Parashat Balak

Come enjoy our Friendly Friday Kabbalat shabbat!
TONIGHT FRIDAY July 7 at 7PM.

Shabbat morning services this shabbat, July 8 at 9 AM. Torah service at 9:45 with a children’s service at 10:30 and sit down kidish meal immediately following services.

Candle lighting in Austin is at 8:18 PM

Cantor Ben Moshe’s Message
This week we read in Parshat Balak about the non-Jewish prophet, Bil’am, who attempts to curse the People of Israel but blesses them instead. His words, “Mah tovu ohaleikha Ya’akov, mishk’noteikha Yisrael”-“How good are your tents, O Jacob, your dwellings, O Israel “-are recited upon entering a synagogue. We often think of these words as referring to our synagogues, or in ancient times to the Temple, but the plain meaning is a reference to our homes. In truth, the Jewish home is the primary stage of Jewish spiritual life. It is in the home that we light candles for Shabbat and holidays, we have our festive meals including the Passover Seder, and where we learn he basic lessons of morality which are at the core of our Torah. Let us always remember that our literal dwellings are just as holy as our synagogues, and act accordingly, treating our families with the same respect as our fellow congregants. Shabbat Shalom.
Hazzan Yitzhak Ben-Moshe

Enrolling now for our one of a kind school BERS. We will have a Hebrew immersion class as well as our Sunday Funday.
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to save your spot.

COMMUNITY NEWS:

Join us at the JCC Pool on July 16 & August 13 from 12 – 2 PM for a pool party, live music, a bounce house and food and sno-cones for purchase. Free for the entire community.

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Sponsor a Kiddush for your special occasion.

Rabbi Tarlow’s Weekly Parasha:
Because last week we did not study Parashat Chukat this week we will examine both that parashah and the one for this week, Parashat Balak. You will find Parashat Chukat in the book of Numbers 19:1-22:1 and parashat Balak in the Book of Numbers 22:2-25:9.
Chukat deals with issues of water, for purification, for drinking, and as the essential resource for life. The second Parashah, the one read this coming Shabbat Balak, deals with blessings and curses, and tells the famous story of Balaam and his famous talking donkey.
When we read the text in a foreign language such as English we do not see the connection between these two sections. Viewing the text in the original Hebrew, however, provides a very different perspective. The Hebrew text revolves around four words: water, a pool of water, life, and blessing. These four words are not related in English but in Hebrew the reader sees a very clear relationship between them. Water in Hebrew is “mayim;” life is “chayim.” Both words are plural verbal-nouns that indicate motion and consistent change. In a like manner, the Hebrew word for blessing “brachah” is related to the Hebrew word for “pool of water” (brechah). Thus, the Hebrew reader connects the constant flow of water to that of a stream of life and understands that without the physical pool of water (brechah) the spiritual blessings of life (brachah) cannot exist.
In a sense these two sections read together teach us that life has both a material and spiritual side. Both sections deal with the “stated” and the “hidden”, the apparent and the less apparent. Life contains both the tangible and the intangible elements that distinguish it from other forms of existence. These sections remind us that to be successful in life we need to deal with all its aspects, and that life, like water, is an ever-moving stream.
In Hebrew there is no such thing as “a water”. Rather water is composite of many drops. In a like manner no one has a single life, we all have many sides to our lives, each with its own unique set of circumstances. A lesson that these sections teach us then is that what was in our lives is not what will be in our lives, that that successful living comes from the recognition that we all change and must learn how to adapt to these changes.
What is true of people is also true of societies. Societies that do not change, that are stand still, soon die. The way we combine these elements of life helps to determine if we drink from the well of bitter waters or of living waters, waters filled curses or with blessings. Let us hope that we choose to seek the physical blessings of water and the spiritual blessings of life.

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