RJ Blog

Rava said: What is meant by “How beautiful are thy feet in sandals? (Song of Songs 7:2) How beautiful are the feet of Israel when they go up in pilgrimage.” Sukkot is a holy day – a “pilgrim holiday” in its origin sense – to be observed not only with heart and soul, but the body as well. The above-mentioned verse sheds light on the original observance of the Shalosh Regalim, the 3 pilgrim holidays of Sukkot, Passover and Shavuot. Sukkot was one of the three times in the Jewish calendrical cycle that the Israelites strapped on their dusty sandals, [...]

The month preceding the High Holy Days is called Elul. It is a time of reflection before we “officially” begin the important process of teshuvah. In some ways this time of the Jewish calendar reminds me of Havdalah – the short but sweet service in which we say good-bye to Shabbat, but not before we have paid tribute to the fabulous 24 hours of rest and renewal we experienced. The goal of Havdalah is to think back, so we can gratefully and gracefully move forward into the new week. Elul has always been a time for me to think back [...]

I just had the privilege of traveling almost 12 hours from my suburban home in Princeton, N.J., to trek deep into the Rocky Mountains. I had been told that the last six miles of the journey would be on a narrow dirt road up the side of the mountain. I didn’t know that the dusty yellow school bus I was traveling in would have to halt, creep inch-by-inch in reverse, and perch itself precipitously on a ledge in order to allow a truck to squeeze by. That is when I felt the full magnitude of agreeing to be a “Kivun” [...]

The barista at my local coffee shop hands me an extra dollar and I immediately hand it back. I see someone struggling with a baby carriage trying to open a door and I rush to help. I make room for a car to enter my lane of traffic. I clean out my pantry and donate a few cans of food to the local food bank. These sound so mundane; behaviors that every “good citizen” should do. They’re also behaviors that I would label mitzvot.Would you? Perhaps we’ll up the ante… Last year I had cancer. People brought me dark chocolate [...]

I just had the absolute pleasure of staffing a Taglit-Kesher trip to Israel, as part of the URJ’s Birthright program. The Birthright experience is a 10-day whirlwind of education and activity providing a “taste of Israel” to North American Jews (ages 18-26) who have never before visited Israel on a peer-educational trip. One of my goals as the “madrichah” (educational guide) on the trip was to present a Judaism that is meaningful and adaptable; something that has value for people at all stages of their life. It was at one of our sites – in the ancient city of Tzipori [...]

With great excitement, tinged with a touch of trepidation, I moved to Israel in the summer of 1996 to begin my first year of rabbinical school at Hebrew Union College. There was so much to learn those first few months, from how to pay the phone bill (which, mind you, was in Hebrew!) to buying groceries at the local Supersol. In addition to ulpan and a full course load, there were the names and faces to learn of my 65 classmates, none of whom I knew before arriving in Jerusalem. My goal, of course, was not to simply learn names. [...]

With a glance at my calendar I quickly compute a number of dates and times with my finely-tuned “breast cancer calculator”.  In just a week it will be my 1-year “anniversary” of the day my life changed forever. It was early last November when I walked into my OB-Gyn’s office for my yearly pilgrimage that I smugly referred to as my “healthy” check-up.  I was simply there to check the appointment off my “to do” list. My mid-wife conducted a breast exam, not so different from the self-exams I did each month, and felt a suspicious lump. This, of course, [...]

Last year I introduced a new ritual into my family’s observance of Yom Kippur. I was determined to observe this most holy of days in a meaningful and active way. Yom Kippur is a long and challenging day, even for the seasoned Jew who spends the month of Elul and the”days of awe” in preparation. The normative Yom Kippur rituals (i.e. fasting, prayer, personal and communal atonement) are not necessarily engaging or developmentally-appropriate for children or pre-teens. Even teenagers (and adults) can be overwhelmed by the length of services and miss the point of fasting if they do not understand [...]

My first summer at URJ Camp Harlam I was given the task of leading a service for Tisha B’Av. I grabbed a Gates of Prayer out of the camp sifriyah (library) and simply followed its lead. I had trouble relating in my heart to the ninth of Av as one of sorrow and destitute, even though I knew at a cognitive level that Tisha B’Av marked the destruction of The Temples which once stood in Jerusalem.  For me, the Kotel (also referred to as the Western Wall, the only remaining wall from the once mighty and majestic Temple built by King Solomon) was a [...]