Friday, November 06, 19 Chesvan 6:00 PM Please join Zachary Mayer for a virtual "From Our Home to Yours" Kabbalat Shabbat Services
Saturday, November 07, 20 Cheshvan 9:30 AM Please join Rabbi Lev Friedman with Rose Spitzer reading Torah (live) for a virtual "From Our Home to Yours" Shabbat Morning Services
Please click here for the link to the new Conservative prayerbook, Siddur Lev Shalem: Shabbat Shaharit Siddur Lev Shalem The prayers will be the same as in our usual blue siddur, so feel free to use that instead if you wish.
Please click here for the link to the page numbers for Shabbat morning prayers in Sim Shalom (Blue) and in Lev Shalem Page Numbers for Shabbat Morning
We Remember: This week's upcoming Yahrzeit and Shloshim Observances
Shloshim Miriam Harel Benjamin Hyman
Saturday Bertha Milder Julius Levine William Goldberg Ronald Blumer Hazel Schwartz Myron Cohen
Sunday Beatrice Dresner Sadye K. Mezer
Monday Lillian Bardfield
Tuesday Doris Hyman Abraham Katz Nathan Mindess
Wednesday Stanley Fischer Irene Brown Saul A. Sherman Sarah R. Einstein
"At this hour, all of the House of Israel stands before its God": Rabbi Leo Baeck's sermon to German Jews, Kol Nidre 1935.
As the 1000 year history of German Jews came to an end on Krystalnacht (Nov 9-10 1938), the leader of all German Jews, Rabbi Leo Baeck, already warned the community of this probability in a pastoral letter sent to all synagogues in Germany to be read out on Kol Nidre, 1935. The Gestapo forbade it to be read and yet many synagogues did so and Rabbi Baeck was subsequently arrested...
What did it say and why was it so provocative and yet prophetic at the same time?
A Conversation with Congressman-elect Jake Auchincloss
Tuesday, November 10 at 7 p.m. via Zoom
Join an APIAC led discussion and get to to know Conressman-elect Jake Auchincloss. Click here for the full flyer and click here to register. The zoom link will be provided by AIPAC after you register.
From Our Rabbi: A Teaching
In Parashat Vayera this shabbat, there are a number of memorable famous stories. We read about Abraham and Sarah, Sodom and Gemorrah, the birth and circumcision of Ishmael and Isaac, and finally the Akedah, the near sacrifice of Isaac. Abraham, Sarah, Lot, Hagar, and their children take center stage as the main characters in the dramas that unfold. But there is another very important character in the parasha that is practically ignored--the ram.
You remember the ram--the one that was caught in the thicket and sacrificed in place of Isaac.
The ram is symbolic for us this week. We too feel caught in a thicket, unsure how to find a clear path forward, or when that path will appear. We don’t know how long we will be stuck. This stuck, tangled place we are in as a country is not just because of the lack of election results (at least at the time of writing). It is because it is hard to see how this country, which is so divided can unify on a set of values, and regain a moral centre.
The Torah calls the ram in the thicket ‘Ayil Aher’, the other ram. If our ram is known as ‘the other’, it implies there is another ram in the scene that we cannot see. This ram is potentially free and uncaught. For us, there is perhaps a way forward out of the thicket. We may not be able to see it right now, but it is there nonetheless. This parasha tells us to look for the unseen ram, the unknown path forward toward release from the thorny place of divisiveness. Regardless of who eventually leads this country, it is up to us to chart our own clearing toward hope, compassion, and kindness to all. Showing respect to others who differ from us will help clear the brambles of anger and division. We may not agree with each other but the only way to find freedom from stuck places is to widen our view and unveil the unseen.
The path forward is there, waiting for us. It is time to begin the search.
Shabbat Shalom, Rabbi Marcia Plumb
Congregation Mishkan Tefila 384 Harvard St. Brookline, MA 02446
