Dear Friends:
In Psalm 90, we ask Adonai to teach us how to make each of our days matter. I write these quarterly messages documenting my rabbi-ing in part to challenge myself to make each day matter. Life indeed is a precious gift, and from the moment we awaken to our last conscious thought before falling asleep, we have the opportunity to do something meaningful and positive in the world.

Much of my rabbinic work this last three months was at HaMakom (hamakomtheplace.org) in Santa Fe where I spent some of my Shabbat mornings on the “rabbi” side of the bench, some on the “cantor” side of the bench, and some as an enthusiastic congregant. At the end of our post-service oneg, I instituted a practice of sharing a brief, often Hasidic, teaching based on the weekly Torah portion. I spoke about Jewish foods as an installment in the monthly HaMakom Adult Education series only a few days after our two sumptuous Passover feasts at home, courtesy of chef Beverly and her sister, Deborah. Beginning the second night of Pesach, we started counting the Omer, and I should have started counting calories as well. Deborah and her two youngest daughters, Daphna and Dalia, ensured that we wouldn’t go hungry during their ten-day stay in New Mexico by transporting nearly 100 pounds of kosher-for-Passover food from Brooklyn.

At the Los Alamos Jewish Center, I officiated at a joyous ceremony for a Bat Mitzvah who made all of us proud with her expert chanting and words of wisdom. Also on “the Hill,” the churches in Los Alamos invited Jewish participation in their Lenten series, and I spoke about the Jewish view of afterlife in a talk entitled “With Feathers: Why Woody Allen was Wrong About Hope.” Further from home, I got to spend a Shabbat with my Mom, and I shared a D’var Torah at the synagogue down the street from her new place in San Diego. Providing parents with opportunities to kvell is also a way of making one’s days count.

Frequent flying in conjunction with my day job as a physicist has contributed to ample book reading time, and I can recommend for the scholarly-inclined Everyday Jewish Life in Imperial Russia: Select documents, 1772-1914 by ChaeRan Y. Freeze and Jay M. Harris; Who By Fire, Who By Water – Un’taneh Tokef – edited by Rabbi Lawrence Hoffman; and Jewish Education and Society in the High Middle Ages by Ephraim Kanarfogel. For those interested in biography, I enjoyed Franz Kafka: The Poet of Shame and Guilt by Saul Friedlander and The Man Who Loved Only Numbers by Paul Hoffman, a book about a truly eccentric Jewish mathematician named Paul Erdos. In the fiction genre, Motti by Asaf Schurr, Between Friends by Amos Oz, and Lily La Tigresse by Alona Kimhi were all translations from Hebrew, while That Is How It Is by Moshe Nadir was translated from Yiddish.

The sudden, unexpected death of my friend and former Los Alamosan, Ginny Melvin, was yet another reminder for us to make each day matter. May her memory serve as a blessing, and may the immeasurable good that she accomplished in the world be an inspiration for us all.

Keep counting down to Sinai, and have a joyous Shavuot (but watch the calories on those blintzes!!).

B’shalom,
Rabbi Jack

The ancient midrashic work, Vayikrah Rabbah (IV:6), contains the following anecdote. Rabbi Shimon bar Yohai, a Palestinian rabbi of the second century of the Common Era, taught: “[There once was] the case of men on a ship, one of whom took a hand drill and began boring a hole beneath his own seat. His fellow travellers said to him: ‘What are you doing?’ Said he to them: ‘What does that matter to you, am I not boring under my own place?’ Said they: ‘But the water will come up and flood the ship for us all.’”

As I compose this next installment in my series of rabbinic quarterly messages, I am reflecting on a session at the recent adult Jewish education event in Albuquerque called A Taste of Honey, sponsored by the Jewish Community Center. The panel discussion I attended was called “Pew and Jew,” and it included a summary of the findings from the Pew Research Center survey of Jews in America as well as touching on the implications and applicability of the results on the Jewish communities of New Mexico. Whether you agree with the findings of the survey or not, for me one inescapable truth is that we Jews are all on the same ship, and when one Jew begins drilling a hole in the bottom of the boat, we all are in danger. The Babylonian Talmud Shevuot 39a says succinctly that all Jews are responsible for one another.

During an earlier session at A Taste of Honey, I taught a class about Jewish culinary traditions from Biblical times through the medieval era entitled “The People of the (Cook) Book.” Among my other rabbinic activities over the past three months was the opportunity to deliver the opening prayer one day during the New Mexico State Senate session. I shared with the legislators the same anecdote above to inspire them to work together on behalf of the citizens of New Mexico.

Beverly and I took a mini-vacation at the end of December and traveled to the southern part of New Mexico. At Temple Beth-El in Las Cruces, I presented a D’var Torah on Shabbat courtesy of Rabbi Larry Karol, and the following day, I conducted a wedding ceremony on a majestic spot of undeveloped land just outside the Gila Wilderness. Both bride and groom, along with most of the relatives present, were Ph.D. scientists, and somehow it seemed fitting to have the officiant be a Ph.D. physicist rabbi.

Rabbi Malka Drucker, founding rabbi of the HaMakom congregation in Santa Fe, has been away on a multi-month leave, giving me the privilege of leading services on a regular basis with Hazzan Cindy Freedman. Many of the congregants, including me and Beverly, travelled up to Boulder, Colorado at the end of January to celebrate as Cindy received her ordination as a full-fledged cantor. It was a tremendously moving ceremony, and we were all proud of Hazzan Cindy’s accomplishment. Beverly and I stayed on in Boulder for the next three days attending the annual conference of OHALAH, the Association of Rabbis for Jewish Renewal. It was a wonderful experience, and I hope to attend this conference in future years.

Looking over my reading list of the past three months, it appears that I’ve focused disproportionately on the scholarly, possibly a reflection of some increased responsibilities at Los Alamos National Laboratory which have forced me to make multiple trips to Washington, D.C. in search of funding. Those long flights are conducive to massive tomes. I enjoyed Essential Papers on Judaism and Christianity in Conflict: From Late Antiquity to the Reformation – edited by Jeremy Cohen, Genius: Elijah of Vilna and the Making of Modern Judaism by Eliyahu Stern, and Studies in Jewish Law, Custom and Folklore by Jacob Z. Lauterbach. For lighter reading, I recommend Jewish Anecdotes from Prague by Vladimir Karbusicky and Super Sad True Love Story by Gary Steyngart. And for a different slice of Judaism than traditional Ashkenazic fare, I found Baghdad, Yesterday by Sasson Somekh a most pleasurable escape.

When next I write to you, we will have emerged from slavery and celebrated our freedom during Passover. I urge you to look out for your fellow Jews, making sure that everyone has a seder to attend.

And if you see them lift a hand-drill or start to deliver a long sermon, be careful they don’t start boring.

B’shalom, Rabbi Jack

This rabbinic quarterly update looks back to August, September and October which were rewarding and enjoyable, contrary to a teaching in the Babylonian Talmud Tractate Yoma 29a that “the end of the summer is worse than the beginning of summer.” According to Rashi, the Talmud is referring to the heat and its injurious effects, but I find the High Holidays with their accompanying preparation time and subsequent quietude most fulfilling. 

High Holidays: Chavurat HaMidbar in Albuquerque graciously invited Beverly and me to participate in their annual retreat, this August held in Taos, and I used the opportunity to speak about repentance and its evolution from Biblical texts to contemporary writings.

Rosh Hashanah itself found us in Cheyenne, Wyoming, where I served as shaliach tsibbur in the beautiful sanctuary of the Mt. Sinai synagogue. It was wonderful to reacquaint ourselves with people we’d met two years ago when we visited the shul before seeing former Los Alamos congregant Jay Wechsler, zikhrono livrakha, and we made several new friends as well.

For Yom Kippur, it was back to New Mexico, where I led services in the building built by Temple Montefiore, the oldest congregation in the state. Though the community decreased in size from its peak in the early part of the twentieth century and eventually was forced to sell the building, the current Jews of Las Vegas have been working hard to reconstitute their presence. Beverly and I were honored to be the guests of the congregation from Friday through Sunday, and we appreciated the generosity of the Los Alamos Jewish Center which loaned a Torah scroll for the holiday. During the afternoon break on Yom Kippur I held an open question and answer session with topics ranging from Kabbalah to Jewish philosophers to raising a Jewish child.

On Erev Sukkot Beverly and I shared a lovely meal with dear friends under the bamboo s’chach of our sukkah and then went to sleep in sleeping bags later that evening. Some time after midnight I was awakened by gentle drops of rain on my face, and shortly after dragging our gear into the house, the heavens opened up. While we didn’t try to sleep out there again, Beverly and I had all our meals in the sukkah and enjoyed being back home for this most joyous of holidays. I led Shemini Atzeret services in Los Alamos, and then we headed to HaMakom in Santa Fe for Simchat Torah. The culmination of that service was the now-traditional unfurling of the entire scroll with congregants standing in a circle holding the text. Rabbi Malka and I were inside the circle offering prognostications inspired by the Torah text held by each individual. Time will tell how prescient I was.

Life Cycle Events: In other rabbinic duties over the quarter, I had the opportunity to assist with virtually every Jewish life-cycle event, from birth to death. My mother’s only sibling, my Uncle Charles, passed away in Florida before the High Holidays, and it was indeed sad to serve as rabbi for his funeral service, despite the pleasure of seeing my cousins, brother and mother. More joyous was the year-long conversion process for three adults which culminated in their “birth” as Jews, and I felt like a proud parent when I called these three, along with two other members of HaMakom, to the Torah as B’nai Mitzvah last month. Perhaps my favorite ceremony is a wedding, and recently I officiated at a lovely event north of Santa Fe on a glorious fall afternoon.

Books: As usual, my free time has been spent immersed in books from our ever-growing library. The library was a great asset in preparing me for a presentation at the annual New Mexico Jewish Historical Society meeting. This year’s theme was the Sephardic heritage, both in New Mexico and in Spain. My talk had the lengthy title of “Islam and Christianity Clash with Judaism in the Sephardic World: Maimonides’ Letter on Apostasy and Nachmanides’ Disputation at Barcelona.” In addition to delivering this lecture, I also got to lead Havdalah before the Saturday evening session.Two growing areas in our library are Israeli fiction and Yiddish fiction in English translation; in the former category I particularly enjoyed reading The Story of Aunt Shlomzion the Great by recently deceased Yoram Kaniuk while in the latter I was entranced by From Man to Man by Moshe Nadir. In the scholarly realm, I heartily recommend Burnt Books by Rodger Kamenetz whose visit to Santa Fe inspired my choice of reading material.

Assuming my progress in the 7 ½ year cycle of reading the entire Babylonian Talmud stays on track, I should shortly read the aforementioned passage from Tractate Yoma, and I may learn more about the difficulties associated with the end of summer. In the meantime, I wish you a joyous Chanukah and winter.

B’shalom, Rabbi Jack

The best I can do at encapsulating the Jewish concept of repentance is “I’m sorry and feel badly for what I did wrong, and I’m trying hard not to do it again.” As I compose this quarterly rabbinic message, we are rapidly approaching the High Holidays, and I am focused on repentance. With each passing year, I delve deeper into the meaning and beauty of the extended Jewish calendar season that starts around mid-summer and extends through Sukkot in the fall. I’ve been reading the powerful book by Rabbi Alan Lew entitled, “This is Real and You Are Completely Unprepared: The Days of Awe as a Journey of Transformation,” and will use this theme for several upcoming talks and sermons.

Over the last three months I was privileged to officiate at several life cycle events. A teenage friend, navigating difficult family relationship issues, sought solace in a name-change ceremony. For my remarks, I referenced the text from Tractate Rosh HaShanah. In the Talmud, change of name is mentioned along with repentance, prayer, and charity in the list of actions to avert the severe decree. A more joyous leadership opportunity was my inaugural same-gender marriage ceremony. I felt honored to join two people together whose love and commitment toward each other was so evident; this first-time (but hopefully not last) ceremony afforded me the chance to recite the Shehechiyanu.

I had most fulfilling worship experiences leading services in Los Alamos, Santa Fe, and Las Vegas, New Mexico over the past quarter. My Shabbaton in Las Vegas was held in the acoustically exquisite and historic former Montefiore Synagogue. Following Saturday services I spoke about the role of books in the Jewish text tradition. In Santa Fe, several die-hards listened to my 1 AM lecture on Rabbinic roots of conversion during late night Shavuot study. Other teaching moments were both formal (my monthly classes with the adult B’nai Mitzvah students of HaMakom) and informal (at the end of the service on my Dad’s Yahrzeit where I was joined by Dov and my Mom).

My daughter, Orli, graduated high school in June, and I shared a Hasidic teaching at the service honoring the graduates. At a reconciliation ceremony on Hiroshima Day marking the opening of a special peace art exhibit I offered a blessing for peace as well as words and song from Jewish tradition. And on a 10-day visit to Vienna in June I enjoyed sharing a few comments on the parasha after our Saturday lunches at Or Chadasch and taught a new tune to the congregation. Teaching goes hand in hand with learning, and I mastered the traditional trope for the Book of Lamentations this year just in time for Tisha B’Av. Over thirty years ago I began serious adult Jewish study with Rabbi Leonard Helman, whose recent death was such a loss to Jews and non-Jews alike in Northern New Mexico. May his memory serve as a blessing.

Beverly, my ezer k’negdo (“sustainer beside me”) spent five weeks in Brooklyn dealing with family issues, leaving me with a feeling of emptiness but also much free time for reading and purchasing books. On the scholarly side, I read Jewish Questions: Responsa on Sephardic Life in the Early Modern Period by Goldish and The Light of the Eyes by de’ Rossi. Lighter non-fiction included a biography titled Moses Mendelssohn: Sage of Modernity by Feiner and The Gods are Broken: The Hidden Legacy of Abraham by Salkin. I can heartily recommend the recent English translation of a Yiddish classic, The Zelmenyaners by Kulbak and two of Wiesel’s more recent works, A Mad Desire to Dance and The Sonderberg Case. Squeezing their way onto the shelves were several biblical commentaries by the 16th century Rabbi Moshe Alshich, plus These are the Words: A Vocabulary of Jewish Spiritual Life by Green, and My Father’s Paradise: A Son’s Search for his Jewish Past in Kurdish Iraq by Sabar among (probably too many) others. I am blessed that Beverly is so supportive of the library, lest I be forced to say “I’m sorry and feel badly for what I bought, and I’m trying hard not to do it again.”

Have a wonderful High Holiday season, and may you and all your loved ones be written into the Book of Life for a healthy and happy new year.

B’shalom, Rabbi Jack

Rabbi Jack uses Aaron and Miriam sock puppets to talk about Lashon Hara

Counting is a fundamental human activity – many of us count the number of e-mails in our in-boxes (this message describing my recent rabbi-ing activities is planned as one of only four per year), and starting on the second night of Passover, Jews around the world start another form of counting, namely a countdown to the holiday of Shavuot, celebrating our receiving the Torah at Mount Sinai. Over the past three months, I’ve had several opportunities to share Torah with friends; there is nothing I enjoy quite so much as experiencing the beauty of the weekly Torah portion with Jewish adults.

On a recent visit to the Washington, D.C. area for a family simcha, I was honored to lead a Torah discussion at Adat Shalom in Bethesda, transmitting teachings from Rashi through Hirsch to a wonderful and sophisticated group. In February my longstanding relationship with Chavurat HaMidbar in Albuquerque resulted in a most enjoyable Shabbat afternoon session on the medieval commentators, and after Havdalah, I delivered a variant of my talk on Jews in Theoretical Division at Los Alamos during World War II.

The next day I was one of the speakers at the annual Albuquerque adult Jewish education event called A Taste of Honey. My topic was Lashon Hara (gossip), and my sock puppet friends from last Yom Kippur made their New Mexico debut (see photo). I’ve delivered several other Jewish-themed presentations of late (alas, all the rest without sock puppets), including a talk entitled “Jewish Prayer and the Jewish Pray-er” as part of the annual Lenten series in Los Alamos, a Pre-Passover Workshop in Las Vegas, New Mexico, and “With Stars in Their Eyes: Astrology in Jewish Texts” as part of HaMakom of Santa Fe’s continuing adult education series. The Northern New Mexico Chevra Kaddisha, devoted to preparation of bodies for traditional Jewish burial, offered an afternoon training last month where I provided insights into “The Liturgy of Tahara and Etiquette in a House of Mourning.”

The powerful passage in Psalms (90:12) asking G_d to “Teach us to count our days rightly, that we may obtain a wise heart” reminds us that life is not without end. No sooner did I complete my discourse to the Chevra Kaddisha than I learned of the death of a dear family friend, and shortly thereafter I was on a plane to California to conduct the funeral service for this woman whom my mother befriended in high school. May her memory serve as a blessing.

These past three months I’ve conducted Shabbat services in Los Alamos and Santa Fe, led a community seder, paid healing visits to people both familiar and completely unknown, spoken with potential converts, educated an adult B’nai Mitzvah class on the topics of Passover, the Holocaust, and Israel Independence Day, and last but far from least, presented the daily prayer beginning the State Senate session. I doubt the hallowed chambers of the Merry Roundhouse in Santa Fe have rung before with words about the House of Hillel and the House of Shammai (whom I described as early Democrats and Republicans).

I try hard not to count the number of books that are in our library, but Beverly and I watched somewhat in disbelief as an entire bookcase, empty only last month, filled up over the course of a week. A few of the recent acquisitions include Jewish Bible commentaries (Malbim on Ruth, Kimhi on Psalms, Kli Yakar on Deuteronomy), Yiddish fiction (At the Edge of Dreamland by Eisenman, Temptations by Pinsky), contemporary Hebrew writing (A Different Source by Izakson, World Cup Wishes by Nevo), theology (I’m G_d; You’re Not by Lawrence Kushner, The Book of Job by Harold Kushner), and the five volumes now available in the new Koren Talmud series. A trip to Vienna in March helped me attack some relatively massive tomes on the shelves (Hasidism Reappraised by Rapoport-Albert, East River by Asch) but I also consumed some slimmer volumes (Conversations: Primo Levi & Tullio Regge, Book of My Mother by Cohen). Two inexpensive and consistently high quality series which I recommend are Jewish Encounters (Schocken) and Jewish Lives (Yale University Press); I just read Benjamin Disraeli by Kirsch in the former and purchased Moshe Dayan by Bar-On in the latter.

There are still dozens more books to order, but who’s counting?

B’shalom, Rabbi Jack