Blog Archives

Omer Week 6 – Foundation: Generativity and Truth

5/26/2024

For five weeks of our Omer journey from Passover (liberation) to Shavuot (revelation), we aligned with our capacities of love (hesed), strength (gevurah), balance (tiferet), resilience (netzah) and splendor (hod).

In important ways, these five weeks have been lead-ups to the culminating two weeks that start now as we round the corner and approach Shavuot. This sixth week focuses us on foundation (yesod) – the traits of physicality, creativity and truth. Our next and final week we reach presence (malkhut), bringing our full selves into the world so that we can receive Torah anew with our full selves.

Life Upright and the If/Then of Spirituality (P. Behukotai)

5/26/2024

Why live spiritually? Why live as a Jew – or, for that matter, in any community or system of faith or doctrine? These are questions for the ages, ones that modernity places in particularly sharp focus.

They're worth wrestling with, especially now.

Omer Week 5 – Splendor: Gratitude and Identity

5/19/2024

The first four weeks of our Omer journey from Passover (liberation) to Shavuot (revelation) were themed to calibrating love (hesed), strength (gevurah), balance (tiferet) and resilience (netzah). From our to love and be loved, we evoked soft-hearted courage to face the future, boundaries flexible enough to avoid excess rigidity but strong enough to protect us from abuse, balanced beauty and spirituality that lift us without fetishizing, and our ability to rebound from disappointment with confidence.

This fifth Omer week focuses on splendor (hod), which spiritually means so much more than brightness.

The Seven-Year Itch (P. Behar)

5/19/2024

Modern U.S. society seems to arrange some of its most important cycles of domestic life and employment in groups of seven years. Long before there were sociologists or psychologists to confirm these trends, ancient Jewish agricultural life similarly arranged itself in arcs of seven years to replenish the land lest it become weak. Few of us are large-scale farmers nowadays, but we still get a seven-year itch. Paying attention to it, and making time and space for it, can reap tremendous harvests in life.

Omer Week 4 – Resilience: Rebounding and Confidence

5/12/2024

The first three weeks of our Omer journey from Passover (liberation) to Shavuot (revelation) were to calibrate our qualities of love (hesed), strength (gevurah) and balance (tiferet). From our to love and be loved, we evoked soft-hearted courage to face the future, boundaries flexible enough to avoid excess rigidity but strong enough to protect us from abuse, and balanced beauty and spirituality that lift us without fetishizing.

This fourth Omer week focuses on resilience (netzah), which is about more than forward progress like the Energizer Bunny.

The So-Called Blemished Among Us (P. Emor)

5/12/2024

We're all blemished – no exceptions. Yet in one of Biblical tradition's most vexing admonitions, only the physically perfect could serve as spiritual priests, as representatives of the people.

Society hasn't evolved far past this spiritual no-fly list, its prejudices or its offenses to equal dignity. We miss out on the great gifts that differently abled persons offer. So why would Torah have a no-fly list at all? Maybe to hold a mirror to us, provoke our moral outrage, and force us to leap beyond ourselves.

Omer Week 3 – Balance: Beauty and Spirituality

5/6/2024

The first two weeks of our Omer journey from Passover (liberation) to Shavuot (revelation) were themed to calibrating our character capacities around love (hesed) and strength (gevurah). These weeks were about balancing our willingness to love and be loved, our soft-hearted courage to face the future, and our boundaries lest we be either rigid or doormats easily abused.

This third week we focus on balance (tiferet), which is about much more than aligning or a "Golden Mean."

Rabbi's Corner – May 2024: Getting Married

5/1/2024

This month, we're on the runway to not one but two congregational weddings. The second of them, metaphorically speaking, is next month in June, when the collective Jewish people stand at Sinai again to receive Torah anew. In many ways, it's like a "wedding." We'll get there shortly.

On May 19, we – the Shir Ami community , and I as rabbi – are slated to have a "wedding" of sorts. That day, we'll gather to confirm my installation as rabbi of Shir Ami. What is this about, and why is it like a "wedding"?

Omer Week 6 – Foundation: Generativity and Truth

Life Upright and the If/Then of Spirituality (P. Behukotai)

Omer Week 5 – Splendor: Gratitude and Identity

The Seven-Year Itch (P. Behar)

Omer Week 4 – Resilience: Rebounding and Confidence

The So-Called Blemished Among Us (P. Emor)

Omer Week 3 – Balance: Beauty and Spirituality

Rabbi's Corner – May 2024: Getting Married

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