Tag Archives: authenticity

True Blue

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I shared this dvar in honor of the Robbin Landes Family @
a 7 Brachot meal for Hannah Robbin Landes & Eitan Gavson:

Dear Sheryl, Rav Landes, Isaac, Hannah and Eitan,

I am so touched to have the opportunity to address the five of you directly in celebration of Hannah’s & Eitan’s marriage. Thank you.

You all mean a great deal to me – both as individuals, and as a model of a beautiful family. And in both cases, you demonstrate a searching for meaning that is expressed in the thoughtfulness of the choices that you make. Your Judaism – the Judaism that compels me – is a delicate balance of commitment to our Halakhic heritage, and the embracing of every individual’s self driven journey to find his or her best and most true self.

I’d like to consider one component of Parshat Shlach with you now, examining it through the lenses of choice and commitment.

At the very end of this week’s Parasha, on the fringe, so to speak, we find the mitzvah of tzitzit (Numbers 15:38-40):

לח דַּבֵּר אֶל-בְּנֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל, וְאָמַרְתָּ אֲלֵהֶם, וְעָשׂוּ לָהֶם צִיצִת עַל-כַּנְפֵי בִגְדֵיהֶם, לְדֹרֹתָם; וְנָתְנוּ עַל-צִיצִת הַכָּנָף, פְּתִיל תְּכֵלֶת. 38 ‘Speak unto the children of Israel, and bid them that they make them throughout their generations fringes in the corners of their garments, and that they put with the fringe of each corner a thread of blue.
לט וְהָיָה לָכֶם, לְצִיצִת, וּרְאִיתֶם אֹתוֹ וּזְכַרְתֶּם אֶת-כָּל-מִצְו‍ֹת יְהוָה, וַעֲשִׂיתֶם אֹתָם; וְלֹא-תָתוּרוּ אַחֲרֵי לְבַבְכֶם, וְאַחֲרֵי עֵינֵיכֶם, אֲשֶׁר-אַתֶּם זֹנִים, אַחֲרֵיהֶם. 39 And it shall be unto you for a fringe, that ye may look upon it, and remember all the commandments of the LORD, and do them; and that ye go not about after your own heart and your own eyes, after which ye use to go astray; Continue reading →
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[Alumni Guest Post] Toward God’s Love

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R. Julie Gordon (PEP '12) recollects:

Here are some of my thoughts after my experience davenning with Women of the Wall (WOW) on May 10, 2013.

Rabbi Julie Gordon praying with Women of the Wall

Rabbi Julie Gordon praying with Women of the Wall

I was exhilarated on the day after my bat mitzvah when I learned how to lay tefillin through the wisdom and care of Bert Cooper, z”l, our Albert Lea, MN para-rabbi. I felt empowered and joyful. Safely ensconced in our community and our shared relationship with God. My Baba had given me my Zayde’s tefillin. On that day when I held them in my hands, we both cried. She said, “Zayde would be so proud that you will be using his tefillin as he laid tefillin six days a week.” I remember those words every day as I wrap them around my arms, even now 40 years later, the soft leather straps worn thin and replaced twice. The scrolls checked and rechecked by sofrei stam. I am the only person on my mother’s side of the family who lays tefillin and I do it with care.

Last week, on my 56th birthday, I was preparing to lay my Zeyde’s teffilin, and to wrap myself in his memory, as I feel commanded to do this mitzvah. But, for the first time, I felt afraid. Continue reading →

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[Alumni Guest Post] Tricky Number Ten

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Rachel Bikofsky (Summer '12) wrote a reflection
on last week's Parshat Hashavuah (Parshat Yitro).

We could all stand to take this lesson from her book:

As parshiot go, this past week’s–Yitro–was a Big One.  Amid tremendous spectacle at Mt. Sinai, Hashem revealed to the Israelites the Ten Commandments.  Although the rest of the Torah would not be given until later, this first phase was monumental in its own right.  For a full translation of the Commandments, visit this page…but, for the sake of brevity, I’ll give a quick recap:

  1. I am Hashem, your G-d.
  2. You shall have no other gods besides Me.
  3. You shall not take the Name of Hashem in vain.
  4. Remember the Sabbath Day and keep it holy.
  5. Honor your father and mother.
  6. You shall not murder.
  7. You shall not commit adultery.
  8. You shall not steal.
  9. You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.
  10. You shall not covet. 

Commandments 1-4 are pretty essential to the essence of Judaism, so it seems logical that the list would lead with these.  Regarding Commandments 6-9, these are critical guidelines for morality, not to mention vital to the safety of the community and the maintenance of public order.  Although I’m sure no one enjoys a completely conflict-free relationship with his or her parents, it does make sense that (except in the most extreme circumstances) it is a child’s duty to honor his or her parents by respecting them and providing them with what they need, materialistically and emotionally, as they age.

But what about Commandment # 10?
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the moment i knew i would be ok

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From my blog:

the moment i knew i would be ok

I walked across the street leaving the bench where I sat to give my feet a rest from my blisters
I feel you again, that constant “what the !! are you doing next year?”
as we brought the new year an hour prior, it rests on my mind
How do I make goals for the new year when you don’t know where you will be, what you will be doing, or who you will be sharing your life with?
It has to just be about you, the internal home that never changed no matter where you go.
I will pray for inner calm through chaos.
So we walked, I am not just waiting around
I take a long step in the cold, through the hurt, raise my arms and fly to the other side

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[Alumni Guest Post] The Word “Jew”

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Originally posted on the Ayeka blog
By Aryeh Ben David (Year '80):

Sometimes I start a workshop by asking people if they know what the word “Jew” means. It is amazing how many people do not know what it means.

thkI checked a few encyclopedias, googled it, and was surprised to see how many theories exist regarding where the word came from and how it came to be used as a reference for the people of Israel.

But then I decided not to let these theories complicate my life. There’s really only one definition that I like. There’s really only one that I want to think about when I hear the word Jew.

And that comes from the name Judah, which comes from the word l’hodot, which means to be thankful. I like to think of the word Judaism as meaning – the practice of being grateful.

That doesn’t mean that I don’t still kvetch. I still grumble over why Continue reading →

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[Alumni Guest Post] Aryeh Ben David – What is Spiritual Education?

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Posted by Aryeh Ben David (Year '80)
On the Ayeka Blog:

(These thoughts were influenced by Parker Palmer’s A Life Unidvided)

Holding the space for souls to reveal. Soul evoking soul. If I had to summarize Judaism in a sentence it might be: souls evoking souls. Sympathetic vibrations of our souls. First – I pluck the soul string of my life – and that evokes the sympathetic vibration of another’s soul string. I don’t have to pluck his string. I don’t have to do anything to him. If I do it authentically to myself – it will have the result of his being moved, being moved without him even moving himself. His soul string will be plucked, and then he will realize what happened. He will become conscious and aware of what is going on within himself.

We need to create the space for our soul strings to be plucked. A place of quiet, of sincerity, of authenticity, of caring and love. A place of “kol d’m’ma daka.” A place of whispering. Not a place of clamoring. Continue reading →

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Authentically Now

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Evan was my first flatmate in Israel; he and I studied at Pardes together, and we had plenty of conversations about our shared Jewish heritage over the course of that year.

He had fond childhood memories of his grandfather, a traditional, American shul-going Jew, and recalled the smell and texture of the tallit that he had worn at services. Evan’s Jewish religious identity was bound tightly to his memories of his grandfather.

My Eastern European last name means ‘He who prays to G-d’, and as far as I know, my family was comprised of traditionally religious Jews only five generations ago. Nonetheless, my decision to live a traditionally religious Jewish life has set me apart in some significant ways from my family members. Unlike Evan, I have no personal memories of anybody’s tallit, but still feel that my Jewish religious identity is bound tightly to the meaning of my last name, and my ancestors to whom it was assigned.

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[Student Profile] Kyle Lebell

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Kyle was raised in Berkeley, CA to a father who had rejected his Jesuit upbringing and faith altogether, but remained knowledgeable through his work as a publisher of religious books, and a Jewish mother who did not have a strong traditional upbringing.  While Judaism as such did not play a positive, central role in her early life, God and spirituality certainly did.  Her mother taught her the Shma as a blessing to allay her fears, and she still instinctively recites it when appropriate.

Attending bi-weekly Hebrew school a half-hour drive away from home during her primary school years, Kyle felt that: “Judaism was a building I attended Hebrew school in.”  Nevertheless, her mother did not abandon the hope that Judaism would play a central part in Kyle’s life, and her efforts paid off.

While attending a private high school — education was and continues to be one of the highest values in the household — Kyle participated in the New Jewish Film Project, bringing together Jewish high school students from the Bay Area to create a film to be shown at the San Francisco Jewish Film Festival in the summer of 2002.  They created a documentary, Not Another Jewish Movie, about what it was like growing up Jewish in the Bay Area, and it was screened widely. Continue reading →

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‘Encounter’ing and Machloket

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I made aliyah in August 2009, after completing my MPA at Columbia University, knowing that I wanted to come to Israel and use my degree to make a positive difference in the future of the Jewish people. Today I do that through my studies at the Pardes Institute of Jewish Studies in Jerusalem and work at Encounter, a non-profit organization aiming to transform the Israeli-Palestinian conflict through face-to-face understanding.

The Encounter November 2010 Trip for people with Israeli citizenship was a poignant experience for me. I came out of the trip truly believing in the Encounter model and its Communication Agreement to help people’s listening skills and communication techniques develop when confronted with difficult issues. The Encounter model makes a space for listening and processing over time – while allowing people to keep and/or adjust their own beliefs and perspectives – I would call my personal beliefs “responsibly Zionistic”.  Meaning that Continue reading →

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Impressions, Poland: Day V, and… Authenticity

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This will likely be my final note on the Pardes ’10 Poland Trip. We’ll see.

Much of what I’ve reflected upon has been inspired by R. Levi Cooper, and I’m particularly appreciative of his emphasis on the wealth of Eastern European Jewish culture before the Shoah. We spent much of our final day touring the Jewish sites of Kraków, Poland because he did not want to end our trip at a concentration camp (we’d been at Auschwitz all day the previous day). He wanted us to leave Poland remembering the glory of Ashkenazi culture before the Shoah.

k2
For me, it worked.

—–

Last night, I attended a men’s Rosh Hodesh celebration hosted by two lovely human beings that I study with at Pardes. I’d never attended such an event before, and I didn’t really know what to expect (I’m not sure anybody else did either), but I had a wonderful time.

We were lucky to have our classmate Ira play guitar and lead us in song, and Ayal lovingly encouraged us to share words of Torah with one another, which many did. Our group included new students and older students, as well as the medic from our Negev Tiyul. A friend later commented to me upon the level of “authenticity and Jewish love” at Josh & Dave’s Rosh Hodesh event; I wasn’t the only one affected. “It was good to sing and dance with you last night,” he wrote.

I often have difficulty feeling celebratory when it’s expected of me. Earlier that day, students had been dancing around Pardes in celebration of Rosh Hodesh, and I had felt uncomfortable, but at the men’s Rosh Hodesh event that night, I suddenly wanted to sing & dance in celebration of the month of Adar – and I did.

—–

k1After touring Jewish Kraków, before boarding the bus for our next destination, a friend with a strong kesher (connection) to his Ashkenazi roots said to me, “I can imagine having lived here: I can imagine having been myself, living in this Kraków that we learned about today. I relate to this.”

And I said, “I don’t relate to this at all. I have pieces of Eastern European, Israeli, and North American Judaism swirling around within me, and don’t think I would have been the same person back in the Kraków of centuries past. My pluralistic Modern Orthodox Judaism didn’t exist back then. I would been raised under different influences. The shuls of Kraków are beautiful, and I stand proud of the tremendous Jewish culture that once flourished here, but… this isn’t my Jewish culture.”

—–

I’ve been enjoying Bible Raps music clips recently because somebody at Pardes sent out a link to their Purim video (Bible Raps was started by a Pardes alumnus, btw). Listening to this reflection of a 21st century American Jew’s passion for Jewish education has resonated powerfully with me: the fusion of Jewish learning and modern U.S. pop culture feels… authentic. It feels like a fusion of… pieces of myself.

—–

I’ve been taking classes on halakha (Jewish law) at Pardes this year, and loving them. Rabbi Moshe Isserles (1520-1572) of Kraków has been one of my teachers this year, and having the opportunity to visit his shul in Poland was very special for me. Out of eternal honor for this Gaon (Torah giant), his chair at shul remains empty throughout the year.

k3Once, R. Isserles lived and taught. Once, he was a pillar of his Kraków community; he donated his home to the community as a synagogue; he subsidized students of Torah with his own resources; and he was one of the greatest Jewish scholars of Europe.

Today, I connect to R. Isserles through his texts. Centuries later and on different continents, I apply this Gaon’s teachings as best I can to my life in modern, Western society… which is very different from the life he knew.

And increasingly, I think… I cannot save the Judaism lost in Europe to the Shoah, as much as I appreciate it, as much as I am inspired by it, but I can be a part of Judaism today. I can’t be a part of R. Moshe Isserles’ shul or community, but I can build Jewish community at my own shul.

In a previous post, I wrote that I feel… it matters. It matters that Jews visit Poland. It matters that Jews visit the sites of Nazi terrors. It matters that Jews visit the remains of Jewish Eastern Europe. But I also feel… that Jews must continue to live as Jews to honor their ancestors. I also feel… that Jews must continue to live as Jews… today.

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