Category: English (Page 3 of 14)

Kedoshim: When the world seems to lose its own compass

May 2, 2019 / RabbiAdrian / 0 Comments

Chaverim,

Once again we are mourning and raging after an anti-Semitic attack on a synagogue over the weekend. I have been and remain determined not to give any anti-Semite the victory they want in any way. Whenever they want to push us out of society, whenever they want us to be too afraid to gather in our places, or to live our lives as Jews out in the open, whenever they want us to feel that we do not belong, we say that is they who do not belong. It is they who are doing wrong and evil. Our place is wherever we chose to live, in South Africa, in Germany, in Australia … and in Israel. Every time an anti-Semite shows his or her face, we and ten or a hundred or a thousand of our friends and allies come to counter them.

Last week and the upcoming week are dedicated to the memory of those of our people who perished in the Shoah, and who fought in the many wars to establish and protect the modern state of Israel. We restore the dignity of those who have been dehumanised by the Nazis and we honour those who stood up to protect our Jewish values and heritage. BUT, most important, we keep the promise given to them, to never forget.

Our Torah portion for this week opens with the following, beautiful words: “You shall be holy, for I, the Eternal your God, am holy (Lev. 19.2)”. What follows is not only a set of ritual obligations or ceremonies, but mainly a codex of ethical guidelines. Being holy means to be conscious of what we do and how we do things. This is even more important in times when the world seems to lose its own compass, when terror, fundamentalism and populism is shaping the reality in which we are living.

Friends, this must not be our future—you—we have it in our hands to counter this: it is our obligation to bring holiness into our world and to create a future that is less frightening. Please vote on Wednesday, strengthen our democracy by making your voice heard, and continue to stand with us when evil shows its ugly face.

Our Torah portion mentions love several times. So, let love be our answer.
May this Shabbat be filled with love, for you, our people and the whole world.

Shabbat Shalom – Rabbi Adrian M Schell

Yom HaShoah Ceremony @ West Park Cemetery 2 May 2019

Omer—Counting

April 18, 2019 / RabbiAdrian / 0 Comments

Beginning with the second night of Pesach we count the Omer until we arrive in our calendar at Shavuot. To help you with the counting, we have prepared a leaflet for you with a calendar, the blessings and the numbers (download link below and available in the Shul).

Traditionally the Omer is counted in the evening, after sunset.

Chag Sameach

COUNTING THE OMER 2019 PDF FILE

Mark the Omer time in a significant way

April 18, 2019 / RabbiAdrian / 0 Comments

Many of us know that Passover takes place during the Hebrew month of Nisan. In contrast, most of us do not know that the month of Nisan also includes another observance which begins on the second day of Passover. In ancient times, as set forth in the Book of Leviticus, our ancestors would start bringing a ceremonial measure of barley, called an “omer” to the Temple on each of the 49 days between the 15th of Nisan and Erev Shavuot (the 6th of Sivan). The number 49 has special significance in Jewish tradition because it constitutes a week of weeks (7×7), a significant number in the story of creation and in the beliefs of the Jewish mystics. According to the rabbis of the Talmud, these 49 days also represent the length of the journey from Exodus from Egypt to the giving of the Torah on Mount Sinai.

According to Jewish tradition, the “Counting of the Omer [Hebrew: Sefirat HaOmer ]” represents a spiritual journey from slavery to freedom and from chaos to the giving of the law. In the absence of the Jerusalem Temple, many Jewish communities have sought to imbue the counting of the Omer with daily spiritual significance. We at Bet David have adopted the Kehillah feeding scheme as a way to mark this time in a significant way.

I believe that education is one of the major ways to empower all parts of our society and to fulfil the dream of Nelson Mandela of a better South Africa. However, we have seen that many families still struggle on a daily basis to put food on the table because education is expensive and, too often, after paying the school fees there isn’t enough money left for a decent meal for those learners.

Several years ago, a former student of our own Mitzvah school started a feeding scheme in Alex, in an attempt to combat this situation. By providing one full, hot meal a day for more than 200 children, she managed to take away some of the burden those families have to carry every day.

With each parcel donated, we bring a little bit of healing (Tikkun) into our world. Please support Kehillah also this year generously. May we, on our journey from Pesach to Shavuot, bring some additional light into the world.

Chag Pesach Seamach – Rabbi Adrian M Schell

Bet David Kehillah’s Omer Project

Counting of the Omer begins on Sunday, 21 April for 50 days in support of Kehillah’s Feeding Schemes. Place your name and those of your loved ones on the list to donate one day’s food parcel for only R100 to Kehillah. Sign up on the sheet on the notice board in the Bet David Gallery, or call the shul office. Please EFT to Bet David Sisterhood, Nedbank Sandton Account 1970476214, branch 197005.

Thank you for your great support!

Metzorah: Only one month to go, and election day is here.

April 11, 2019 / RabbiAdrian / 0 Comments

25 years after the first democratic election. Many things have changed since then, and still much more needs to change, bringing more healing and more equality to our country.

Therefore, it is no wonder that campaigning has returned to South Africa, as many politicians and parties have very different ideas on how to solve the problems we are facing. As a result, it is inevitable that there will be debates about race, empowerment of different classes and the status of foreigners in South Africa. Once again, political leaders will try to explain to us who is in and who is out. All too often, they will try to score points by being harsh towards one group in our society and soft to others. In my humble opinion, this has nothing to do with the colour of our skin, our backgrounds, reconciliation, or real interest in problem solving — this is unfortunately only politics. At times, when listening to these politicians who are fighting about your votes, it seems to me that they try more to convince you who is more acceptable to be a part of “our” group and who is not, rather than seeking to find ways to include everyone in our society.

In this week’s Torah Portion, we appear to get a similar kind of situation where the Torah lays down a legal system and laws for who is considered clean and unclean. And, by virtue of a person’s uncleanliness, who needed to be removed or kept separate from the camp for a period of time.

At first glance we can therefore assume that it is about exclusion, searching out the unclean and excluding them from society. However, I would suggest that it is the opposite. This part of the Torah reminds us of the importance of finding ways to include all, so that when a person was removed from the camp for what ever reason, the law provided a way back, based on open and trans-parent principals. Ultimately, these people would be returned and re-admitted into the camp and into society, because a healthy society needs all of its members to flourish. My hope and my wish for this year’s election campaign is, that our politicians follow the example of the Torah and strife for inclusion rather than to polarise and divide this society more than it already is.

Shabbat Shalom – Rabbi Adrian M Schell

Tazria: There is always the possibility of Teshuva

April 4, 2019 / RabbiAdrian / 0 Comments

The portions of Tazria and Metzora are perhaps, for many of you, very uncomfortable portions of the Torah, dealing with all kinds of issues related to ritual purity and impurity.

Ritual impurity, or tumah, has nothing to do with hygiene. Instead, tumah is a spiritual state that prevents a person from participating in the worship life of the community. One becomes impure through a variety of means, all of which are perfectly natural, such as illness, childbirth, physical
discharges and contact with a corpse. Purity and impurity are not related to good or evil. However, impurity is considered to be a spiritual disability.

For example, tzaraat, the skin affliction that is discussed at length in this part of the Torah, is not the biological disease Leprosy – as it has historically been translated – but rather a state that the Torah understands as the physical manifestation of a spiritual or ritual problem. This is not a medical treatise, nor are the Kohanim (the priests) serving as paramedics. Rather, tumah is a purely ritual concern, and as the ritual leaders of the community, it falls upon the priesthood to facilitate purification for those who find themselves in a state of impurity.

The laws presented in this and the next parasha have long been the basis for numerous rabbinic homilies against the spread of lashon ha-ra — literally “evil speech” or gossip. Metzora, the rabbis conjectured, sounded just like motzi-ra — the bringing forth of evil with the mouth. Cause and effect: if one is guilty of lashon ha-ra, one will be afflicted by tzaraat and thus becomes a metzora. But the Torah tells us that tzaraat is not a permanent condition. One can become healthy again. Neither the condition, nor the sin that precipitated it, is hopeless. There is always the possibility of Teshuva — expiation for one’s misdeed — and a process by which the unclean metzora could again become pure and rejoin the community. This process always exists for us, no matter what our sin was.

Shabbat Shalom – Rabbi Adrian M Schell (Source: R’ JD. Cohen)

Shabbat Parah Adumah ?!

March 28, 2019 / RabbiAdrian / 0 Comments

Shabbart Parah Adumah ?!

The Shabbatot surrounding holidays are often permeated with the holiday themes, creating the mood for an upcoming festival, reflecting or enhancing festival themes, or easing the transition from a holiday back into the weekly flow of Shabbat.

A special Shabbat usually includes a special Torah or Haftarah [prophetic] reading that either replaces the standard weekly reading or is read in addition to it, as well as a maftir, or final aliyah, that reflect’s the holiday’s theme and is read from a different Torah scroll.

Shabbat Parah, the Sabbath of the Red Heifer, occurs on the last Shabbat of the month of Adar. The final Torah reading read on that Shabbat, Numbers 19:1-22, deals with the red heifer whose ashes were combined with water to ritually purify anyone who had been in contact with a dead person. Because only people who were pure could eat from the Passover sacrifice, in ancient times a public announcement reminded anyone who had become impure to purify themselves before making the Passover pilgrimage to Jerusalem.

The Haftarah, Ezekiel 36:16-38, also deals with issues of being cleansed from contamination, but the impurity in this case symbolizes human sinfulness. But, like physical impurity, sins can be overcome. As God says in Ezekiel 36:25,26: “I will sprinkle clean water upon you, and you shall be clean: I will cleanse you from all your uncleanliness and from all your fetishes [idolatrous practices]. And I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit into you.” This renewal of self and nation reflects Passover’s theme of redemption.

Shabbat Shalom — Rabbi Adrian M Schell

[Source: MyJewishLearning.com]

A joy that has no bounce

March 20, 2019 / RabbiAdrian / 0 Comments

Each month in the Jewish calendar symbolises many things, one of which is the general energy for that month. The energy of the month fills through every aspect of our lives, if we pay attention. The month of Adar, the month in which Purim falls, is the month of Joy! What better month to make plans for the future, to get married, to start a new partnership, a new job or just to
relax, than on the month where Joy rains upon us?

However, be mindful that there are two types of joy. There is the light-hearted, ecstatic, playful and, for me, bouncy joy, like the joy of a child at play. The second kind of joy is the joy that comes from toiling all night, all week, all month or all year with ourselves. The joy after hours, days, weeks or months of cleansing the soul of the many darknesses that it holds from past mistakes, negative conditioning, and mistaken projections.

It is the joy that is waiting for you, once you have journeyed to the depths of your “Gehenum“ and rectified whatever needed to be cleansed or awakened there. It’s a joy that has no bounce because it fills the entirety of your reality and your universe. It is the joy of being on the journey of a lifetime, knowing that even when you are in the depths of despair, there is a light waiting for you on the other side.

Wishing you a happy, joyful Purim—a freiliche Purim and Shabbat Shalom

— Rabbi Adrian M Schell

Mazal Tov to Carla (Rubin), daughter of Linda and Alan Rubin, and Jason Danker who were married on 17 March

Shabbat Zachor: God’s outcry

March 14, 2019 / RabbiAdrian / 0 Comments

It is an interesting co-incidence that on this Shabbat we commemorate all the violent and destructive attacks on the Jewish people in the past while we also begin with the reading of the third book of our Torah—Leviticus, Vayikra in Hebrew.

Leviticus is known for its long and detailed descriptions on how and when to bring animal sacrifices (korbanot) to the Eternal, but it has more to offer than the ritual outline of biblical Judaism. Leviticus establishes a firm framework for an ethical and just society. It calls upon each and every one for us to base our acts on righteousness and compassion.

The key word is kadosh, meaning holiness. Holiness is nothing lofty nor unreachable, far from our human realm—on the contrary, it is achievable and is something we can become with our own human abilities.

Judaism has no concept of half gods and that holiness is only a matter of the divine realm; Judaism teaches us that we can create holiness by conscious acts. It is our duty to give space to the divine.

One of the motives in the Esther story we read on Purim, is that God withdrew Godself from this world, and that cruelty could come into this world, because mankind allowed it. A motive we find in any dark moment of history, from Amalek to Auschwitz. Humans allowed cruelty to take over, to tip the scale into the wrong direction.

Vayikra, the first word of Leviticus, can be translated as ”And God called“. For me, it is God’s outcry to us, to bring light into a darkened world. With its teachings, Leviticus is a call to each and every human being to ensure that the scale is moved back, that holiness gets its space in this world and that—please God—the next generations can live in a world less broken.

May we find strength in the teaching of our tradition and may Esther serve us as a role model in bringing truth and healing into our community.

Shabbat Shalom and Purim Sameach — Rabbi Adrian M Schell

Vayakhel: I feel blessed to work with these wonderful women

February 28, 2019 / RabbiAdrian / 0 Comments

The Torah portion Vayakhel presents Moses’ speech to the Israelite community at one of the many special gatherings during their wanderings in the desert. The speech opens with a brief restatement of the commandment to keep the Sabbath. However, the topic of Moses’ message is the building of the Tabernacle. Moses solicits gifts—gold, silver, copper, and a long list of other items—to provide for the physical structure of the Tabernacle and its adornment. He also urges those who are skilled builders to construct the Tabernacle, the tent to cover it and all the furniture within, including the ark.

Our biblical ancestors understood the unifying power of a community effort to construct a sanctuary. Regarding the giving of gifts, and engaging in the labour towards the sanctuary, the biblical text uses the phrase “everyone whose heart so moves him” to recognise the psychological need to give, as well as to praise those who donate or volunteer their wealth and time, moved by an “inner voice” and not by any external pressure.

This Shabbat we honour the women of our congregation as part of the Women’s day of prayer. As someone who works nearly every day in the office of Bet David, I am able to witness day after day how much women contribute to the success of our congregation. The amazing team of our Kehillah, the wonderful staff of the Mitzvah School, Glynnis, Debbie, and Di in the office. Often their engagement goes beyond the normal, and that is what makes Bet David a warm and welcoming congregation.

Thank you all for making Bet David so special.

I feel blessed to work with these wonderful women.

Shabbat Shalom – Rabbi Adrian M Schell

Tetzaveh: Why is light the most common symbol for God?

February 14, 2019 / RabbiAdrian / 0 Comments

Friends,

Our Torah portion speaks about the ner tamid, which is often translated as the “eternal light” but it would be better to understand it as “always light” because it always had to be tended to. The Hebrew suggests this meaning rather than the more familiar eternal light. The ner tamid is the only commandment associated with the ancient tabernacle that we still do today almost exactly as it is commanded in the Torah.

Here is our question for this Shabbat: Why is light the most common symbol for God?

One answer, suggested in the Etz Hayim Commentary, is because light itself cannot be seen. We become aware of its presence when see other things that it illuminates. So too with God. We become aware of God’s presence when we behold the beauty of the world, or the love of others, or the goodness of others. It is only in light’s reflection that we discern its reality.

This analogy to light works also with fire, another symbol for God, used in Judaism. Fire is also not an object. We become aware of its presence when we feel it. Fire is also a process of liberating energy from something combustible. Fire requires our efforts to tend it. That is why the ner tamid must be the “always light.” Thus God becomes real in our lives when we liberate the potential energy within ourselves for good.

People often ask where is God? I admit that the light and fire of God can too often be obscured. But the helpful message of these metaphors is that we have to look very hard to discern their reality. Light and fire are often perceived by the glow or warmth they create rather than in their own realities.

What is the Bible’s most familiar image for God? It is the burning bush. When Moses stands before the bush he is amazed that it is not consumed by the fire. You have to stare a long while before discovering that the bush was not consumed. Miracles are discerned over time not immediately. Making God a reality requires effort. It is a matter of looking carefully. It is a matter of always tending the fire. It is not a matter of magic. It is instead a matter of recognising when and searching for the glimmer and reflection of light.

Have a wonderful and blessed Shabbat –

Rabbi Adrian M Schell

(Source: Rabbi Steven Moskowitz)