Chaverim/Dear Congregants,

Please join us tonight at 7pm for our lovely Friday night services. We will be joined by Mike Hurewitz of Jewish Family Services who will give a short talk about the crucial work that this great organization does.  Following services, there will be coffee and cake.  We hope you can all join us for this special event.

Sunday morning, May 18 at 10am  we will have Sunday school for the children.

Sunday afternoon at 3:30 in the afternoon, we continue Cantor Ben-Moshe’s Introduction to Judaism class which is open to all wishing to delve into Judaism, its rich history and traditions.

Shabbat shalom to you all!

This week we conclude Sefer Vayikra, the Book of Leviticus, with Parshat B’hukkotai.  Our parshah begins with the promise that if the People of Israel will live in accordance with the Torah, they will be able to stay in the Land of Israel and prosper.  What follows is one of the two passages of “tochechah”-rebuke-found in the Torah.  These passages recount in grim detail the consequences of failure to live up to the Covenant with God-famine, warfare and exile.  Traditionally, this passage and a similar one in the Book of Deuteronomy are read quickly and in an undertone, in order not to dwell on these unpleasant topics.  Nonetheless, we should consider these things, not in order that we become fearful of retribution for any slight infraction of halachah, Jewish Law, but as a spur to do the right thing.  It is significant that the infractions that are considered most heinous by the Torah, and thus most worthy of punishment, are crimes against others, especially the weak in society, the poor and the outsiders.    We are called upon to be “a kingdom of priests and a holy People”.  Let us always strive to live up to that.  Shabbat Shalom.

Rabbi Peter Tarlow’s Weekly Parasha:  This week we conclude our study of Sefer VaYikra, or as it is known in English translation, the Book of Leviticus.  You will find the book’s final parashah, B’Chukotai,  in Chapters: 26:3-27:34 of Leviticus.  Throughout this section, and to some degree throughout the entirety of Hebrew Scripture,  the question of “who controls history” faces us?  Is history controlled by humans, does it happen by chance, or is the hand of G’d the ultimate director of history? Furthermore, we are faced with the deeper issue of what is history?  Is it the collective narrative of individuals or the relationship between peoples?  Is history the recording of social movements or of individual actions?  Do we control the events in our lives or are we mere slaves to historic currents?
These questions are subtly embedded in the text  For example, in Leviticus 26:3 we read “Im b’chukotai telchu v’im mitzvotai tishmru va’asitem otam/If you walk in (follow) My laws and keep (watch over) My commandments and you do them…”  On a first reading it would appear that the text is indicating that history is the story of a tit-for-tat.  If “you” follow G’d’s laws then goodness will come, but if not, then evil will come.”
This verse, however, is not only more complicated than it might appear to be at first, but also introduces an additional side to the philosophical argument.  Grammatically, the verse presents us with conceptual problems. If we read the verse carefully in the original Hebrew, we note that the verse’s first two verbs have a subjunctive sense (expressing doubt). Thus, it is unclear if we will or will not follow G’d’s laws.  Then, at the end of the verse the verb’s mood changes and its third verb (to do) is written as an imperative: “You will do them” no questions asked!
How come?  Is the Torah  giving us an important lesson about history and our role in it?  Is this section hinting at the idea that history is the recording of not only what we wish to do but also about what we wish we did not have to do? Is history the story of what happened or what did not happen? Is it teaching us that being an adult means getting beyond our own feelings and pleasures and doing that which is right just because it is the right thing to do?  On still another level, we can read this text as a primer in economic theory.  Read this way is the text not a warning us that the price for economic irresponsibility is eventual political and societal chaos?
The text clearly unites the economic with the social and the political, and to some extent even with the theological and philosophical.  If we read the text carefully we note that it emphasizes the idea that we live life in social relationships, and that these ties dominate every aspect of our personal and group lives: from the political to the economic.  Is this the reason that Leviticus recognizes that all of us have personal economic needs, and it also reminds us that we must treat each other with both justice and dignity?
Perhaps the memory of slavery echoes throughout these texts.  Is the text teaching us that we must allow for individual creativity and at the same time create a form of “compassionate capitalism” that demonstrates our respect for ourselves and for our fellow human beings?  These are challenging concepts and questions in economically troubled times.  How would you interpret these texts and answer the challenges it poses to us?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 We look forward to seeing you all tonight , Friday May 9 at 7pm for our lovely Kabalat Shabbat services.

Tomorrow, Saturday May 10 at 9am, we will have our Shabbat morning services, with the Torah service at approximately 9:45.  We will have our congregants Bam, Kevin and Yosef as well as Ricardo reading from the Torah in the culmination of their Torah Trope class this year.  We hope you can all come out and show your support.  Yesher Koach to all the students.  There will be a kidush lunch following services sponsored by the Koeller family.

Sunday afternoon we continue our ever popular Intro to Judaism classes. These popular classes are for anyone interested in refreshing their knowledge of Judaism and for those looking to convert.

Sunday May 11, as well as it being Mother’s Day is also the Israel Independence Day celebration at the J.  The event starts at 2-4:30 and is free and open to everyone.  Please see http://www.shalomaustin.org/ for more details.

Wednesday May 14 at 7pm is Bam Rubenstein’s class – Davening for the Diaspora.  Come learn all about Our Daily Prayers.

This week we read in Parshat B’har of the Sabbatical Year and the Jubilee Year.  In ancient Israel, on a set schedule land would lie fallow, debts would be cancelled andservants would go free, and in the Jubillee year land would revert to its original owners. It was as if there was a reset switch built into Israelite society, so that society wouldn’t become too unequal, and so the Land of Israel itself could observe a Sabbath and rest.  The Torah is very much concerned with equality-after all, we are taught that God created us all equally.  In fact, the Rabbis teach that all humanity started with one couple so that no one could claim superior ancestry over anyone else.  The Liberty Bell in Philadelphia, one of the most recognizable symbols of the United States, contains a quote from our parshah-“Proclaim liberty throughout the Land, and unto the inhabitants thereof”.  May we always follow the example of our parshah, and strive as individuals and as a society for true equality of all people.  Shabbat Shalom.

This week’s parashah views the people of Israel as one community and that land belongs to no one, but rather to G’d.  As such, we note a constant tension that runs throughout the text: Where does the individual’s rights end and his/her responsibility to society begin?  The parashah makes us debate the role of private versus public property and at what point does government oversight turn into government tyranny?  It is in this section that we re-read about the Shmitah (the Sabbath of the land ) and the Yovel, the Jubilee year. This redistribution is affirmed in the fact that the parashah reminds us that land belongs to G’d.  As such not only is life to observe a weekly Sabbath but we must also permit the earth to observe its Sabbaths, called the Yovel or Jubilee year. Moreover it is not we, humans who give the land its rest but rather it is the land that has its own responsibility to its Creator.  Just as human being then are to show gratitude to G’d through the Shabbat so too must the the earth also demonstrate its gratitude.

This week’s parashah asks if a society can survive if the individual becomes the final arbiter with no responsibility to and toward the “other”.  From Leviticus’ perspective our responsibilities are not only to ourselves, but also to our community, to the land, to time and to the Eternal. Thus we are not free to pick our own Sabbaths, but rather all Israel must make the seventh day holy.  Through this communal ownership of time, we transform Saturday into a national “cathedral of time.” 

This week’s and next week’s section emphasize actions. It teaches us that what we do and how we act toward others makes a difference and brings us farther from or closer to G’d.  The parashah reminds us that it is our duty to reach out to  others and to offer support and comfort during difficult times.  Thus we are to clothe the naked, visit the sick, comfort the mourner, and bury the dead.  These acts, and others,  are more than mere mitzvot, rather they are the practical means by which we help build a holy community.

Leviticus would not agree with the approach that many moderns take: that the individual is the final judge of all of his or her own actions.  Instead the book reminds us that such positions will lead to the “cult of individualism” and from such a lack of community and communal responsibilities, all will suffer from a world of selfishness, isolation, anomie, and alienation.  What do you think?  Where does your personal responsibility end and your communal responsibility begin?