Friday, December 2, 8 Kislev 6:00 PM Please join Rabbi Marcia Plumb and Ellen Allard for a HYBRID"From Our Home to Yours" Kabbalat Shabbat Service
Saturday, December 3, 9 Kislev, 9:30 AM Please join Rabbi Marcia Plumb and Cantor Ellen Band 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
We Remember: This week's upcoming Yahrzeit Observances
Saturday Evelyn Winet Tena Miller Bertha Cohen
Sunday Amy Tichnor Elaine Berman Gross Robert A. Lushan
Monday Arieh Frankenstein Joseph Miller
Tuesday Chava Reuveny Lena Wise
Wednesday Naomi Diamond Eva Shepatin
Thursday Agnes Bridges
Friday Harold Kaitz Marjorie Sue Rosenthal Todd Schwartz Elias Figler
A Teaching from our Rabbi
At Neilah on Yom Kippur, many of us find it meaningful to come before the open ark for personal prayer. When I was a child, I thrilled at standing before an open ark. Years later, it can still feel like a holier place than anywhere else in the synagogue.
Certain places are designed to feel more special than others.
In this weeks parasha, Vayetzei, Jacob lays his head on a rock in a field and falls asleep. He dreams of angels going up and down a ladder that stands next to his head. He wakes up and says, ' God was in this place and I, I did not know it.'
Rashi retranslates this verse saying, 'If I had known, I would not have slept in such a holy spot.'
Rashi declares that this spot is holy because of the spiritual experiences that Jacobs' ancestors and future descendants had in the same spot. 'This is Mount Moriah, where Abraham prayed, and it is the field in which Isaac meditated” 'This spot is also Har Habayit, the Temple Mount in Jerusalem. ' (Rashi, v. 17)
Jerusalem becomes the holiest place on earth. All Jews turn toward her to pray.
The Talmud however gives us contradictory advice about Jerusalem as the holiest site in which to pray. In advising what to do when it is time to pray the Amidah but one is travelling, the Talmud says: 'If one is riding on a donkey, one gets down [and prays.] If one is unable to get down, one should turn ones face [towards Jerusalem], and if one cannot turn ones face,one should see ones heart as the Holy of Holies.' (Brachot 4:5)
In other words, we do not need to be in Jerusalem to be on holy ground. We don't need to be anywhere special to feel God's presence. We can be in a field lying on a rock. 'Ultimately the key to heaven’s gate is not to be found on Mount Moriah, but in the human heart.' (Rabbi Josh Feigleson).
God is wherever we let God in. Everywhere is full of awe. We just need to wake up and see it.
This Shabbat, may angels fill your home with blessings. Shabbat Shalom, Rabbi Marcia Plumb
Congregation Mishkan Tefila 384 Harvard St. Brookline, MA 02446
