Friday, July 21, 3 Av 6:00 PM Please Ellen Allard for a VIRTUAL ONLY Kabbalat Shabbat Service.
Saturday, July 22, 4 Av, 9:30 AM Please join Cantor Ellen Band for a VIRTUAL ONLYShabbat 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
Tisha B'Av Campus Schedule
Tuesday, July 25 8:10 p.m. - Fast of Tisha B'Av begins 8:10 p.m. - Maariv
Wednesday, July 26 - All services at KI 7:15 p.m. Learning on the Book of Job 7:55 p.m. - Mincha 8:40 p.m. - Maariv 8:49 p.m. - Fast Ends
Happy Summer! CMT SUMMER 2023 SHABBAT SERVICE SCHEDULE
We Remember: This week's upcoming Yahrzeit Observances
Shloshim Harriet Charnow Robbins Marjorie Tichnor
Saturday Kate B. Silk Matthew N. Stein Matthew N. Stein Rose Eidelman Norman Buchbinder
Sunday Robert B. Seltzer
Monday Milton Lefkowitz Philip Rome
Tuesday Abraham Silber Libbie Listic Mollie Ehrlich
Wednesday Jacob Goodman Max Gilman Sarah Freedman Charles Figler Lottie Stern
Thursday Evelyn D.G. Freedman Ellen Katz
Friday
A Teaching from our Rabbi
Every week, for three years, I have been studying Daf Yomi with a group of women rabbis and scholars. Daf Yomi is the 7-year project of reading a page of Talmud every day. We are currently studying the book of Gittin, which deals with divorce. Last week, we read about the destruction of the Temple, just in time for our marking of Tisha B’av, the day we mourn the destruction of Jerusalem.
‘Nebuzaradan, captain of the guard of the Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar, killed 211,000 people. And in Jerusalem itself he killed 94,000 people on one stone, until the blood of his victims lowed…. At that moment Nebuzaradan contemplated the idea of repentance.’ (Gittin 57b)
The Gemara adds that some of Haman’s descendants studied Torah in Bnei Brak, and some of Sisera’s descendants taught children Torah in Jerusalem, and some of Sennacherib’s descendants taught Torah in public. (Gitten 57a)
As you can see, the Rabbis of the Talmud retell the horrors they witnessed at the destruction of the first and second Temples. Our question was, why tell about these painful experiences in the book about divorce? What does Tisha B’Av have to do with divorce? And why would the killers of the Jews seek repentance and become teachers of Torah?
The Rabbis of the Talmud felt divorced from G-d because of the destruction of the Temples. They worried that G-d had left them. A way to fix a broken relationship is to apologize and seek forgiveness. In this way, the lovers can become close again. Teshuvah also requires a change in behaviour.
If the killers of the Jews and destroyers of Jerusalem repent and become followers and teachers of G-ds Torah, it would represent the reconciliation between G-d and the Jewish people.
Then, Talmud Gittin comforts us with the verse from Isaiah: ‘Rejoice with Jerusalem, and be glad with her, all you that love her, rejoice with joy with her, all you that did mourn for her” (Isaiah 66:10). In other words, one day we will rejoice as much as we have mourned. Don’t give up hope that peace and joy will fill our world. It will come, as long as we mourn our unkind and inhumane treatment of others and seek repentance.’
As we approach Tisha B’Av this Tuesday night and Wednesday, I invite you to join the fast as if it is an early Yom Kippur. Reflect on how we have behaved toward others, repent, and ask forgiveness. Make the commitment to come closer to G-d by drawing closer to our fellow human beings through teshuvah.
Use this Tisha B’Av as a way to come closer to our best selves, and thus, help bring joy to ourselves and others.
This Shabbat may we all reflect on our words and actions this past week and how we can improve in the week ahead. May we find peace of mind and joy through reconciliation with others.
Shabbat Shalom Rabbi Marcia Plumb
Congregation Mishkan Tefila 384 Harvard St. Brookline, MA 02446
