Yesterday was the equinox, but I couldn't help noticing that sunrise was at 7:07AM and sunset was at 7:16PM. That stretches the definition of "equi" a bit. Looking ahead, the day won't be within a minute of 12 hours until September 25 or 26. (One's a minute longer, one's a minute shorter.) So off to Google I went.

There are two things going on, it turns out. The first is that the equinox is relative to the center of the sun, but we count sunrise and sunset from when the top is visible. But that only accounts for 2.5-3 minutes at my latitude.

The bigger factor is atmospheric refraction: after the sun has actually set (all parts past the horizon), or the reverse in the morning, you can still see the sun. What? Yeah, apparently you can look westward at sunset and see "the sun" even though the sun is not in your line of sight; light bends. This effect varies with atmospheric conditions, but is usually good for about six extra minutes of day.

I said that I won't see a 12-hour day here for a few more days. Apparently that effect gets stronger as you move toward the equator; this site says at 5 degrees North that date isn't until October 17. It also says the day is never exactly 12 hours at the equator, when I thought the equator was the one place where you had reliable 12-hour days all year. Today I learned.

I wonder -- because I'm the sort of person who wonders about stuff like this -- what the effect is in halacha, Jewish law. The day starts at sunset, but when beginning Shabbat we add some extra time just to be safe -- 18 minutes in most communities. That's l'hatchila, what you should do from the outset, but b'dieved, after the fact, if you cut into the 18 minutes with your preparations, it's ok because it's not actually sunset yet. Except... maybe it is? If you have a bad week and light candles two minutes before (nominal) sunset -- when you can still see the sun in the sky, except it's not there -- have you kindled fire on Shabbat? Or do you go by what you can see anyway? I plan to ask this on Mi Yodeya if it's not already there, but first I have to finish Sukkot preparations.

Update: asked.

And in honor of the coming holiday, a bonus daf bit:

Everything the talmud says about Channukah is covered on four pages of tractate Shabbat. Some parts are well-known, such as the dispute between Hillel and Shammai about whether to start with one light and build up (Hillel) or start with eight and decrease each night (Shammai). Here is a different teaching on this holiday.

Rav Yehudah says: he who lights the Channukah lights pronounces two blessings and he who watches pronounces one (add one more on the first day for everyone). What blessing does everyone say? Al ha-nisim (for the miracles). What blessing does the one who lights say? Who has commanded us to light the Channukah lights. But the torah says no such thing! Rav Avia derives it from "you shall not turn aside from [the torah]" (Deut 17:11). R. Nechemiah says it comes from "ask your father and let him tell you" (Deut 32:7).

R. Amram objects to this reasoning, saying that we could use it to require a blessing for every rabbinic ordinance. (R. Amram took the words right out of my mouth.) R. Abaye answers him: a certain rabbinic ordinance (that is, one calling for a definite action) requires a blessing, but one arising out of doubt does not. Well then, Amram asks, what about the blessing on the second day of festivals (in the Diaspara), which is a case of doubt? Abaye says this is lest people treat the second day slightingly; his argument is that if people don't have to sanctify it they will treat it as an ordinary day. (Shabbat 23a)

R. Avia's proof-text surprises me; I read that verse (which continues "do not add to or subtract from the law") as opposing, not supporting, this rabbinic innovation, yet this is exactly the verse cited. R. Amram's objection is the same one I have wondered about; what are the bounds on this approach? Obviously there are some, but I have more to learn here.

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There is an issue in halacha called kol isha, which literally means "a woman's voice". The idea is that a woman's voice -- specifically a singing voice, according to B'rachot 24a -- will arouse men in the same way that seeing her hair (or certain body parts, and I don't just mean the naughty bits) will. So just as women are to cover their hair and wear modest garments to keep men from sinning, so too are they to refrain from singing around men. (Well, at least solo; being in a group can mitigate.)

I'd long assumed that kol isha is the reason women can't read torah (except in women's groups) in traditional communities. But I've thought of an argument against that position, which probably means that either the argument is wrong or this isn't a kol-isha issue to begin with. (I tend to assume that no halachic argument that turns out to be correct would be original to me, because I don't have the vast knowledge base yet.)

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To summarize, Jewish law does not hold (as much of Christianity appears to) tha life begins at conception; rather, human life begins at birth. (Specifically at crowning, as I recall.) The torah covers causing the death of a fetus; it's a property crime. Killing a person, of course, is not. So abortion is permitted under Jewish law. Not desirable, but permitted.

Now here's where the halachic problem with the agenda of the far right comes in: under Jewish law, there are cases where abortion is mandatory. It is unambiguous that this is required to save the life of the mother; the rabbi generally agree that it is also required to preserve the health of the mother.

Most pro-choice folks (certainly myself included) argue on the grounds of individual liberty, but the author of this article points out that as Jews we should be considering the halachic issue, too. The rest of this entry is me talking, not the author.

If Bush gets his way (through legislation or by stacking the Supreme Court), we could end up in a situation where national law forbids the correct practice of our religion, specifically as regards to how we treat other people. I've been trying to think of an analogy for Christians (staying away from murder because it's emotional), and the closest I can come up with is: suppose the government required you to bear false witness against your neighbor, with the result that he would be criminally or economically ruined. (And if you think that can't happen...) That's a violation of one of the ten commandments. Would you be outraged? Would you heed that law? Requiring the Jewish community to stand by while an actual life is ruined in favor of a fetus is kind of like that. A Jew who does that violates laws (both between man and man, and betweeen man and God) that we take every bit as seriously as Christians take their laws that say life begins at conception. But Christians do not sin if they fail to prevent an abortion; we do in some cases if we fail to perform one.

If religion has no bearing on government, then the anti-abortion lobby has to rework its arguments. If religion does have bearing on government, then all religions must be considered, not just the one most popular with lawmakers. Some of the founders of the country may have been Christian (many were Deists), but this is not a Christian nation. Not then and certainly not now.

At torah study one of the regulars told me I'm becoming more and more like a rabbi over time. (I said "summer school was good for me", but he argued that it's more than that.) When I (gently!) corrected my rabbi during study he whispered to me "see?!" and I told him to hush. When he called me "rabbi Monica" at S'lichot that night, though, I told him that was presumptuous and to please not even joke about that. Just what I need -- someone overhearing and thinking the para-rabbinic program is going to my head or something. He agreed to poke fun at me in other ways instead, which is fine. :-)

We've been using lay torah readers in the morning service for a year now, and there's been some discussion of minor changes. Until now, the person reading torah is responsible for leading that part of the service as well -- we've made it clear that he's free to delegate, but that almost never happens. Meanwhile, some torah readers feel intimidated by the service (but don't make other arrangements), and some people want to lead the service but don't want to read torah. So after discussing it with people, I'm going to keep two separate sign-up lists. After the service four people told me they want to lead services (who were not already torah readers), so I think that was the right thing to do.

As part of that, I'm going to conduct a workshop soon after the holidays on the torah service -- liturgy, choreography, and practical skills. Assuming permission (likely), I'm going to copy a handout from a class at HUC on the choreography of the torah service, because why invent work for myself when I have a perfectly good handout? (It's an annotated siddur excerpt. It's not our siddur, but it's close enough.) This sort of public speaking I can do, though teaching more formal classes still intimidates me. One step at a time, I guess.

One of our regulars, a 13-year-old who became bar mitzvah in June, also signed up to read torah. I think that's great! He's the only person of that age who's currently showing up, and I'd like to keep him. His father has been involved in the congregation for years, including this service; the son started showing up at this service a year or two ago.

Aside that I might come back and expand on later, or not. This season involves three states: t'shuvah (repentance, literally "return"), s'lichah (forgiveness), and kapparah (expiation). It's not just about the first.

The S'lichot program this year was very good. I got there a few minutes late, but all I missed was havdalah, which I did at home before going anyway. They then had two mini-classes, one on the Rambam's laws of t'shuvah (excerpts; it's a long work) and the other on customs and random bits of information on the season. I think this is the first time (since I've been going) that they've aimed for an educational angle (as opposed to something like a cantorial concert), and I like this approach a lot. Then after that we had some refreshments, and then the S'lichot service itself. (This is customarily done at midnight, but we tend to start around 11:00. Some of our older congregants demanded it.)

Yesterday's mail brought a birthday present from my mother-in-law (a very kind woman). She sent a very nice purse, in which she had placed a keychain from the Diaspora Museum in Tel Aviv. The keychain has a tiny pouch (closed by a snap), and inside it was a teeny tiny copy of the book of Tehillim (Psalms). We're talking about a book that's as long as the middle joint on my index finger, as wide as the end joint, and somewhat thick. It's very cute, though I can't actually read the text myself. That's ok, though. I've (now) heard of smaller liturgical aids on keychains (t'filat ha-derech, or the traveller's prayer, which makes a lot of sense), but an entire book surprised me.

It does make me wonder about one thing, though. We do not take books containing the divine name into restrooms. I've always understood this to mean actual exposed books, though when I'm carrying a volume of talmud in my backpack I make sure not to carry that backpack into a restroom either. But what about something like these keychains? I'm not really worried about personal practice; I figure that if there were a problem with t'filat ha-derech keychains someone would have raised the issue by now, and my keys stay in my pocket when not in use. But I wonder where the line is that makes a keychain in my pocket seem ok to me, a book in a backpack iffy, and a "naked" book wrong.

There was a fascinating (to me) discussion at breakfast. There is a light breakfast after services every morning -- usually just bagels and bread, cream cheese, and drinks, unless someone sponsors a fancier breakfast. The process of getting the bread/bagels has been a pain for various reasons, and today someone (a regular, not a visitor) proposed a change: getting bagels from a new bakery that is better in quality, cheaper, more conveniently located -- and not under rabbinic supervision. This last point had not even occurred to the person bringing up the subject as something important; when others pointed it out he went on an anti-kashrut rant. ("What could be treif about a bagel?" "Well, this place sells sandwiches, right? So maybe they sliced your bagel with the same knife they just used to slice the ham?" "You're being too picky." And so on.)

Other people pressed that line of argument with him, but I brought up a more fundamental issue. This is a Conservative congregation. That means they, as a congregation, are bound to a certain interpretation of halacha. It doesn't matter if every member of the minyan eats treif at home; the congregational meal must be in accordance with that halacha, both for appearance and to support the needs of any visitor who actually keeps kosher. (I think, but am not sure, that failing to keep a kosher shul kitchen is one of the issues (along with performing an intermarriage, and I'm not sure what else) that can get a Conservative rabbi censured.) So if that halacha says a bakery must be under supervision, you have to follow that. Bottom line: you have to ask the rabbi and follow his ruling.

The person I was arguing with seemed to be of the belief that "kashrut is silly, so we don't need to worry about it". He failed to see the difference between decisions about personal practice and decisions about communal practice. At one point he brought up other Conservative deviations from the Orthodox interpretation of halacha, like allowing women to lead services, but I pointed out that this isn't the same thing at all: the Conservative movement has a process, which they followed, to determine that women can lead services. They didn't just get up one day and say "we don't like that restriction, so we're not doing it". That same process produces an understanding of kashrut, which must be followed in the shul.

The rabbi was not present, by the way. (I would of course have deferred to him if he were.) I didn't mean to be "speaker for the rabbi", and I said a few times that he needs to consult the rabbi about the kashrut rules for the shul. But when exactly did I, a Reform Jew, become a spokesman for Conservative Judaism in a Conservative shul? *boggle*

(I should clarify that I am not trying to malign or question this community as a whole. I assume that most people present agreed with me but just weren't putting it into words.)