a pleasant Shabbat

[cellio]

This Shabbat was very good in a number of ways.

The walk through the snow/slush/ice wasn't too bad, though I do wish that people who live on corners would remember to shovel paths to the curb, and not just along the sidewalk, to aid people crossing the street. As a result, I walked for most of a block in the street, paralleling nicely-shovelled sidewalks, because of the knee-high pile at the end of that stretch. Oops.

Friday night our junior rabbi led the main service, as the senior rabbi was leading a learners' minyan. The sermon was about halachic issues in organ donation, which took me a little by surprise at first. (During the course of the sermon we found that the rabbi had just lost a friend who died waiting for a transplant, so that explains why the subject was on his mind.) He made the point that not only is organ donation not forbidden by Jewish law, but that it's actually mandatory due to pikuach nefesh (saving a life). The arguments against donation revolve around resurrection; the Reform movement rejected physical resurrection two centuries ago, and even if we hadn't, you can certainly argue that if the moshiach is able to raise the dead at the end of days, he can certainly replace the heart you gave away while he's at it. Meanwhile, refusing to donate that heart leads to someone else's death unnecessarily.

The girl who became bat mitzvah this Shabbat was very good. (The bar/bat mitzvah participates in the Friday service a little, though the main service is Saturday.) She was confident, audible, and could carry a tune. I've heard that the talk she gave on Saturday was also well-written, though I didn't hear it myself. Too bad that some of her relatives were inconsiderate jerks, like the two who sat behind me and yapped through the entire service, ignoring glares and "shh" sounds. Oh well. (They weren't locals -- or if they were, they're locals who never come. The immediate family is much better.)

Saturday the 20s/30s group held an afternoon gathering -- a combination of study, socializing, getting to know each other, prayer, and singing. It was really nifty. (I was joking with the organizer Friday night about how I'm participating as much as I can with that group now, because in September I become inelligible. We joked about "happy 40th birthday -- now scram". :-) )

The afternoon started off with singing and introductions, with my rabbi asking us to describe a time we'd found a special connection in prayer. The variety of answers was interesting. I was near the end of the line, so for once I got to hear most of the other answers before speaking. (When we do this Saturday morning I tend to be near the beginning.) Interestingly, of the 20 people there, three mentioned having Christian backgrounds.

We then spent a while studying the week's Torah portion, which was Ki Tisa. The "famous" part of Ki Tisa is the golden-calf incident, and that's what we studied here, but this parsha also contains the command to keep Shabbat as a sign of the covenant. (The "v'shamru" prayer is from this parsha.) Later we talked about this more, with a side discussion into what work is forbidden on Shabbat and why.

The discussion of the golden calf was interesting and wide-ranging. There was a discussion of how the people could actually build the idol in the specified time. Our best guess (discounting Aharon's excuse -- "I threw the gold into the fire and out came this calf!") was that it was probably a wooden calf that was then gilded. We don't have sources for this, though. We had artists who've done metal casting. :-)

There was a lot of discussion of the part about the sins of the parents being visited onto the children -- how is this fair? But it's true despite anyone's intentions -- consider what happens to the children of alcoholics, or children from broken homes, or the like. They have a rougher time of it than their peers -- it's not that God is punishing them specifically, but that they bear the consequences of their parents' negative actions. It's not fair or unfair -- it just is.

We talked about how the calf incident could happen, and that the people were bassically left to fend for themselves for 40 days, without an effective leader, right after coming out of slavery. Slaves aren't accustomed to thinking for themselves or solving their own problems, so God's (aborted) plan to just wipe them out and start over was way out of line. They committed a grave sin, and ultimately this generation is going to have to die off in the desert because they just aren't ready, but it's a lesser sin than if we did such a thing, fully aware of our options and the consequences. (That last part is mostly me talking, by the way.)

One failing that this people did have, in my opinion, is that they did not look outward. Here they were in a confused, frightened state, and instead of looking for guidance -- from Aharon, or tryying in some nebulous way to connect with God -- they looked for a solution that was entirely within their capability (making an idol) and did that. Sometimes we can't solve our problems ourselves, and we have to reach out -- to God, to our families, to professionals of various sorts. This is one of the lessons I learn from Ki Tisa.

After the study session we had a getting-to-know-each-other game -- we were paired up, given a topic to discuss for 4-5 minutes, and then given new partners and new topics. It was fun, and I got to know a little more about four or five members of my congregation.

We had mincha (the afternoon service), and then our junior rabbi gave a talk about fences around the Torah and interpreting the law and our practice, with the main point being that sometimes so many fences build up that we lose sight of the real goal. And that as Reform Jews, we're free to interpret things differently and drop or add fences of our own, but we're not free to just blow off the original commandment without studying it. It sounds like the rabbi is at least as sick of hearing "I'm Reform, so I don't do that" as I am.

Thursday night at the board meeting the organizer asked me if I could lead havdalah, as both rabbis would have to leave before then. (It went something like this: "Do you know the havdalah service?" "Sure, I do it every week." "Great, could you do it for us this week?") Friday night she asked me if I could also lead bentching, the grace after meals (the afternoon included the customary third meal of Shabbat). Both of these went well (got compliments, even), and I learned that in the case of music, sometimes chutzpah can substitute for knowledge. Specifically, I had forgotten the melody to part of the bentching, so I just made something up on the fly and people sang along. I know they hadn't heard the melody before, because I hadn't heard the melody before either. :-)

Some of the people there weren't familiar with havdalah, so I ended up giving a little talk about the symbolism before we did it. So ok, I can stand up in front of a small group of sympathetic friends and lecture, but I'm still very uncomfortable teaching classes more formally. Weird.

The afternoon shared many elements with our morning minyan's annual Shabbaton (retreat for all of Shabbat, not just the afternoon). That's coming up again in May, and I'm really looking forward to it.

I realized this morning that this spring I'm chanting Torah twice, and neither is at my synagogue. I have to pester my rabbi again about getting a shot at that. (I'm chanting a little for that women's service I mentioned a few days ago, and I just got permission to chant my "birthday" portion on a Thursday at Tree of Life again this year. Last year I did the first two aliyot; my goal for this year is to be able to do all three. For this portion, the third is a little longer than the first two put together.)

Comments

[goljerp]

if the moshiach is able to raise the dead at the end of days,

I tried looking up in my copy of Urbach's The Sages to see what he said about ressurection and the moshiach... because my initial reaction was "moshiach doesn't ressurect; God ressurects!" (I couldn't find anything quickly) This probably boils down to the question of whether the moshiach has extraordinary powers of his own, or just comes at an extraordinary time. (The answer is: you can find rabbinic support for either point of view. And, even if Moshiach is not inherently supernatural, the bible has several stories of Prophets ressurecting people, and the Talmud has at least one story of a Rabbi bringing another Rabbi back to life.)

Our best guess (discounting Aharon's excuse -- "I threw the gold into the fire and out came this calf!") was that it was probably a wooden calf that was then gilded. We don't have sources for this, though.

Isn't Aaron's excuse weasely? I guess I always pictured him using some sort of mold, although gilding a calf makes sense. One interesting thing which I hadn't heard of before was: the calf was supposed to be the throne of the god; the god itself would have been imagined riding the calf. (Apparently one of the gods of the area - El or Baal, I forget which - was envisioned this way. Also the temple in the northern kingdom had calves?)

I had forgotten the melody to part of the bentching, so I just made something up on the fly and people sang along. I know they hadn't heard the melody before, because I hadn't heard the melody before either. :-)

Hey, how do you know that you weren't channeling the proper melody without realizing it? ;-)