Tag Archives: nigun / niggun

[Alumni Guest Post] Peter Avniel Salzman of Blessed Memory

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Alicia Jo Rabins (Year '99, Fellows '00) wrote the following
in memory of her friend Peter Avniel Salzman z"l

ajrWhen the Pardes students asked me to write something for the Pardes blog a few weeks ago, I thought I’d write about how Pardes changed my life. How I was, at twenty, a secular American Jew hungry for spiritual wisdom, cobbling together rituals based on the few blessings I knew, reciting the Kiddush over beer on a Friday night in my college dorm room. How a chance encounter with an Orthodox student led me to Pardes, where I was introduced to the depth and beauty of Torah, and fell in love. How I now strive to bring some of that electric energy and excitement to my own teaching, and also to my work as an artist, in which I often build on Jewish texts and traditions. And how I am eternally grateful to Pardes for creating a space where I could dive deep into Torah without having to pretend to be anyone other than my young, eager, critical, exuberant self.

I thought I’d write about the palpable holiness of studying after-hours during night seder and on Shavuot – that feeling of navigating the depths while others sleep, and how it reminded me of the weeks I spent living on a boat in the middle of the ocean during my junior year. Or about the daytime energy of the beit midrash, the French press and bag of coffee grounds my chavruta Marc and I kept in our locker to fuel our learning sessions, my exhilaration as we dug into Talmud, the compassion and brilliance of our teachers. Or about the Shabbat dinners I hosted with my dear roommate Jill that first year – we couldn’t afford a table, so our guests ate on my twin mattress, which we flipped over and covered with a length of leopard-print material we’d bought in the shuk. I thought I’d write a simple love letter to Pardes.

Avniel

Avniel

But this past Sunday, Peter Avniel Salzman passed away. Those of you who knew me in Jerusalem know how close we were during the years I was at Pardes; I loved him, as did many of you. He was 38 years old. So, with a heavy heart and the knowledge that my words are insufficient, I will write a few words in Peter’s memory. Continue reading →

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Torah Balance

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Yesterday was a special day at Pardes. Not because Meir was roaming the halls with a mass of students, singing at the top of his lungs, although that was part of it. Not because there was dancing in the beit midrash, although that was part of it as well. The occurrences above, while special, have been seen from time to time at Pardes before.

375086_10151567979563826_2073371638_nBut, this time, the spirited nigunnim sung in the halls and the circle dancing in the middle of the beit midrash were in celebration and commemoration of a Hachnasat Sefer Torah, the welcoming in of a Torah that was given to the Pardes community. This sefer torah was brought into our community with a number of meaningful rituals: It was brought, under the shade of a tallit, to every classroom where Torah was being learned that morning; it was escorted through the halls in which endless conversations referencing the impact of Torah study can be heard; and it was passed, from person to person, around the beit midrash, out to Continue reading →

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Snow day = best day of my life

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From my blog:
We were all awake long before we finally received the email from Pardes to tell us that school was canceled. We all knew, there was a blizzard coming down outside our windows! The city had already shut down the afternoon before because of some hail. We quickly rallied and got a group together to head to the Kotel. We were told that we couldn’t miss a white Kotel.
We trudged down Derech Hevron all the way to the Old City…actually, it was sunny and we were throwing snow balls at each other! We went to the overview where the following picture was taken. Then we went to the Kotel.
Our brave and AWESOME group!

Our brave and AWESOME group!

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The Niggun I could not recall

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For the past couple of years, on Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, I have been attending this Minyan (service, today, this word is often used for groups who pray together but are not affiliated with a movement of Judaism) called Koleinu, at my parents synagogue. One year, before Rosh Hashanah, they has a workshop to teach new tunes that would be incorporated into the service. Everything that was taught was really beautiful. However, there was one melody that really stuck with me. This year, as Rosh Hashanah approached, I tried to remember that melody, and I just could not. I was very troubled by this because I usually have a very good memory for music.

Yesterday, I attended Sod Siach, a Minyan, that reminds me of the one from home. All of the sudden, a melody that the person leading us used, triggered the memory of the forgotten melody. As soon as I was outside again, walking home, I began singing the melody so I would not forget it. Then I sang it as I gathered what I was bringing to lunch, and on the way to lunch, I sang it while sitting in the park, and later, while taking a walk on “the rakevet” (a park that connects many neighborhoods in Jerusalem, which runs along the old train tracks). Finally, after Shabbat, I sat down and recorded myself singing it so I would not forget. My hope is that I can soon share this melody with my community at Pardes. Shavuah Tov everyone!

Update: You can download it here.

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Week 36: From Silence to Song

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(Mostly X-posted from my home blog, Yinzer in Yerushalayim)

The weekend before last was the retreat Shabbaton for Self, Soul, and Text class at Kibbutz Hanaton, our teacher James’ home, in the Galil. The schedules Friday and Saturday were nearly identical, each day going like: 9-9:45: Sit. 9:45-10:30: Walk. 10:30-11:15: Sit. 11:15-12:30: Lunch. 12:30-1:15-Sit. It was brutal, and that’s no joke, since “Sit” didn’t mean “Lay on a couch, go on your computer, and schmooze,” it meant, “Sit upright in the big white tent like the kind we use in Pittsburgh as the Game Day Live Tent at Heinz Field for 45 minutes, focus on your breathing, or, if your nose is too stuffy to make that even remotely relaxing, then on the feeling of your butt in the cushion and try to meditate without thinking of scenes from The Simpsons.” and “Walk” didn’t mean “Go for a stroll on the beautiful grounds of the Kibbutz,” it meant “Slowly pace back-and-forth over the same 10 feet of ground, trying to focus on your steps and breathing without humming the Red Hot Chili Peppers song in your head. The hardest part of this was that we couldn’t hike: Hanaton is a gorgeous place, with birds singing everywhere, that kibbutz smell (read: cow dung) in the air, rolling green hills and farmland, a huge clear sky showing Omnimax sunrises and sunsets twice-daily, and a Druze village in the distance, and the nearest source of water was the reservoir in the distance sealed-off with barbed-wire; all we could do, however, is see everything from a distance. Meals offered no escape either, since this was a “silent” retreat, and by “silent,” they mean “lonely:” there was no talking, touching, looking, or even smiling at your friends from Thursday night until Saturday night. As I said, it was absolutely unforgiving. When we weren’t Sitting or Walking or praying, we were usually either listening to an excellent class by James, meeting with him privately, or singing niggunim with him. Friday afternoon, we all went to the mikveh.

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[Self / Soul & Text] Singing

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Weariness wrapped itself around him, and in moments of reflection he realized he missed his family.

This was a moment of such reflection.

He’d wanted to spend some time singing several days earlier, but after meditating and speaking to G-d, he’d been interupted by his roommate before he could begin his song. The interuption had been worthwhile, but he’d had to reschedule his singing.

The following day, he’d come to school early – before davening, and closed himself away in a classroom to sing and chant. That had been fun, but he’d felt somewhat self conscious about it, as passersby could hear him through the door. Still, he’d enjoyed it – especially the familiar Shabbat tunes that he’d chanted. Towards the end, he realized that he didn’t want to stop his niggun… but he had to go to davening.

This time, he decided to sing after davening ma’ariv. He’d been finding recent pleasure in singing ‘Aleinu’ loudly in the privacy of his apartment after davening, and it seemed fitting to begin his spiritual chanting after singing an impassioned rendition of this prayer (it reminded him of his childhood).

At first, the singing was loud and spontaneous – he felt a release of emotions, as if a pressure release valve had been opened. His singing sounded disjointed and ugly to him – it poured out of him desperately, angrily. He wanted to stop, but he continued – the notes wanted to be sung.

Eventually, the broken notes began to merge with one another, and he found himself chanting familiar Shabbat zmirot melodies. Dror Yikra (to the tune of Sloop John B.) was probably his favorite, and he eventually settled into a loud round of chanting. Then he realized that he was feeling… quieter… and his chanting became softer. and softer.

softer.

A high came over him, and he sat with it for some time. His lips were moving, but the sound of his chanting echoed only in his mind, and he found himself sitting empty, appreciating the quiet and the mechanical noises of his apartment.

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Week 24: More Leftovers

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(Mostly X-posted from my home blog, Yinzer in Yerushalayim)

* For Tuesday’s group lecture, Robby Berman, head of the Halakhic Organ Donor Society came to give a riveting, inspiring, infuriating talk. I’ll sum it up in brief: There is no valid Jewish (or non-Jewish) reason to not save lives by being an organ donor. If you are reading this, you will die someday, and if you are not an organ donor, you are only contributing to the needless deaths of 6,000 other Americans or 100 other Israelis each year. Click here to sign up and get more information.

 

* It used to be that sometimes, especially at night, I would be walking in Jerusalem or even just sitting in school, when it would just hit me: Dude! There’s a Hebrew-speaking Jewish State in the Holy Land after 2,000 years. That’s nuts! This would usually be followed with: And I’m currently living there, in Jerusalem, studying Torah. That’s insane! I would then experience a rush of awe and gratitude and recommit myself to making the absolute most of every remaining second here.

I admit, however, that sometime around when the weather started getting colder and I started getting other things on my mind, I found myself experiencing less and less of these epiphanies. I’m ashamed to admit that I became guilty of that cardinal Jewish sin of taking Jerusalem for granted.

Then about two weeks ago I was at a Shabbat dinner at a family’s house through a new monthly program called Shabbat Connections that pairs foreign students from local study programs up with families in Jerusalem for Shabbat meals. The family hosting me and some other students also invited their upstairs neighbor over for the meal. No sooner did this neighbor introduce herself then did she ask if any of us were considering making Aliya. She then raved to us about how much she loves living in Israel generally and Jerusalem specifically. It’s not like she was some shiny-eyed new oleh, either, she has been here over 10 years but still speaks about Israel like someone who just got back from Birthright. When the host suggested we go around the table saying our names, where we’re from, and what program we’re in, she jumped in and added that we should also say our impressions of living in Jerusalem. When the circle came to me I said sometimes being here feels like living in Jerusalem, sometimes it feels like living in any other city. When the circle got to her, she said she was a professor at Hebrew U and an author. I acted surprised and said I thought she was a plant from Nefesh B’ Nefesh, the organization that helps Jews make aliya. I had to say it, her gung-hoedness was getting on my nerves. Of course I love Jerusalem, too, but…but…

 

Her stories of teaching Arab kids made it clear that she knew well all the problems this place has, yet it hasn’t tarnished at all her simple joy for just having the unbelievable privilege of being a Jew in Jerusalem. By the time I vented my annoyance at her, I was well-aware that it wasn’t really annoyance, it was jealousy—how could I have lost that spark after only a few months while hers was still going strong after so many years and terror attacks and wars and visits to the shuk on Fridays? As others shared their experiences, my jealous insecurity grew, until I released it through the Nefesh B’Nefesh remark. After I said it my heart skipped a beat, but she and everyone else laughed. This made me laugh, too, and as we laughed, I felt a pressure-valve release somewhere around my gut and all the anxiety and self-absorption inside my chest fly away, making room for something new to take its place. As we said good-bye at the end of the meal, I thanked her for reminding me of how special it is to be in Jerusalem.

 

Later that week, I was walking to school on a cold, windy morning, watching cats climb out of a dumpster, when I smiled and thought: Whoa! There’s a Hebrew-speaking Jewish State in the Holy Land after 2,000 years, and I’m currently living there, in Jerusalem, studying Torah. That’s insane! and a new, deeper sense of awe and gratitude soon followed. Thank God, this has happened many more times since, and I’m determined to make sure it will continue to happen until I leave.

 

* There is nothing in the world like Shabbat in Jerusalem. The entire city shuts down. One day in every seven there are no busses, few cars, and every store except Dominos Pizza and that convenience store on Derekh Hevron is closed. They are replaced by the sound of song echoing through the streets from every shul and dinner table all Friday night and by people walking at a relaxed pace—be they young families all dressed in their best clothes, pushing strollers and carrying tallit bags, the father’s bright white kippa with blue trimming bobbing up and down as the family’s personal flag bringing up the rear; groups of students huddling close together, laughing amongst themselves; or couples out on a walk holding hands—Saturday afternoon.

There is a wide-variety of shuls on every block, ranging from shuls where they sing a lot and you can understand what they’re saying, to shuls where they sing a lot and you can never be sure when they’re singing a niggun and when they’re singing the actual prayer, to shuls where they sing a lot, and clap and pound their siddurs, chairs, the wall, whatever they can get their hands on, even more. The shul I go to most Friday nights, Mizmor LeDavid is the latter kind of shul. I know I wrote about the experience there before, but what I didn’t mention is the diversity—if there really is to be a World to Come, it couldn’t be much different than Mizmor on a Friday night. The place is literally crammed with Jews—on both sides of the mechitza, there are Chasidic Jews in full garb sitting next to Religious Zionists, sitting next to secular Jews, sitting next to overwhelmed-looking tourists, sitting next to native Israelis, sitting next to Conservative rabbis, sitting next to Chabadniks, sitting next to Pardesniks, sitting next to flaming Ba’al Teshuvas, sitting next to vegans, sitting next to meat-eaters, sitting next to Reform rabbis, sitting next to soldiers—all singing, dancing, and praising together as one to welcome the Sabbath Queen to Jerusalem. I can’t imagine how this city could have prayed before the advent of Shlomo Carlebach.

 

* [WARNING: Do not read this section, it will cause you pain. You have been warned.] It is a fact universally acknowledged that the more Torah you study, the more prone you become to making really horrible puns. This phenomenon is why the best rabbis can clear a room with a single joke. Since coming to the “Pundes Institute,” my classmates and I have discovered that, after having studied enough Torah, even people who ordinarily have at least some shred of self-respect start making the worst puns then hating themselves for it, but it’s like they just can’t help it. Even I, who was already punny enough before getting here, have found myself getting so bad I Pharisee that I may never be able to fully reenter society. Even the people who aren’t so traditionally religious, it’s Sadducee what’s become of them. One day, some friends and I started trying to come up with reasons for why this could be, perhaps something about spending so much time analyzing the meanings and nuances of words and language, when my friend, JTS rabbinical student Jonah Rank, came up with the answer, citing the Rabbinic dictum, “יש שבעים פנים בתורה” (I would translate this, but it wouldn’t work.) There can be no doubt Jonah will make one “whale” of a rabbi someday!!!!!!!!!

 

* I never thought it would be possible that the name “Yehoshua” could be easier for someone than “Derek.” Yet, when I first got here and tried to order food using “Derek,” I had to repeat it several times, enunciate clearly, and spell it before Israeli cashiers, even ones who spoke English, had any idea what I was saying. Worse, nearly every Israeli I know pronounces it “Dewek” in spite of the fact that there’s not even a “W” sound in Hebrew. But when I use my Hebrew name “Yehoshua,” which is double the amount of syllables, and, I think (and since I am an American, all my prejudices are correct), just much harder to pronounce in general, all I have to do is just mumble it and they automatically get it. In America, I only heard my Hebrew name when I got called up to the Torah; in Israel I hear it when I get called to the Torah and when I get called to pick up a sandwich. This is why we call this the Holy Land.

 

*Speaking of puns and my name, if I hear one more person riffing on my name and its similarity to the Hebrew word דרך (“derekh”) meaning “way”…I’ll still be no less powerless to do anything about it.

 

* Since Week 14: Things I Love about Israel, I have thought of some more important similarities between Jerusalem and Pittsburgh:

  • Both cities are defined by being made up of multiple and idiosyncratic neighborhoods. Just like how in Pittsburgh each neighborhood has its own characteristic feel and types of people, so too in Jerusalem: German Colony where I live is upscale and filled with tourists; Baka and North Talpiot where most Pardesians live are filled with wealthier Anglo and French olim; Nachalot is filled with mystics; the Jewish Quarter of the Old City is filled with English-speaking yeshiva students and their American-born rabbis; as anyone who’s seen the popular (and excellent) Israeli show Srugimknows, Katamon is filled with desperate Orthodox singles; Mea Shearim and Har Nof are filled with Cheredim; Abu-Tor is filled with tension, as it is a mix of Jews and Arabs; and the list could go on.
  • Both cites are famous for denizens who refuse to believe it’s not still the ’70’s—in Jerusalem it’s the 1870’s, in Pittsburgh the 1970’s.
  • The colors of Jerusalem’s most popular team, Beitar Yerushalayim, are black and yellow gold, and I think this explains all the rest.

 

*For those of you who keep asking what a Yinzer is, this video provides a fairly good tutorial.

 

Quote of the Week:

FIRST ETHIOPIAN CHILD IN THE ELEVATOR [To a friend and I]: Shabbat shalom!

SECOND ETHIOPIAN CHILD IN THE ELEVATOR: No, say, “Good Shabbos!”

 

Hebrew Word of the Week: כספומט (“kaspomat”) – ATM

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Mishpatim

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Today I had the most wonderful pleasure–I got to read from the Torah in the Egalitarian Minyan at Pardes.  It happened almost by accident.  As the gabbait for the minyan, I neglected to ask people to read earlier in the week.  Last night, when I realized my mistake, I decided to just learn it myself.  The time felt right.

When I got to services this morning, I was nervous with anticipation.  It felt a bit like I had just learned to ride a bike with training wheels, and was now preparing to ride a race on a brand new bicycle in front of all my peers with just two wheels.  (The Torah scroll that we read from does not have any punctuation or musical indications (trope).  Not only that, but the letters in the scroll look very different from what you might find in a Hebrew book.)  As I stepped outside the room to practice, I mentioned to my friend that this would be the first time I have read from the Torah since my bat mitzvah.  Immediately I corrected myself: this would be the first time I have ever read from a Torah scroll in a community.

I feel as if I am back in my 12 year old self, surveying the community assembled in the Unitarian Church, futilely attempting to calm my nerves as we stand for the opening of the ark.  The memory is so fresh today, it’s as if I can see through my own eyes the empty womb of the ark which has given birth to something so vast it does not even fit in the room.  My ears are brushed with the anxious murmur of voices, and I feel the change in my physical being.  It’s as if the electric nervous signals have stopped and reversed course; I am laughing and the Torah is gone, and all that remains is bliss.

After practicing, I come back into the room.  I davenn quickly, spurred on by my speeding heart.  The Torah service arrives.  I smile at my friends as the ark is opened, trying to review in my mind the parsha and the tune and worrying and suddenly I realize that we’ve paused and everyone is confused.  I look up.  The empty wooden ark smiles back at me.

I am laughing and running, remembering my trickster Grandpa and lovingly chiding myself for having forgotten the Sefer Torah.  Luckily, this time it is only a room away.

The Torah is recovered from the safe, and we race back into the davenning space.  It’s as if the Torah rides in on the wings of the niggun that the community is now singing to hold the space.  Before we start, I share with everyone briefly about my bat mitzvah.  The irony is there, but I am not sure the word fits.

I read my two aliyahs haltingly, but without major catastrophe.  And when I finish, my community erupts spontaneously into Siman Tov u Mazal Tov and I am sure that my blush has reached the tips of my toes and the joy that is blossoming in my heart can’t be contained within my body.

And how fitting this is.  When I wrote my essays about coming to Pardes, I wrote about the missing Torah at my bat mitzvah.  I wrote about leading services at Hillel and about feeling the absence of traditional learning.  I wrote that I wanted to come to Pardes to find that missing Torah, and to be able to bring it to my friends and family and community.

Here I am.  I have begun the journey.  Next year I will be in Boston at Hebrew College, starting rabbinical school.  And yet, it was this year that I set out on my spiritual quest.  It was this year that I left the warm embrace of my community back home to come to Israel, and to find the Torah treasure locked away in the recesses of the beit midrash.  It was this year that I left and this year that I arrived.

And that’s exactly it.  I have arrived.  I have arrived in the loving embrace of a community that is wonderful beyond my most hopeful imaginations.  I have arrived to the bliss of Jewish learning, and the supportive challenge of living in Israel.  I have arrived to the moment of filling my smiling Torah arc.

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Week 15: Exoduses

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On Sunday the 11th, the Social Justice Track went on a tiyyul to South Tel-Aviv to explore the situation of refugees and migrant workers in Israel.

Refugees in Israel are mostly asylum seekers fleeing persecution in their native Sudan, Darfur, and Eritrea. While walking through South Tel-Aviv, it is easy to forget you are still in Israel, especially after you’ve spent so much time in Jerusalem; Eritrean and Sudanese flags are everywhere; the music, food, window signs and of course people are African. We saw a lot on our tour, but two experiences stand out: the Tel-Aviv Central Bus Station and the refugees’ stories. If the South Tel-Aviv street is more like Africa than Israel, the Central Bus Station is like everywhere else in the world that isn’t Israel than Israel. Since every day so many east Asian and central African migrant workers and refugees flock through it daily, it was teeming with flags and calling-card rates for Thailand, the Philippines, and China, bags of shrimp snacks and other foods, and an enormous lighted, musical Christmas gift display., the only reminder that this was indeed still Israel aside from the olive-skinned people staffing the Christmas display were the Hebrew signs over the glatt-trayf food stands. I really wish I had brought my camera, for this is the Zionist dream: other peoples being able come here to make a living while still being who they are in what remains a distinctly, uniquely Jewish country.

The other highlight, and by far the most powerful part of the day, was listening to Ismail and Ali’s stories. Both men are Africans who risked their and their families’ lives to come to a country they knew nothing about in the hopes of the possibility being able to live there in peace. The journey they and the 1,000′s of other refugees make is dangerous beyond belief: They travel almost entirely on foot from central Africa. Along the way, most fall into the hands of the Bedouin in the Sinai who often traffic and abuse them. Most women will get repeatedly raped along the way and sold as sex slaves; Bedouin killing and selling the organs of people who they don’t expect to receive much money for is not unheard of.

Those who survive the Bedouins and reach the Negev are usually soon greeted by the IDF. Ismail said once the IDF approached him, in their military gear and tank, and established that he was an asylum seeker, the first thing they did was offer his young son a glass of water. They then took them in and helped them get to Tel-Aviv. Ismail currently runs a small shop and, with his own money, started a free center to teach fellow-refugees Hebrew and computer skills (Ismail has an advanced degree in computer science but hasn’t been able to do much with it since the persecution started in Darfur). Ali had a similar story, although his family is still in a refugee camp in Chad. I don’t remember how long it has been exactly, but I think he said it had been something like 24 years since he last saw his wife and children.

Hardships aside, both men are “enjoying” life in Israel as much as they could be expected to, given their situations. Both men are making a decent living and have been here over 20 years. Both speak Hebrew fluently, and Ismail said it is his children’s first language. Both said they have experienced almost no racism since arriving here and will be eternally grateful for how good Israel has been to them. As Muslims being persecuted by other Muslims, they thank God for Israel at least as much (if not more) than many Jews do or, thankfully, could right now. As Israeli as he and his family are, they are not Jewish, and therefore, can never become citizens. But that does not mean they are in a bad situation: they have a legal status in this country and are entitled to certain rights. Israel has no official policy on refugees yet besides the rights specified in the UN Refugee Convention of 1951 to which it, in the shadow of the Holocaust, was an enthusiastic signatory. Israel of course does not have open borders nor was anyone advocating for them—our tour guide, a Pardes alumnus who currently works for the Jewish Joint-Distribution Committee, had many stories to tell of deporting people who, while in a desperately poor and all but hopeless situation in their home countries, are not in physical danger there and thus not in need of asylum. Most of these people end up staying in Israel anyway illegally, but the point remains.

Walking the South Tel-Aviv streets and hearing the refugees’ testimonies, seeing first-hand what a beacon Israel can be to non-Jews, was the most uplifting experience I’ve yet had on a Social Justice tiyyul. We are a people whose holiest book commands us, more than anything else, to have compassion on the stranger, for we were strangers in Egypt (and Europe, and Arabia, and Ethiopia, ad nauseum). It can sometimes be too easy to be jaded when our Jewish state is not everything we think it ought to be, which made it especially refreshing to see a positive story—these people had no idea what a Jew was until they got here, they only knew that this was a free country where they might be able to make a living. And after making unimaginable sacrifices to get here, they discovered not only financial opportunity, but a welcoming, largely sympathetic people. The sight of non-Jewish asylum seekers speaking Hebrew and blessing themselves by Israel was a source of great pride and nachas for myself and most of the class. Ismail said as a refugee he identifies with the Jewish story and he and Ali seemed genuinely touched that we cared not only to hear but then to ask thoughtful questions about their stories. As I mentioned earlier, this, too, I believe, is a proud fulfillment the Zionist dream.

After listening to Ismail and Ali, we met with a woman from the Hotline for Migrant Workers, for whom the situation is not so positive. Like in America, there are jobs Israelis don’t want to do. Since using Arab workers is no longer an option for many reasons, Israel turns to the Far East, mostly Thailand and the Philippines, to get its menial laborers. Like the African refugees, the journey to Israel for these people is difficult—they pay agencies upwards of $10,000, that they usually borrow, just to leave their families to come here. They then must spend their first several years here just working off their debt for the journey before they can begin sending money home. While they do have some standing under Israeli law, there has never been legislation passed concerning them. They frequently work long hours for less than Israeli minimum wage, but this is still oftentimes better than what they could make at home. It’s a complicated situation that I don’t pretend to know much about, but at least in this problem, Israel is far from unique.

It was a rough day with the many highs and lows I’ve come to expect from Social Justice tiyyulim. Also like other Social Justice tiyyulim, it left me too grateful for words for my situation in life, and committed to—as a Jew every bit as much as as a human being—never stop using my fortunate situation and education as leverage for stepping up for those less fortunate.

 

Tuesday night was the first of hopefully many soirees for my Modern Jewish Thought class. Most of my class plus a few guests met at two classmates’ apartment to tackle humanity’s biggest issues the way great minds have been doing it for centuries—while drinking wine; eating cheese, fruit, and junk food; and reclining on comfortable couches. Our topic for discussion was surrender to God vs. creativity: Does surrendering to God’s Will leave any room for creativity? What would/should a balance look like? Is surrendering to God’s Will totally desirable to begin with? Does surrender in Judaism mean anything besides obeying the Law? Can Judaism without Law even possible? Can surrender exist without God?, and much, much more. One of the things I love most about Pardes is even though our teacher was too busy to join us, it turns out, we really didn’t need him (much as we missed him)—we led and moderated the discussion and stayed on topic (at least in so far as possible in a room full of Jews). Another thing I love about Pardes is that time and again we prove that respectful dialogue with people you disagree with is not only possible, but beneficial to every side. Personally, when people said things I disagreed with (which was often), I found myself not only seeing a lot of myself in their religious struggles even though they have taken different turns than and reached different conclusions than I have, but also respecting them more for their honestly sharing their thoughts, and being open to critique. I like to think I would have been able to accept honest critique too had anyone who disagreed with me actually been able to form a coherent argument. All in all, it was a wonderful, energizing night that left me reflecting on my own beliefs and energized about spending the rest of the year learning wrestling with our Tradition alongside these people.

Friday morning, my level bet Chumash class along with level aleph held a siyum to celebrate our finishing studying Parashat Sh’mot, the first 5 chapters of the Book of Exodus. A siyum is a feast usually thrown to celebrate the completion of a tractate of Talmud or some other long, complex, intricate text. So why have one for celebrating finishing the first 5 chapters of Exodus? Because for us, Parashat Sh’mot is a long, difficult, intricate text—we’ve been learning it 3 mornings a week since coming back from Yom Kippur. If the better part of three months seem like a lot of time to get through 5 chapters of text, you should just know that we aren’t just learning what the text is about—how the Israelites multiply and become enslaved in Egypt, Moses is born, Moses grows up and gets into trouble for caring too much, Moses argues with God at the burning bush, Moses gets laughed at by Pharaoh—we’re learning what it says, literally doing a word-by-word, sometimes letter-by-letter reading of the original Hebrew text, getting inside its grammar, structure, parallelism, symbolism and allusions, and the varying interpretations and explanations different classical commentators and Midrashim have of all these things and more. It’s a lot of work, which is what made the siyum so sweet. Besides eating way too much sugar, we celebrated our accomplishment by singing nigguns, hearing classmates’ reflections on the parsha, hearing a d’var Torah from our teacher, Rav Meir, and playing review games. Another thing I love about Pardes is that grown adults actually get competitive playing Bible review games. But one thing I don’t love about Pardes is how it’s Bible review games are rigged: Our teachers actually expect us to believe both games ended in a 5-way tie, but I’m not stupid. When everyone gets a prize at the end of a competition and nobody is made to feel superior to his peers, nobody really wins. But this is what I get for going to a more liberal yeshiva.

Quote of the Week: “’I want to start a new tradition.’ Well, you can’t start a new tradition, to say that means you understand no part of that sentence!” -DLK

Hebrew Word of the Week: פליט (“paleet”) – refugee

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