, who had invented Sarin gas, never deployed it on the battlefield, that this was the only "incident?"
Continuing the legacy of never again...
Shabbat Shalom,
Rabbi Shalom Plotkin
On this day in history Dec. 3rd 1943 the tragedy of Bari occurred. (I first heard about this when I was in the port of Bari, Italy during my service as a Navy Chaplain 42 years later!) It was like a second Pearl Harbor, but in this case the German Luftwaffe sent over 100 fighter/bombers in a surprise attack against allied shipping destroying 17 ships, damaging 7 more, and killing over 1000 merchant marines. There was a secret cargo of 2000 poisonous mustard gas bombs aboard one American Liberty ship that was blown up that caused 628 people to suffer "mysterious burns". 69 died with two weeks.
What amazes me is that the British historian writing the article says: "The Bari raid produced the only poison gas incident associated with WW2, made worse by the perceived need for secrecy in wartime. " He goes on to report that the ship, "John Harvey, already on fire, suddenly blew up, disappearing in a mighty fireball, casting pieces of ship and her deadly cargo of mustard gas all over the harbor. Mustard gas gives off a garlic odor, and now it combined with oil in the harbor, creating a deadly and volatile mixture. People were noticing a smell of garlic in the air, already doing its deadly work. "
I beg to differ. The only gas incident??? We were allowed to handle an actual gas mask worn by a Jewish slave laborer in Dachau, one of the Nazi death factories, during our synagogue's tour of the Holocaust Museum at the Klein branch JCC recently. Does the gassing of millions of Jews with Zyclon B gas by the Germans and their allies in the death camps not count as an incident? What about the gassing of "imbeciles" who were forced into specially rigged "vans" so that the exhaust gasses would kill the human "cargo?" Perhaps the author decided that since the Germans, who had invented Sarin gas, never deployed it on the battlefield, that this was the only "incident?"
Continuing the legacy of never again...
Shabbat Shalom,
Rabbi Shalom Plotkin
Gift of Life Shabbat/Organ Doantion
In this week's parsha Vayishlach, our matriarch Rachel was in child birth and she had hard labor. The midwife said to her at the height of her pain, "Have no fear, you're going to have another boy." However she was in so much pain she had trouble focusing on the fact that God was answering her prayer for another boy and instead she said, "Name him Ben-Oni, child of pain or child of mourning, because he is killing me." Then she died and she was buried on the road to Ephrot which is now the city of Bethlehem. Her husband, Jacob, said, " We won't call him Ben-Oni instead we will call him Ben-Yamin," (Benjamin) which means son of my right hand.
I wonder how Rachel's difficult birth might have played out in a modern hospital today. God willing, her life might have been saved through an emergency C-section or another of today's revolutionary lifesaving techniques. However, had Rachel passed away, it's possible that her family might have remembered a discussion they might have had about organ donation. Or possibly they might have seen that she marked "organ donor" on her driver's license and after she passed away they might have donated her organs in order to save another person's life. In that case her body would have been treated with the utmost dignity and still could have been prepared for a Jewish burial according to our traditions without any undue delay.
This coming Shabbat morning Seymour and Donna will be sponsoring the Kiddush in honor of their son Garren's full recovery. We will be celebrating Gift of Life Shabbat to recognize the mitzvah that Garren donated half of his liver to a very sick young man he had never met named Marco, and Garren will share his experience. If you would like to test yourself to see what you know about Jewish law regarding organ donation, you could take this quiz from the Halachic Organ Donor Society, just click HODS quiz.
Shabbat Shalom,
Rabbi Shalom Plotkin
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