Musings from Students of the Pardes Institute of Jewish Studies in Jerusalem
Posted on November 13, 2012 by The Director of Digital Media
Betty Hilton (Year Program, ’81-’82) gave this sermon at her temple in San Antonio, Texas about how much the Pardes experience influenced her. Sadly, she died as the result of a brain tumor about a year after giving the sermon, Dec. 2008. Have you ever wondered whether or not God is directing your life? Does Continue Reading »
Posted on October 9, 2012 by Laura Marder
Do you ever feel like there is a cage around you? Like you can carry it around but sometimes it gets heavy and tires you down. Perhaps it restrains you from moving in a comfortable way or running to what you really desire. I hadn’t really thought of myself in a cage at all before Continue Reading »
Posted on July 1, 2012 by The Director of Digital Media
Alum Chanan Kessler (Year Program ’86) has shared his personal blog with us, which chronicles his reflections and experiences after his mother passed away. Chanan, we’re very sorry to hear of your loss… and thank you so much for sharing your insights and process with the rest of us.
Posted on May 28, 2012 by Derek Kwait
(X-posted from my home blog, Yinzer in Yerushalayim) This week really started last Shabbat afternoon as I sat in a corner of the Tayelet (promenade overlooking the Old City and East Jerusalem) reading the opening chapters of James Carroll’s Jerusalem, Jerusalem. Carroll begins the book by discussing the tension between the two Jerusalems, the earthly Continue Reading »
Posted on April 22, 2012 by Laura H.
There is a great deal of contrast in the types of graves we are seeing in Poland. Today, we went to Belsec, where even in the mid-1990s, there were still bones visible on the earth. The memorial there is cut into the shallow hill of the camps – into the mass grave. We spoke about Continue Reading »
Posted on April 20, 2012 by Barer
This week’s double parsha is some of the densest and hardest-to-apply material in the Torah, in dealing with seemingly endless details of various bodily ailments and skin maladies. In trying to find a window into some of the meaning that these chapters might hold for us today, I think it might be helpful to consider Continue Reading »
Posted on April 17, 2012 by David Bogomolny
The Tachanun practice that we learned in class has shaped my daily davening. It took my a few minutes in class to take the practice seriously – to really relate to the idea of being dead, rather than just playing dead – but after a while, I was able to see my mat as a Continue Reading »
Posted on March 29, 2012 by Lauren Schuchart
(The fourth in a series of 5 posts detailing my heritage trip to Poland… originally posted on my blog) ___________________ Belzec “Earth do not cover my blood / Let there be no resting place for my outcry” (Job 16:18) When many people think of concentration camps, they think of Auschwitz. Why? Because many of Continue Reading »
Posted on March 28, 2012 by Lauren Schuchart
(The third in a series of 5 posts detailing my heritage trip to Poland… originally posted on my blog) ___________________ Houses of Life We visited several Jewish cemetaries throughout Poland. In ordinary circumstances, a cemetery would seem like a low point on an itinerary. In Poland, cemeteries were a way to remember and memorialize great lives that were lived. Continue Reading »
Posted on March 27, 2012 by Lauren Schuchart
(The second in a series of 5 posts detailing my heritage trip to Poland… originally posted on my blog) ___________________ Gone Now are Those Little Towns “Gone now are those little towns where the shoemaker was a poet, the watchmaker a philosopher, the barber a troubadour…” –Antoni Sionimski, “Elegy for the Jewish Villages” Tykocin