Our Clergy’s Thursday Thoughts

Noach 5785 Our Actions Are Our Offspring

Posted on October 30, 2024

Rabbi Alex Freedman.

The weekly Torah reading that highlights Noah has a peculiar beginning: “These are the offspring of Noah – Noah was a righteous man, perfect in his generations; Noah walked with G-d. – Noah begot three sons: Shem, Ham, and Japeth.” Why would the Torah tell us that Noah had offspring and then go on a tangent before actually naming his sons? Is the Torah distracted by something? The Rabbis find a deeper lesson. 

Here is the Artscroll commentary: “The verse began to introduce the list of Noah’s offspring, but once he was mentioned, Scripture praised him as a righteous man. According to the Midrash, theTorah means to teach that the primary ‘offspring’ of the righteous are their good deeds, for the worthwhile things that a person does are his primary legacy (Rashi).”

In other words, Noah’s first offspring was actually his good deeds. Those came before his children in time, because Noah lived his own life before his children came around. 

I appreciate that this interpretation gives such weight to our actions. They are not merely choices to make during the day and ones that fade away into history. Instead our actions are a record of who we are, one that follows us forever, we hope for the good. 

This is the first week in a whole month without a Jewish holiday, and 5785 still feels fresh. I hope we retain the sense of renewal that we felt on Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur. As we re-enter the familiarity of the normal part of the calendar, like Noah, let us give extra attention to our actions post-holidays. Let us treat our choices and actions with the same care we offer our own children.

What To Expect This Simchat Torah

Posted on October 23, 2024

By Hazzan Jacob Sandler.

This Simchat Torah, we will dance through tears remembering a full year since October 7th, 2023. Many are wondering what, exactly, this is going to look like. The first three hakafot (circuits of dancing) will be recognizably similar to the past few years, with a focus on engaging the children and indulging in the joy that defines the holiday. The fourth hakafah, which is the exact middle, will be slow and somber allowing us to memorialize the yahrzeit of October 7th. We won’t dance. We may even cry. And we will highlight our special new Torah cover as we sing the familiar songs that have carried us through this painful year. The fifth hakafah will serve as a transition back into the joy of the holiday. We will dance again! And we will do so using melodies that inspire hope and celebrate Israel’s strength. Our final two hakafot, informed by the full breadth of emotions we’ve had to hold all year, will be traditional, and joyous with themes of redemption and Jerusalem. 

For an outline of the evening’s hakafot:

  • Seasonal melodies, joyful dancing
  • Torah melodies, unrolling a Torah scroll around the young children
  • The annual “Limbo Hakafah”

  • Memorializing October 7th, 2023 a somber hakafah
  • “We Will Dance Again!” songs of hope and strength for Israel
  • Classic melodies, joyful dancing
  • “The Final Hakafah: Songs of Jerusalem and Redemption”

V’samachta b’chagecha–Let us rejoice this Sukkot!

Posted on October 14, 2024

By Hazzan Jenna Greenberg.

On the first two days of our upcoming holiday of Sukkot, we read from Vayikra 23:42-43 about the mitzvah of dwelling in sukkot for seven days: “All citizens in Israel shall live in sukkot (huts). This is so that future generations will know that I (God) settled B’nei Yisrael in sukkot when I brought them out of Mitzrayim (Egypt). I am God your Lord.”

According to these verses, a sukkah is a kind of shelter and it’s important to remember the shelter that God gave to our ancestors when they left Mitzrayim

But what kinds of shelter were they? As is often the way in Jewish tradition, a midrash shares two rabbinic opinions. R. Eliezer says: They were actual sukkot, or huts. R. Akiva says: They were clouds of God’s presence. 

But could both of these opinions be right? R. Eliezer focuses on the literal, physical hut, whereas R. Akiva considers the metaphorical and spiritual experience of this commandment.

While this is a very hands-on holiday, building and dwelling in a sukkah, even assembling and shaking the arba’at haminim (the 4 species) throughout the week, the physicality inspires the spiritual. When we dwell outside and shake the lulav and etrog, these tangible experiences in and with nature remind us of God’s presence in the world, both over our sukkot and in the creation of everything.

So let us rejoice in God’s creations this week, as we are also commanded in the Torah to be happy on this holiday: V’samachta b’chagecha v’hayita ach sameach, You shall rejoice on your festivals​, and should be fully happy!

Chag Sukkot Sameach!!

Yom Kippur One Year After October 7th

Posted on October 9, 2024

By Hazzan Jacob Sandler.

It’s hard to believe we’ve passed the one year mark since October 7th 2023. It’s unfathomable that 101 hostages remain in Gaza. I can’t make sense of the rising antisemitism and I remain deeply heartbroken for all we’ve endured this year.

The truth is, every Rosh HaShanah and Yom Kippur, we are called upon to imagine that we stand at the precipice of life and death. However you may feel about the imagery of Unetaneh Tokef and the “Book of Life” in which we seek to have our name inscribed and ultimately sealed, these High Holy Days serve as an opportunity to examine one’s own mortality, and, in so doing, their deeds. If you had asked me on Rosh HaShanah or Yom Kippur last year what I thought the year ahead would bring, I would have surely said something positive. One of my dearest friends and I always go into the new year saying, “This is going to be our year!” As it says in the Mahzor, a year of abundance, a year of blessing, a year of good fortune…a year of song, a year of fulfilling life… a year of rest, a year of consolation, a year of abundant joy, a year of delight…” and it ends with that passage from the people of Sharon, which until this moment I always found puzzling: “May it be Your will, HaShem our God and God of our ancestors, that their homes not become their graves.” (Mahzor Lev Shalem p. 333-334)

And looking back, there were some of those things. There were beautiful babies born, and weddings and b’nai mitzvah and all our usual holidays. And all year, was shadowed by October 7th and its aftermath. I couldn’t have known then that, just as I thought I’d crossed the finish line of the Tishrei holiday season, an entirely new challenge would arise. 

I am so honored that in this week of Teshuva, I could lend my voice to the local Port Clinton gathering, organized by those incredible Shamash women. I’m in such awe of their commitment to Israel, their leadership and their strength. I am so honored that I could represent Beth El alongside Rabbi Schwab, Wendy Abrams, Consul General to the Midwest Yinam Cohen and Congressman Brad Schneider at the JUF memorial event on Monday night. It’s moments like these, in community, that I find strength and hope that carry me. At Beth El, we will mark the yahrzeit on Simchat Torah, and I hope you will join us. Because we will dance again. And we will acknowledge that our joy is diminished by this too. 

As we approach Yom Kippur, I see with new eyes just how mysterious the year ahead is. I see how little I can take for granted, and I pray that God lives up to the name “Av Harachamim” the merciful Parent. I pray, with my whole, yet heavy and still broken heart, that we be forgiven, individually and as a people. And though it can be hard to ask “Who shall live and who shall die?” I want to raise up the final words of that Unetaneh Tokef prayer: “Uteshuvah, utefillah utzedakah ma’avirin et roa-hag’zerah” Repentance, prayer and acts of loving justice can lessen the harshness of the decree. May we all be blessed for a better year. May we all be sealed in the book of life. May our intentions, our emotions and actions help us to create the world we need – one of peace, safety, truth, and love. G’mar Chatimah Tovah.

“Shanah Tovah” Does Not Mean “Happy New Year”

Posted on September 30, 2024

By Rabbi Alex Freedman.

We all say “Shanah Tovah” around Rosh Hashanah, and we all say “Happy new year” around January 1st. But they do not mean the same thing.

“Shanah Tovah” means “Have a good year.” And “good” does not always mean “happy.”

Of course I wish we all do have a happy 5785, but that feels out of touch right now. With the horrors of October 7th fresh in our minds; antisemitism incidents at record numbers; the plight of the hostages still in Gaza pressing down on our hearts; and the uncertainty of Israel’s immediate future because of what is happening in Lebanon, this is decidedly not a happy time for the Jewish people. And yet we will gather soon as families and a Beth El community to celebrate the new year with its renewed potential. And we should still say “Shanah Tovah” with conviction.

“Shanah Tovah” means “Have a good year.” And “Tovah/good” takes us to the beginning of Genesis, when G-d creates the world and sees each feature as “Tov/good.” In fact, there is actually one day when G-d creates something and does not declare it to be “good.” The second day is when G-d creates the firmament, the atmosphere that divides the lower waters from the upper. Something about that does not merit the appellation “G-d saw that it was good.”

We keep reading and see that the phrase “G-d saw that it was good” then appears twice on the third day, when G-d gathered the lower waters into oceans and later created seed bearing fruit. What accounts for this unique placement?

The Etz Hayim Humash cites Rashi and shares: “The Sages explain this as due to the act of separation on that day, which may be necessary but is never wholly good…” In other words, what is “good” for the Torah is when an action is complete and makes whole. Division is the opposite.

In this light, we should each wish each other a “Shanah Tovah,” a year when we become more whole, more united, and more complete. May 5785 bring such blessings to all of us.

What is hidden, and What is revealed

Posted on September 26, 2024

By Hazzan Jenna Greenberg.

In parashat Nitzavim, we read the following in Deuteronomy 29:28: “Concealed acts, hanistarot, concern the Lord our God; but with overt acts, haniglot, it is for us and our children, Lanu ul’vaneinu, ever to apply all the provisions of this Teaching, HaTorah hazot.” In the context of our parasha, hanistarot and haniglot are acts understood as concealed sins and revealed sins, respectively.

Rashi explains that the concealed or hidden things are between us and God, but the overt or revealed ones have greater potential to affect others. In other words, Kol Yisrael aravim ze bazeh: All Jews are responsible for one another.

Another commentator, the Netziv, explains that this verse is letting us know what our job is to understand about the world. The “hidden things” are the reasons God knows for why things happen, and it’s not our job to worry about those things.

When thinking about this idea of “hidden things,” I am also reminded of Psalm 81:4, the Psalm for Thursday: “Sound the shofar on the New Moon, the festival day when the moon is hidden.” We say these words in the Rosh Hashana Ma’ariv service. This imagery evokes our senses: what is missing in our sight is celebrated with the very audible primal sounding of the ancient shofar, a sound that we’ve been hearing each morning of this final month of 5784.

This announcement during Elul wakes us up each morning, hopefully driving the hidden personal goals within each of us to be revealed by the actions we take. The shofar reminds us that we are accountable to ourselves, a private agreement within each of us, but also to others, in the public ways we act in the world.

May that wake up call drive each of us to make this new year better for us as individuals and for all of us as a community.

Shabbat Shalom and Shana Tova.

“Arise! Shine Your Light!”

Posted on September 19, 2024

By Hazzan Jacob Sandler.

In the sixth Haftarah of consolation one of the primary themes is light. It begins, 

ק֥וּמִי א֖וֹרִי כִּ֣י בָ֣א אוֹרֵ֑ךְ וּכְב֥וֹד ה’ עָלַ֥יִךְ זָרָֽח׃

Kumi, ori, ki va oreich; u-chevod Hashem, alayich zarach.”
“Arise, shine, for your light has dawned; The Presence of God has shone upon you!” To paraphrase the next verse or so, Isaiah prophesies a time when the world will be covered in darkness, but the nations of the world will walk by our light, which is a reflection of God’s light.

Later in the haftarah, Isaiah 60:19 further inspires us, “No longer shall you need the sun for light by day, nor the shining of the moon for radiance [by night]; For HaShem shall be your light everlasting.” 

I’ve been reflecting in Elul as one ought to do. I’ve been working hard to prepare [professionally] for the High Holidays while also being sure to prepare [personally] for the High Holidays. In my daily journaling, one thing I’m coming to terms with is how hard things often seem to be. All year has been trauma after trigger after tragedy since October 7, and the world does seem to be covered in darkness. And what’s worse, I’m not sure I’ve fully processed the Pandemic and all the emotional baggage incurred then. And on top of those two major historic, communal traumas, I am not immune to my own personal challenges. And I know that’s true in varying degrees for us all. 

So when do we get to the comforting light Isaiah described? How do we shine? It’s right there in the first verse. Our light has dawned, and it is a reflection of the Presence of God shone upon us. One of my Elul journaling prompts, from Rabbi Simon Jacobson’s “60 Days” noted the connection between the Hebrew word for face (Panim) and innermost (p’nimi). We might ordinarily think of a face as being the outside, surface level. But our faces are the reflection and gateway to our innermost selves. When we allow ourselves to live authentically, albeit vulnerable at times, we let the light of our souls shine through. Our smile and our words come from the mouth. Our eyes can smile too, and our tears can make our eyes shimmer. Our ears that listen deeply demonstrate our presence with each other. Even our cheeks can glow or blush letting some of our innermost self be on the surface. 

I think that’s the idea. For this High Holiday season, we need to return to ourselves. We must find ways to express the innermost holiness and light that is uniquely ours, and is a reflection of God’s presence. We need to live into, and up to our humanness – which is flawed, but also the best representation of God’s divine image in this world. We need to act with integrity, and honesty so that our light can shine forth a path through the darkness. It is that eternal light in our soul which can never be extinguished. 

And one last thought: If you need a reminder of your shining light between now and the next time we read Ki Tavo, look no further than Kabbalat Shabbat.. In the 5th verse of Lecha Dodi, we sing “Hitoreri, hitoreri, ki va oreich kumi ori!” a reference to this very passage and weekly affirmation that our light has shined, we must arise and shine it.

How Beth El Will Commemorate 10/7 This Year

Posted on September 12, 2024

By Rabbi Alex Freedman.

We are just a few weeks away from October 7th, 2024, which will mark a full year since that awful day. For me, it feels like both a short time and a long time ago. 

Of course we will mark that important day as a community. It’s important for us to do so as a larger Chicago Jewish community, as well as a Beth El synagogue community. And it is vital to commemorate both the English anniversary, Monday, October 7th, as well as the Hebrew anniversary, the holiday of Simchat Torah.

To that end, we will commemorate both occasions. On Monday, October 7th, we encourage our shul community to tune into a special JUF memorial event featuring Chicago Jewish community leaders, including Rabbi Schwab and Hazzan Sandler. Seats are no longer available, but we can all view the livestream. That same evening at Beth El following 7:30 pm Minyan, we will also have a brief ceremony for those of us in the building. 

The evening and morning of Simchat Torah will be the time that our Beth El community does something special in house. A few months ago, congregant Marissa Rosenberg approached me and asked if we could participate in an international commemoration called The Simchat Torah Project. The idea behind it is to use a new Torah cover for Simchat Torah dedicated to one of the victims of October 7th. In this way we will “dance with tears” and strike an impossible balance between honoring the sadness of October 7th while still enabling the joy of Simchat Torah, a deep Simcha that should not be diminished. We accepted. 

Just last week another congregant, Allison Nemirow, flew to Israel to participate in this project, along with participants from many parts of the world. She was there to bear witness to the devastation of October 7th, meet families of the victims, attend the Shiva for Hersh Goldberg-Polin Z”L, and receive our unique Torah cover. She did so and shared her poignant reflections in last week’s Shabbat sermon. She also printed out photos from her trip, which are kept in the binder on the table dedicated to the hostages. Allison displayed the beautiful Torah cover and shared that it is dedicated to Aner Shapira Z”L, best friend of Hersh, who fell in combat while defending innocents at the Nova Music Festival. Grenade after grenade was lobbed into the small shelter where he and others were hiding, and he heroically threw out seven before the next one exploded, tragically killing him. It is Aner’s name that will be on the Beth El Torah cover. 

On Simchat Torah, we will use this Torah cover for the first time, remember the destruction of October 7th, and tell the story of Aner. We will do so before a special Hakafa, circuit, dedicated to the victims. And then we will dance with tears in our eyes. Because the joy of Simchat Torah is a deep Jewish joy that must never be extinguished. 

In Israel, Allison was on the ground for Hersh’s Shiva and shared with his parents that all of us Beth El had him in our hearts and send them so much love. It brings me comfort knowing that one of us from Highland Park was able to be there on our behalf. 

Marissa is organizing a second project where each of us can send the Goldberg-Polin Family a note. She will turn them into a display that will contain many brief handwritten notes to the family, similar to the small prayer notes deposited in the Kotel. Please participate by taking one of these special papers from the synagogue office and leaving it there by October 4th. The “wall” will be framed and shipped to Israel upon completion.

Please join our community at these two important events marking one year since October 7th.

Tzedek, Tzedek Tirdof: Justice, Justice shall you pursue (Deut. 16:20)

Posted on September 4, 2024

By Hazzan Jenna Greenberg.

In this most famous verse from parashat Shoftim, despite the doubling of the word “Tzedek,” no word is extraneous in the Torah. This phrase is understood to mean that we should work so hard to create justice that it is as if we are chasing after it. I think that it is fair to say that of all moments in Jewish history, the pursuit of justice has new meaning this week, this month, this year.

Tzedek: On the secular calendar, this Shabbat, September 7th, marks 11 months since the unjust war broke out against our Israeli family and friends, and by ripple effect, against Jews worldwide. We have nearly circled the sun, and yet so many lives have been cut short since that horrific day. Where is the tzedek in this tragedy? When will justice prevail and evil surrender?

Tzedek: And where is the justice in the most recent events of this past week, that 6 more innocent souls were murdered on the cusp of this marking of 11 months since last Simchat Torah? How is it that the most vocal English-speaking Israeli parent of one of these beautiful souls, who has been actively advocating for and pursuing justice fighting for freedom for her son and for ALL of the hostages, has now laid her only son to rest?

Tirdof: How can we continue to help in the pursuit of freedom and justice for all who are still captive? What forms of Tzedek and Tzedaka are you able to give of your time and resources? It is unimaginable that our Tzedaka is still needed in this darkest 11th hour, as we begin the 12th month of this war.

God willing THIS will be the month in which this war ends and our Tzedaka, our righteous gifts toward Medinat Yisrael and Am Yisrael will actually pay off. 

As we hear the shofar each morning of this month of Elul, may its primal cry usher in justice for all, an end to this war, and the reunion of families so that perhaps, bizman karov, soon, our people, our family, will only know peace.

The choice is yours

Posted on August 29, 2024

By Hazzan Jacob Sandler.

Do you believe in free will for human beings? Or are you more inclined to believe in predeterminism? How does destiny or fate play into the choices we appear to make? And how do we square that with our conception of God? If everything is fated, to what extent can we be held accountable to our choices? 

Are these questions racking your brain? Or are they platitudinous cliches for some philosopher to struggle with while you tend to practical matters? 

As we continue to move through the period between Tisha B’Av and the High Holy Days, we’re encouraged to reflect on these questions. Accountability to our actions is a key ingredient in teshuva and forgiveness. Yet, God is the supreme power in the universe. Annually we rely “not on our own merit, but on God’s great mercy” for that forgiveness.

In this week’s parasha we are offered a choice: 
רְאֵ֗ה אָנֹכִ֛י נֹתֵ֥ן לִפְנֵיכֶ֖ם הַיּ֑וֹם בְּרָכָ֖ה וּקְלָלָֽה׃

“See, this day I set before you blessing and curse: blessing, if you obey the commandments of your God that I enjoin upon you this day; and curse, if you do not obey the commandments of your God, but turn away from the path that I enjoin upon you this day and follow other gods, whom you have not experienced.”

The choice is obvious, right? Obviously, I’m going for blessing over curse every time! Yet, I know that all of us struggle to obey every one of God’s commandments all the time, every day. Sometimes it’s not that simple. 

I saw a TikTok user arguing against free will and their best two arguments were:

  1. We don’t choose the choices – so our free will is limited by the circumstances in which we find ourselves.
  2. We don’t choose our desires. For example, I happen to dislike strawberry ice cream. And I like vanilla ice cream. Putting aside the fact that I’m lactose-intolerant and can’t responsibly enjoy either flavor, I didn’t choose to like vanilla over strawberry, I just do. So I could choose:
    1. To do what I want – eat the vanilla
    2. To do what I don’t want – eat the strawberry
    3. To not do what I want – not eat the vanilla, but still perhaps not have strawberry either.
    4. To not do what I don’t want – not eat the strawberry, but perhaps also not eat the vanilla.

I didn’t choose to want what I want. I chose only how to act, informed by that desire or taste. And I didn’t choose the choices. I also don’t have any real choice about the consequences. So if I’m not free to choose the circumstance or the consequence, what am I responsible for? Simply the action I choose to take. 

I do still believe that, even with this narrowly free will, I am accountable to my choices. Because, as human beings, we have the imaginative faculty that helps us empathize with those impacted by our choices, predict plausible outcomes, and learn from past experiences. We also have the gift of Torah and millenia of wisdom that suggests best practices for making choices that will lead toward the ultimate good. 

I didn’t choose the choice between blessing and curse, nor did I choose the commandments, but I can choose how I’m going to act, and what I’m going to strive for. In fact, the sages suggest that true inner strength is the ability to overcome one’s inclinations to do good.

And where does God’s providence factor into this? What choices does God get to make? All of it is interconnected. Aryeh Kaplan gives the analogy of a computer system. It is dynamic.

“God’s providential direction of the universes never ceases. He is always acting in the world, guiding events based on our actions. In effect, therefore, this is a “two-way” process with a built-in feedback loop to allow for changes in programming. On the one hand, God is directing an ongoing input into the universe, regardless of our actions. On the other hand, God looks at what we do, judges it, and puts into the universe what He decides is appropriate relative to what we do.”

Kaplan describes an automated traffic system, which might detect a major back up and close down a bridge. Those on the bridge see the catastrophe, but have no inside knowledge of the context which caused the bridge closure. Similarly, the output we see in our world might seem to be terrible at times – and, in fact, it is. However, it may be in response to other inputs of which we’re not aware. I wouldn’t suggest sharing this to someone in the midst of a crisis, but it could be a useful framework for recognizing how intricate the ‘math’ of the moral universe would have to be. I, for one, am glad to leave that computing to God.

More importantly, perfecting the world is actually our human responsibility. And it is our choices, collectively, that either help lead the world toward that perfection, or slow it down. And this doesn’t remove God from the process either. Kaplan writes, “Although He gave individuals free will, He still influences the large scale course of history. Even though He does not determine the conduct of individuals, the collective wills of nations and societies are largely determined by God…God also guides the destiny of each individual to fulfill His purpose. Man might have free will, but God interacts with him to bring about His goal.”

And regarding the fate or destiny of the world, Kaplan shares, “God’s overall plan is to bring mankind to an ultimate perfection. Nothing can prevent this. It is, however, in man’s hands to decide how we will reach the goal.”

If at this point, you’re wondering if we have any choice at all, or if it matters, I’ll conclude with one last analogy. Do you remember those choose-your-own-adventure books? You didn’t get to choose the first page, the last page, or any pages in between. But you got to choose how you went through the story, and in many cases the individual story’s ending depended on those choices.There were many paths to only a few destinations. In the grand scheme of history, our small choices might seem insignificant. But the more we choose blessing, the more good we choose to put into the world, the more good and blessing there will be. Period. And since few, if any, of us will be here for the ultimate end, we must make choices that help bend the arc of our portion of the universe toward justice, toward good, toward blessing. Behold, God has set before us the choice – what will you choose?