Friday, October 21, 26 Tishrei 6:00 PM Please join Rabbi Marcia Plumb and Ellen Allard for a HYBRID "From Our Home to Yours" Kabbalat Shabbat Service
Join us to welcome our special guest speaker, Rabbi Ayala Samuels (see below)
Saturday, October 22, 27 Tishrei, 9:30 AM Please join Rabbi Marcia Plumb and Cantor Lorel Zar-Kessler for aHYBRID Shabbat morning Service
If you have a simcha, please share it with us and receive a special blessing from Rabbi Plumb during an upcoming Shabbat service. Sponsor a Kiddush by virtually inviting us to your home as you lead the community in Kiddush and HaMotzi prayers. (we will provide challah and grape juice!) Please contect Rosalie Reszelbach, Janet Stein Calm or Toni Spitzer to arrange.
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
Kabbalat Shabbat Guest Speaker: Rabbi Ayala Ronen Samuels Friday, October 21, 6:00 - 7:30 PM with Dessert
We Remember: This week's upcoming Yahrzeit Observances
Shloshim Cheryl Dockser Mark Halpern Anne Sheila Zeger
Saturday
Sunday Abraham Cohen Theresa Blumer
Monday Charles Silk Dr. Harry Blotner Sarah Korbman
Tuesday Abraham Pugatch
Wednesday Laura Brown
Thursday Joan Seligman Louis Cutter Richard Hyman Florence Kaplan David Eastman
Friday Anne Honey Katz
A Teaching from Our Rabbi
Welcome Back to the Beginning.
Do you recall the phrase, ‘Welcome to the first day of the rest of your life?' When I was young, I used to think it was trite.
But when I read it through the lens of Parashat Bereshit, I think differently of it. I have come to believe it. This Shabbat, spiritually, is the first day of the rest of our lives. Tonight, we begin at the beginning….of time, of history, of all creatures, of humankind. Bereshit–in the beginning.
The first two words of the parasha, and the Torah, are bereshit barah, ‘In the beginning God created….’. It is commonly translated in the past tense. But Rashi, the 9th c. commentator, reads it as ongoing. He translates it as bereshit bero, “As God began to create.”
In other words, Creation is an ongoing process, one that is still taking place. Art Green teaches that ‘even now, in this very moment, Y-H-W-H is breathing existence into all that is. Evolution is a sacred narrative, telling us of a never-ending process of Creation.’
Torah, which means “teaching,” is a guidebook to learning how to live with, and be in awe of, a Creation that never stops becoming new again and again. We are part of that evolution. Throughout our lives, we too never stop becoming. We may think we can't change, but the truth is radically different. We adapt and develop anew every day. The Torah teaches us how to recreate ourselves for the better rather than for the worse.
This Shabbat, may we be filled with the awe that comes from the awareness of Creation around us and within us. May we find renewal in Shabbat rest. Shabbat Shalom Rabbi Marcia Plumb
Congregation Mishkan Tefila 384 Harvard St. Brookline, MA 02446
