From The Bimah: Jewish Lessons For Life

September 16, 2023 Rosh Hashanah Day 1

            On March 18, 1980, a young historian named Marty Sherwin, then age 43, signed a contract with Knopf publishing to write a biography of J. Robert Oppenheimer, the so-called father of the atomic bomb.  When Marty Sherwin signed the deal, both he and the publishing house expected that it would be a five-year project.  He was to get paid $70,000, $35,000 up front, and the remainder five years later when the book was to have been completed.              But, famously, five years later, he had not completed the book. In fact, five years later, he had not even started writing it. Marty Sherwin was a meticulous researcher, and he found himself in a rabbit hole.  He would spend twenty years doing research on Oppenheimer.  His research came to 50,000 pages of original sources, including 8,000 pages of FBI records.  There were more than 100 records of interviews.              So for twenty years, Marty Sherwin accumulated box after box of material.  Boxes in his attic. Boxes in his basement.  Boxes in his of

The story is told of a man named Harry whose business had fallen on hard times. He goes to shul and prays: God, I don’t often ask you for things, but my business is failing, and I need a miracle now. Please help me win the lottery. The lottery happens, and he doesn’t win. He is feeling the financial squeeze. If he doesn’t get help soon, he might lose his house. So off he goes to shul and prays: God, my business is going belly up, I don’t want to lose my house. Please help me win the lottery. The next week, the lottery happens again, and he doesn’t win. Off he goes to shul a third time and prays: God, my business has failed, it looks like we’re not going to keep our house, my health is deteriorating, my marriage is on the rocks. Please help me win the lottery. To his utter amazement, something happens right then and there that had never ever happened to Harry before: God answered back. From the heavens God thundered: Harry, I would like to help you win the lottery, I really would, but first you ha

“In this house we believe that…” American lawn signs confidently proclaim that the members of this house all believe the same things: and the sign then lists the tenets that the members of the home all believe. These lawn signs cover a wide gamut of political convictions. All of which made me wonder: what, if anything, do we have to believe to be considered a good Jew? This is particularly vexing because we famously disagree, two Jews, three opinions. And what happens if we don’t believe, or want to believe but can’t believe, or if we are offended at the notion that we are supposed/required/expected/commanded to believe? What if we believe that belief should be organic, intuitive, freely chosen? As the holidays approach, we usually think it is our deeds we need to work on. Do we also need to work on our beliefs, or not? Another way to put it: It is said that Judaism is a religion of deed, not creed. Is this true? Watch as we share the texts and learning of Donniel Hartman’s lecture from the Shalom

Recently I’ve become obsessed with the reality show Alone. The premise is that 10 survivalists are dropped in the wilds of Alaska or Patagonia or Mongolia with only the clothes on their back, 10 tools, and camera gear to document their experiences. It’s wild to watch. They build primitive shelters and hunt with bows and arrows. There is a lot of ingenuity, but there is also a lot of suffering. A lot of shivering through cold nights, a lot of hunger, a lot of loneliness. And what’s so interesting for me is that every season, there is this refrain that you hear from the contestants. They’ll say, “I’m miserable. I’m lonely; I’m hungry; I’m tired; I’m cold. I wish I could just go home and eat good food in a warm room with my family. But I’m not a quitter. I’m not going to quit.” How do we understand this ethos? I am miserable. I am cold and tired and hungry. What I am doing is actively making me unhappy. And yet, because I committed to this thing, because I said I would, because our culture frowns up

It seems the goal-post of how we reach and teach the next generation is always moving. As parents, grandparents, educators, and a community who cares, how do we get it right? How can we move the next generation toward an indelible connection to Judaism now and for generations to come? Rabbi Ravid Tilles has been the Director of Jewish Life and Learning at Schechter Boston since 2017. Schechter Boston is a Jewish Day School in Newton for students from 15 months to 8th grade. He and his family are also members of the Temple Emanuel community. Before moving to Newton, Rabbi Tilles was the Associate Rabbi at the Merrick Jewish Centre in Merrick, Long Island and has served multiple communities in various educational/pastoral capacities. He received ordination from the Jewish Theological Seminary in 2013 where he also earned a masters degree and certificate in Pastoral Care.

August 19, 2023

August 12, 2023

August 5, 2023

Why was this Tisha B’av different from all other Tisha B’avs? On all other Tisha B’avs, we read about how once there was a Jewish homeland in the land of Israel, and that homeland was destroyed not by external enemies, but by internal Jewish hatred, what the Talmud calls sinat chinam, hatred of Jew for Jew. In previous years, we got to read about it. We had a luxury. It was history. What’s different this year is that we are not reading about it. We are living it. It is not history. It is our reality.

July 22, 2023

July 15, 2023

What do we do with something that is beautiful, broken, and ours? I want to tell you a story that captures beautiful, broken and ours. The story flows from this black and white photograph that was shared at Hartman two weeks ago by Rabbi Rani Yeager. Rabbi Yeager is the rabbi of a congregation in Tel Aviv called Beit Tefilah. He is also a senior faculty member of Hartman. The photograph is of his mother as a very young child, her siblings, and her parents, Rani Yeager’s grandparents. His mother was named Hertzelina by her Zionist parents. Two things about this photograph are striking. One, the date. This photograph was taken in 1944, in Bulgaria. In 1944 the Nazis were intensifying their efforts to murder Jews. In 1944 the cattle cars to Auschwitz were going full-time. In 1944, other countries like Hungary gave up their Jews to the Nazi death machine. And yet, the second remarkable thing about this photograph is that the members of his family are smiling. Why, in 1944, was this family of Bulgarian J

July 1, 2023

June 24, 2023

I want to tell you a story that has a coda and a second coda. The context is college baseball. If college baseball is not your thing, if you have never followed college baseball, not to worry. The story, which I heard on ESPN Daily Podcast, is about life. There is a college in North Carolina called Wake Forest, which has a historically mediocre baseball team called the Wake Forest Demon Deacons. The team last won the College World Series 70 years ago. In 2010 a man named Tom Walter became the coach at Wake Forest. The lifeblood of college athletics is recruiting star high school athletes. In Columbus, Georgia there was a star outfielder named Kevin Jordan. In baseball parlance, Kevin Jordan was a 5-tool player. He could do everything that is required to shine on a baseball diamond: hit to get on base, hit for home runs, run, throw, and play superb defense. As a teenager Kevin Jordan was one of the most highly recruited high school baseball stars. He was drafted by the New York Yankees. He was

What character in the Hebrew Bible says, “kill me now”? What character is so burnt out, so dark inside, so spent, so worn down, that he does not want to live any more and literally says “kill me now”? The answer is Moses in our reading this morning. Usually the Torah says nothing about its characters’ interior lives. When God commands Abraham to sacrifice Isaac, Abraham says hineni, here I am, ready to do the deed. What was he thinking? What was he feeling? The Torah does not say. In stark contrast, in today’s reading, upon hearing the Israelites complain for the umpteenth time, upon hearing their revisionist history that they used to eat fish, cucumbers, melons, leeks, onions and garlic for free in the land of Egypt, upon hearing their demand for meat when there was no meat to be had, Moses finally lets God have it: And Moses said to the Lord, “Why have You dealt ill with Your servant, and why have I not enjoyed Your favor, that You have laid the burden of all this people upon me? Did I

For our last Talmud class of the year we want to leave you with a question to ponder about asymmetry—an asymmetry between Israeli Jews and American Jews. For its 75th, Israel had a contest for what Israeli song best captures Israel? Israelis voted for the winner: a song that was composed in 1982 called ein li eretz acheret, I have no other land. Here are some questions: What is the essential message of this song? What is it about this song that inspires Israelis to vote for it as conveying the Israeli condition? What language, what adjective, would you use to describe the rendition of this song in the video, accompanied by photos of life in Israel? The song, the lyrics, the video, all suggest a deep purpose and blessing, and a deep cost and heaviness, to living in Israel, but the narrator has no other choice: I have no other country. With all its challenges, with all the blood, sweat and tears, with all the wars and terrorism, with all the Israelis who have died in battle or from acts of terrorism, i

I promise that in the fullness of time I will, one day, give a sermon that is not about the Boston Celtics. But today is not that day. We have to process Game 7. What happened on the court Monday night was not just a sad basketball story, if you happen to be a Celtics fan. It was also a confusing, perplexing human story. How do we understand our team losing the first three games, including two at home, and then winning the next three games, including two on the road? How do we understand the Celtics’ stunning, last tenth of a second victory in Miami on Saturday night, and then their utter collapse at the Garden on Monday night? So hot, so cold. So dialed in, so not dialed in. So inspiring, so disappointing. Same team. Same players. Same coach. Same week. I had a friend who was at the game. OK, it’s Matt Hills, and he and Lisa were at the Garden instead of the Gann Chapel, which is why the team lost. But I digress. Matt observed that the teams’ body language told the story. The Miami Heat players

Why do we do what we do as Jews? What is a mitzvah? Is it a nice thing to do, a commandment, or a cultural folkway of the Jewish people? If we don't believe in a commanding God, can we believe in commandment? If not, how can Judaism make any demands upon us? And if we do not allow our faith to make demands upon us, is it too thin and weak to be of consequence?   These were the questions that came up in last week's class about the essay by Elliot Cosgrove entitled "A Choosing People" published in Sources (Spring 2023). Rabbi Cosgrove diagnosed the problem: "The Jews I serve are not halakhic Jews living lives bound by Jewish law." p. 11. What to do about this reality remains elusive.   Enter the very next article in Sources written by Rabbi Leon A. Morris, President of the Pardes Institute of Jewish Studies in Jerusalem (and son in love to our own Joel Berkowitz), entitled "In Defense of Surrender in Liberal Jewish Life." This is a fascinating piece conveying an important