Shabbat with the new(ish) rabbi

My rabbi was away this Shabbat and last, and the associate rabbi (formerly known here as "the third rabbi" or "the educator rabbi") said he'd like to include lay people in services instead of just doing everything himself (yay!). I'm now the head of the Neshama Center (um, is complicated -- not just a worship committee but go ahead and think of it that way for now), so he asked me to invite some people from our group. Since I got to do a service myself in July under similar circumstances I deferred to others this time. Then this Thursday at the board meeting the cantorial soloist told me that one of the people for this week was sick and she wanted me to fill in. People told me it looked very smooth, as if this set of people was used to working together. Nifty. :-) (The cantorial soloist and I, and my rabbi for that matter, have worked together enough to be able to sort of read each others' minds on the bimah. Glad to see it works with the other rabbi too.)

This spirit of inclusiveness extended to the morning bar-mitzvah service in one way. (This is the sanctuary service with family-centric attendance, not the regular morning minyan with a steady community. We're talking about ways to fix that but it's a hard problem endemic to the Reform movement.) Obviously the associate rabbi can read torah -- you won't graduate rabbinic school without demonstrating capability there -- but instead he invited another lay reader and me to read for these two bar-mitzvah services. The other one did last week and I did this week, each of reading everything except the part that the student read. Mine went very well, I thought -- I made two mistakes requiring correction, one of which was accidentally over-shooting an aliya boundary (I realized it at the same time as the rabbi). The bar mitzvah chanted very well; afterward I whispered to him that he was welcome to come back and read for us any time. :-) (Articulate, on key, and it was clear that he understood what the text he was reading meant.) I hope we'll see more of him.

The typical Reform bar-mitzvah service is somewhat tedious (to those outside the family) in some respects; there's a reason the president of the URJ once called it "king for a day". Yesterday's was a little better than I'm used to in some ways; I suspect that's the handiwork of the associate rabbi, and if so I'll be interested to see where this goes. Other aspects still require a lot of work, but I'm glad to have good relationships with both our rabbis such that I can talk with them about these things.

This rabbi was originally hired to focus on education and not be on the bimah much; with the (planned) departure of another associate rabbi earlier this summer, we are back down to two. So roles have shuffled around somewhat and he'll be on the bimah more. Between his service-leading skills, his excellent sermon-craft, and his interest in involving lay people more, I'm looking forward to this.

new game: Defenders of the Realm

Dani played Defenders of the Realm at Origins and found it promising despite its high similarity to another game we enjoy, so he ordered a copy. We've now played a few games.

This is a cooperative game where the players are trying to prevent the spread of four strains of monsters before they overwhelm the map. The map consists of a bunch of interconnected sites, each color-coded to one of the four types of monster. On each turn new monsters appear in designated locations (dictated by cards), and if you get more than three monsters in a particular location that spot becomes tainted. Each type of monster also has a general; the generals might move during the "darkness spreads" stage (also when new monsters come out), and if any of them reach the capital you lose. Other ways to lose are to run out of taint markers and to run out of monsters of any given color. You attack monsters by going to their locations and rolling combat dice; you attack generals by accumulating cards of the right colors, which you draw each turn. Each player has a unique role with associated special abilities. You win by killing all four generals.

But wait; this isn't at all like Pandemic. Why, this is non-deterministic! You have to roll dice to attack infections, er, monsters. And the infection, err, darkness-spreads, cards don't get reshuffled and put back on top. And taint is completely different from outbreaks. Um, yeah.

But all that said, it's an enjoyable game; while it blatantly rips off most of the Pandemic mechanics, it doesn't feel like a complete knock-off. This is its own game, though I do wonder how the publisher has stayed out of trouble.

( more details )

halacha geeking

One of the many fences created by the rabbis is that of muktzah. This is a class of object that you're not even supposed to handle on Shabbat, because the primary use of that object involves activities that are forbidden on Shabbat. So, for example, you aren't supposed to handle writing utensils, your gardening equipment, the TV's remote control, etc.

Recently, while contemplating the logistics of a pot-luck break-fast for Yom Kippur, I found myself wondering: since Yom Kippur is Shabbat Shabbaton (the Shabbat of Shabbats), and it's a fast day -- on that day is food mutkzah?

I don't actually have anything riding on the answer to this (if I did I'd ask my rabbi); I'll take my contribution over before the holiday starts, most likely. But I do find myself wondering about the principles involved. Torah law doesn't need to follow consistent principles -- it is what it is -- but rabbinic law does.