Rabbi's Corner

Why visit Israel?  Here are 25 reasons culled from various sources*  1) Visiting Israel takes you higher. It heightens your senses. It heightens your awareness. It heightens your sense of self. It heightens your faith. And it heightens your sense of identification with a land, thousands of miles away, a land that is so very dear to us all.  Experience... [Read more of this post]

Our new adult ed series, TBE To-Go got off to a nice start with our first discussion section  covering the first four podcasts of the series, “From Israelite to Jew.”  This section will be repeated next Shabbat morning at 8:45, as part of our Synaplex Shabbat.The next discussion section will take place on Sunday, December 6, at 10:30,... [Read more of this post]

 Week after week, our students come forward to explain the deeper meaning of their Torah portions, connecting them to their lives.  Here are many of those given this year, included (with permission) with the most recent ones at the top.  To go back to earlier ones from 2008, click here and scroll down. Tuesday, October 20, 2009 TBE Bar/Bat Mitzvah... [Read more of this post]

The Mitzvah Initiative classes will focus on the following questions: 1. What are the relationships and responsibilities that give my life meaning and purpose? 2. How can I express these thoughts in an authentically Jewish way? 3. What sources of Jewish wisdom can expand my thinking? 4. What might I learn about the source of my feelings for Judaism... [Read more of this post]

TBE To-Go: Online Class “From Israelite to Jew” Using the power of the Internet to bring world-class scholarship to our doorstep, we’ll be embarking on a new adult ed venture called “TBE To-Go.” Much like a book group, I’ll be recommending seminars that can be heard at your own convenience, and then we’ll be... [Read more of this post]

I delivered the following sermon this past Shabbat / Shmini Atzeret: Tonight and tomorrow, we’ll be dancing circles around and with our most sacred object – the torah. Isn’t it fascinating, when you think about it, that our most sacred object is not really an object at all, but a book – an open book, one that is in so many ways a living document.... [Read more of this post]

Rosalea Fisher and Jared Finkelstein were honored at our Simhat Torah services with the special aliyot marking the end and beginning of the Torah reading cycle.  Here are the remarks each of them made to the congregation in honor of the occasion: Rosalea Fisher: As a child, I watched my mother as she modeled for us the art of volunteering. She was... [Read more of this post]