Monthly Archives: August 2022

He asked them Who is called a wise man? They responded to him, The person who sees the consequence of their action. (Babylonian Talmud 32a)

Many years ago I was asked to speak, on short notice, at a symposium in Geneva about the future of the global climate refugee crises. It was an important opportunity, but attending meant I was going to miss my 11-year-old daughter Elianas choir concert, the one for which she had been rehearsing for months. I was crushed, but no compromise was possibleId be on the other side of the globe for every performance.

To my great shock, Eliana didnt care, at least not exactly.

Its okay, dad, she said. If you miss it, you miss it. But do me a favor. When you are here, how about actually being here?

I was stunned, a little hurt, but I knew just what she was talking about. For the past year-plus, Id been wandering around the house, conducting half my business by cell phone, distracted even when I was playing a board game with her. In the great way that children can state a complex thing simply and purely, my daughter had summarized our whole cultures dilemma.

Stuck in a forever state of reactive short-termisman almost obsessive focus on the near futureglued to our devices and grappling with never-ending breaking news and business plans measured in hours and even minutes, weve become too much tree and not enough forest. News about the most recent COVID variant, for example, is a tree. Being part of my kids growing up? Thats the forest. Our short-term addictions, understandable as they are, are obscuring our longer term potentials.

In another story from the home front, my nine-year-old Gideon recently did somethingimproper. Its not important what, but lets just say he wasnt being his best self. When I found out, I flipped out and really read him the riot act.

My wife Sharon pulled me aside and whispered, Ari: Longpath. The word is a mantra in our householdit stands for the deliberate practice of long-term, holistic thinking and acting that, at its root, starts with real, hard-earned self-knowledge. At that instant I saw how off I was. Instead of modeling behaviors of self-awareness to help my son grow, I was reacting, and probably overreacting at that, glued once again to the short-term at the expense of the long-term relationship with my son.

On the highest level, I knew who I wanted to be in that moment with my son, but we are reactive creatures, easily prone to short-term decision-making.

So why is a futurist, who works with multi-national organizations, governments and leading foundations, and whose TED talk has been viewed several million times, writing about conversations with my children?

The future is not just about flying cars, jet packs and robots doing our laundry. Nor is it just about climate change, rampant inequality or the loss of global biodiversity. Taken together, these aspectsgood and bad leave us with an incomplete picture of tomorrows promises and perils.

The huge challenges we face as a society are going to require significant action at a political level. We need to vote at the booth and at the check-out counter in a way that aligns with our values. But that is not enough. Shaping the future also entails doing something beyond the political, something in some ways more difficult and definitely closer to home. Shaping the future towards a world we want to see necessitates that we connect with each otherat the human-to-human levelin a way that has significantly more impact than just how we vote or consume.

How?

Trim tabs. Trim tabs are the small edges of a ships rudder that, although tiny, can make a huge impact on the direction of the ship. The futurist Buckminster Fuller used the metaphor of a trim tab to explain how even small actions could have massive long-term effects, especially when scaled across populations.

Shaping the long-term trajectory of society means connecting with others through a lens of empathy and with an eye on how those interactions will ripple out through time. What makes you a futuristsomeone who cares and wants to shape society towards a better tomorrowis putting your device down when your child enters the room and thinking about how your every action will play out over generations. This is the mindset of a true futurist. This is longpath thinking.

At its heart, the belief in a longpath or longer-term mindset is a Jewish one. After all, were the people who have dragged our story along to every outpostthe people who have waited on and insisted upon a future return. And just as our Passover story promises a transformation that does not happen overnight, the longpath view says that, yes, you can be an agent of change, not just a slave to the current climate, but its going to take some work.

For me, the High Holy Days manifest the essence of a longpath outlook best of all. Rosh Hashanah both reaps the harvest of the past and points us toward our most profound wishes for the future yearbut you cant get there without a Yom Kippur. On this day of teshuvah, which means repentance and return, we understand that to look ahead of us requires that we first look back on the year past and engage in an honest reconciliation with all we have been and all those we have wrongedboth in our own eyes and Gods. Its hard work, but if we do this with an open heart, we have a chance to not only envision a better future, but to participate in creating itfor us and for others.

The longpath view doesnt just look deep into the future, but deep into the past. It holds that you cannot consider the future without transgenerational empathy, a clear accounting of all the preceding generations went through. Then, when you are ready to face the days, months, years, decades and centuries ahead, you must do your future-oriented thinking with future generations in mind. After all, your community and your world will belong to them.

My father was a Polish refugee who escaped the ghetto and lost most of his family in the Holocausthe went on to become a commander in the Jewish resistance. Years later, he used to say, The future really started yesterday. To move through the narrow passages and get to the land of milk and honey, we must adopt a mindset that integrates the far past and the far future.

Transgenerational empathy is not merely a high-flown concept its a practice, a way of taking the future seriously. On our mantel, along with photos of my parents and Sharons parents, and photos of us and of the kids, we have placed a few empty frames, a reminder of the generation to come. Seeing those empty frames is a subtle but persistent reminder that the decisions we make today, as individuals, as a family, as a community, are going to have everyday repercussions hundreds of years from now.

This Rosh Hashanah marks the beginning of 5783 in the Jewish calendar. That means were only 217 years from the year 6000. Some say thats the latest time for the messiah to arrive and usher in the redemption. Others insist the messiah can and will come earlier. The real question is: Where do we want the world to be in 6000, and what kind of longpath thinking will help get us there?

To give you a little context, 217 years ago Napoleon was crowned King of Italy, Lewis and Clark headed out on their expedition, Beethoven premiered his Third Symphony and the first steam locomotive had just had its first run. There was no electricity, no cars, no phones, no internet. The United States itself was a mere 29 years old.

Consider what can happen in two centuries. How would you like the world to look in Year 6000 and what are you willing to do to help make it that way?

Its a mistake to think that the people who will be affected will likely not be your people. According to the handy Descendants Calculator, in 217 years, or eight generations, the youngest of my children, 13-yearold Ruby, could have anywhere between 500 and 87,000 offspring, depending on the average number of kids per generation. And thats just one of my three children!

What kind of a world do you want your descendants to live in? What do we have to do collectively to co-create that future?

We dont need the answers this instant, but we do need to start making the small actions and asking the big questions right away.

The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of JTA or its parent company, 70 Faces Media.

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When Judaism considers the future, it looks to the past - Jewish Community Voice

Although his formal secular education was limited to attending elementary school, David Sarnoff (1891-1971) combined expert knowledge, visionary business acumen, an entrepreneurial spirit, and a near-maniacal ambition to command a vast radio and television empire. Seizing the opportunity to control the then unfettered airwaves, he created the first coast-to-coast radio network and he transformed the world into a global village.

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Renowned as the Father of American Television, Sarnoff was unquestionably the greatest visionary in the history of broadcasting as he virtually single-handedly developed RCA and NBC into the first great mass-communications conglomerate and singularly pushed the development of television from the initial experiments in the early 1920s to commercial feasibility. His contributions were such that while praising the exceptionally large contribution of Jews to the development of wireless in a 1931 interview with the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, Guglielmo Marconi, the inventor of wireless telegraphy, singled out Sarnoff for his work in radio, characterizing it as amazing.

At a time when the standard approach to radio communications was from point-to-point (i.e., from one person to another), Sarnoff was the first person to see the potential of radio as a point-to-mass media where one broadcaster could speak to many listeners, and he transformed radio from an exclusive realm of the transportation communications industry and hobbyists into a media for the masses.

As a young man in 1916, he presented a memo to the head of the Marconi company proposing radio music boxes that could broadcast music, news, sports, lectures and entertainment into peoples homes, but his superiors considered his idea of commercial radio for entertainment purposes to be a hair-brained scheme. On June 2, 1921, he borrowed a Navy transmitter and broadcast the boxing match between the victorious Jack Dempsey and Georges Carpentier, which drew a then-incredible 300,000 boxing fans listening on their homemade radio sets and essentially launched mass commercial radio. Four years after RCA launched NBC in 1925, Sarnoff became its president.

Under Sarnoffs leadership, RCA and NBC commenced regularly scheduled electronic television transmissions and NBC became the first radio chain in the country. The first broadcast, which he introduced from the RCA pavilion at the 1939 New York Worlds Fair (see exhibit), featured a speech by President Roosevelt (the first electronic broadcast by a president) and was seen by a whopping 1,000 viewers watching on the 200 television sets owned in the New York City region at the time.

Sarnoff was commissioned as a lieutenant colonel in the Army Signal Corps Reserve (1924) and was promoted to full colonel in 1931. Called to active duty during World War II, he served as General Eisenhowers communications consultant, for which he was decorated with the Legion of Merit (1944) and was commissioned a brigadier general (1945). He was thereafter known as General Sarnoff, a title that he insisted others use to address him.

Born David Sarnow in Uzlian, a small Jewish village near Minsk in Belarussia, Sarnoff spent much of his early childhood as an outstanding Talmud student in cheder and, beginning at a very young age, he sang in the synagogue choir to help supplement his impoverished familys income. His maternal grandfather, Rabbi Privkin, was determined that his little Talmudic prodigy pursue a life in the rabbinate, so he sent young David to Korme to study with his grand-uncle, the leading rabbinical authority of the city. However, though raised in the strictest Orthodoxy, Sarnoff later decided that the constraints of rigid adherence to his faith were unduly onerous, so he turned to Reform Judaism, and his interest in religion in general became relatively unimportant. Nonetheless, he always credited his incredible drive, powers of concentration, keen analytical mind, and ability to overcome fatigue to his early years of Talmudic study.

Sarnoffs father, an itinerant trader, immigrated to the United States and worked to raise funds to bring the family to America. Two days after Sarnoff arrived in New York in 1900 knowing no English, he was selling Yiddish newspapers on the Lower East Side, an endeavor he soon expanded into his first business, a newsstand. Moreover, as a gifted cantorial singer, he continued to supplement the family income by performing as a male soprano in a neighborhood synagogue choir while attending school at night.

When his father died in 1906 of tuberculosis, however, he had to leave school to become his familys sole supporter as an office boy at the Commercial Cable Company. His lack of formal education always haunted him, but it also served to motivate him to achieve greatness: The dread of remaining an am haaretz (a euphemism for uneducated Jew or, worse, an ignoramus) was always under the surface of my consciousness. I jelled in a determination to rise above my surroundings . . .

His employer refused him three days unpaid leave for Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur and fired him only a few months after he had commenced work. Adding to the familys economic problems, his voice broke just prior to performing for the High Holidays that year and his family was left with no source of income. He joined the Marconi Wireless Telegraph Company of America as a messenger boy and taught himself how to use the telegraph key on his own time. In 1911, he installed and operated the wireless equipment on a ship hunting seals off Newfoundland and used the technology to relay the first remote medical diagnosis from the ships doctor to a radio operator ashore, and he later famously demonstrated the first use of radio on a railroad line, the Lackawanna Railroad Companys link between Binghamton and Scranton.

By 1914, he had risen to contract manager at Marconi, and in 1919, when it was absorbed by RCA, he became its commercial manager. He rose quickly through the ranks at RCA, becoming its general manager in 1921, vice president in 1922, president in 1930, and chairman of the board in 1947. However, it was while working at Marconi in 1912 that one on the greatest legends in communications history was born.

As Sarnoff tells the story, he was alone at his telegraph on April 14, 1912 which he operated for John Wannamaker, who had built a powerful radio station atop his New York store when he picked up a distress call from the Titanic that the mammoth ship had run into an iceberg and was sinking. He was acclaimed a public hero for notifying the authorities, remaining at his telegraph for the next consecutive 72 hours, coordinating the rescue effort, and receiving and transmitting the names of survivors. The story received broad coverage in the mainstream media and was prominently featured by the New York Times in Sarnoffs obituary:

His real first step on the rise to fame and considerable fortune was taken the night of April 14, 1912, the night the Titanic crashed into an iceberg in the North Atlantic and sank. Mr. Sarnoff had the monotonous job of manager of an experimental wireless station installed by John Wanamaker on the roof of his department store at Ninth Street and Broadway . . .

The young telegrapher quickly notified the authorities and the press, and for the next 72 hours, he sat constantly before his equipment, straining to make out the dots and dashes coming from the Carpathia and other rescue ships. In those days of weak signals, primitive circuits and howling atmospheric interference, it was immensely difficult to receive messages accurately. President William Howard Taft ordered all wireless stations on the Eastern Seaboard except Mr. Sarnoffs shut down to facilitate receipt of messages.

However, there is ample evidence that the entire story is a fiction perpetrated by a self-promoting Sarnoff.

First, even with the worldwide extensive coverage given to the Titanic disaster, there was not a single contemporary account in the media of Sarnoffs heroism and, in fact, he did not tell the story until an interview with American Magazine in 1923, more than a decade after the event took place. Second, the Titanic sank on Sunday night in New York City, when the Wanamakers Department store was closed. Third, the Marconi Company had actually closed the Wanamakers station to prevent it from interfering with its four more powerful coastal stations and, in fact, there was no single wireless operator or station that controlled the air traffic related to the Titanic. Fourth, the telegraph machine at Wanamakers was too small and weak to have received the Titanic signals at that distance.

According to some contemporary critics, what most likely happened was that when the news broke from newsboys hawking special editions on the street, Sarnoff ran to his telegraph station, where he did manage a squad of telegraph operators for the next three days. Many of the very purveyors of the myth have now recanted the story; for example, in a 1987 article in Radio Recall, Catherine Heinz, the former director of the Broadcast Pioneers Library in Washington, D.C., declared that her own Sarnoff 1971 obituary, which had repeated the Sarnoff-Titanic story, was false. Nonetheless, as even a cursory perusal of the internet will show, the fable persists, even though the story has been authoritatively debunked.

Even after abandoning his Orthodoxy, Sarnoff always acknowledged the existence of a governing higher power, but he rejected the idea of hashgacha pratit, the belief in a personal G-d overseeing individuals and the world. He believed that it was futile to discuss whether Jews were a race or merely a group of co-religionists and, in an illuminating 1960 interview with a reporter for The Jewish Journal, he provided an excellent definition of antisemitism and how he saw his responsibilities as a Jew:

The essential Jewish identity is worth preserving because it is an influence that conditions the formation of a better type of human being. Jewish ethics, morality, and wisdom are constructive influences. This does not mean that all Jews are angels, or that they are generally better than other peoples. As we know ourselves, there are bad Jews, just as there are bad non-Jews. The trouble is, however, that whenever they encounter a bad Jew, most non-Jews tend to draw a general conclusion and accuse all Jews of corruption . . . Every individual Jew must therefore assume responsibility for the honor of the entire Jewish people and realize clearly that improper conduct on his part may be damaging to all Jews by encouraging antisemitism.

As a Jew whose lot has fallen to be in the public eye in America, I always remember this responsibility . . . Let us hope that further progress, further enlightenment, and broader humanism will abolish these conditions and bring about a time when non-Jews will cease to make distinctions in their minds between Jews and non-Jews.

Like many people, Sarnoffs interest in Judaism was rekindled when he became severely ill towards the end of his life with a mastoid infection. He sought visits with the rabbis of Temple Emanuel, where he served as a synagogue official, and he found solace in reading the Talmudic passages of his youth in Uzlan and Korme. However, his wife, Lizette Herman, to whom he had been introduced by their matchmaking mothers in synagogue, decided not to bury him in a Jewish cemetery and, instead, he was interred in a Judeo-Christian cemetery in Westchester County.

Unlike William Paley, who sought to hide his Jewish roots, Sarnoff bristled at the slightest hint of antisemitism, always making clear who he was and where he came from. Maintaining that antisemitism was a fact of my life, he believed that his application for a Commission with the U.S. Navy during World War I was rejected because of antisemitism, and he attributed many of his problems at General Electric to antisemitism. He never hesitated to speak out publicly and firmly against anti-Jewish hate, and he refused to accept awards or speak at organizations and clubs with Jewish exclusionary policies.

Infuriated by Nazi antisemitism, Sarnoff began regular travel to Washington after Kristallnacht to meet with branches of the armed forces to plan RCAs integration into the American defense buildup and, in a meeting with FDR in 1941, he advised the president that RCA stood ready to convert its plants to serve the needs of war production. He turned his studios into a training center for civilian defense workers and the cathode rays that he had designed for television became instrumental in radar and other sensing devices used in the war effort. He also helped Jews to escape Nazi Germany to the United States.

The only aspect of the development of radio that disappointed him was having Telefunken of Germany as among RCAs first licensees, thereby giving the emerging Third Reich an early television capability: Very often, the products of science and technology that promise so much for mankind have been perverted to evil uses. Hitler and radio is a perfect case, but I firmly believe that nobody can or should try to halt progress.

In 1952, Sarnoff, then president of NBC, accepted an invitation from Eliezer Kaplan, Israels first Minister of Finance, to come to Israel to discuss building a local vacuum tube factory there. He offered his services to Ben Gurion to help Israel in general, and its military in particular, to establish its own national television broadcasting system. Emphasizing that Israeli television would facilitate the dissemination of the Zionist message and make a major contribution to the ingathering of Jewish exiles, he added that he would assist in fundraising for the ambitious project if Israel would agree to a joint venture between the Israeli military and NBC.

In a July 29, 1952, address at a special ceremony held at his honor at The Weizmann Institute, to which he was elected its first Honorary Fellow, Sarnoff stated that he was impressed by scientific advances in Israel and predicted that television service between the United States and Israel will exist within five years. In a press conference at the Ministry of Communications in Jerusalem, he opined that four strategically placed television stations in Israel could blanket the Jewish State so as to provide television reception across the entire country. Minister of Communications David Zvi Pinkas prematurely announced that the new Israeli government broadcasting center would be dedicated to Sarnoff.

The proposal was enthusiastically embraced by Shimon Peres, then the Defense Ministrys director-general, but Ben Gurion rejected the offer with a terse reply that Israelis are people of the book. We dont need television. Ben Gurions keen opposition to television was likely shaped by his initial encounter with the medium when he visited his sons family in London earlier in 1952. He was dismayed when his grandchildren didnt budge from staring mindlessly at the hypnotizing television images instead of rushing to greet and hug him. He viewed television with contempt as a philistine and anti-intellectual contrivance that would Americanize the socialist Jewish state, promote rampant consumerism, and interfere with the emerging national culture of the young country.

According to Tasha Oren, author of Demon in the Box: Jews, Arabs, Politics, and Culture in the Making of Israeli Television (2004), Israelis were also concerned that television would feminize Israeli soldiers, dumb down Israeli citizens, present anti-Zionist ideas, prevent immigrants from being absorbed into Israeli culture, and jeopardize national security. The Knesset took action to discourage Israeli citizens from even owning television sets by, among other things, imposing a draconian 300 percent tax on them.

Sarnoff ended up not being much of a prognosticator when it came to his predictions for Israeli television, which did not make its initial appearance until 1966 as a part-time educational service for schoolchildren. The first general Israeli broadcast, which aired on May 5, 1968, featured only educational programming and news in the early morning and evenings, with dead air in between. According to Oren, the 1967 Six-Day War played a seminal role in Israels decision to permit national television broadcasts. In marked contrast with the Egyptian army, Israel permitted foreign correspondents covering the war to accompany Israeli troops everywhere and, as a result, Israel became the source of all news regarding the war and the government came to understand the importance of the medium.

In 1949, Sarnoff donated the first electron microscope in Israel to the Weizmann Institute in honor of Chaim Weizmanns 70th birthday and, in 1952, he received the award of an honorary membership at the Institute for his contributions to advancing the science of electronics. Ever conscious of the Holocaust, he implored Israel to create a reservoir of scientific knowledge and talents to replace the great repository of Jewish scholarship and science destroyed by the Nazis. Exhibited here is the original parchment with a dedication from the Weizmann Institute to Sarnoff,

A longtime friend of Weizmanns, Sarnoff later became the first recipient of the Weizmann Award in the Sciences and Humanities at a dinner attended by 1,200 leaders in science, business and public affairs (1966).

Finally, in this February 24, 1963, correspondence on his RCA letterhead, Sarnoff thanks publisher Robert Speller for forwarding a copy of the book The Mission of Israel, which was compiled by Israeli journalist, UN correspondent and Chagall expert Jacob Baal-Teshuva. Essentially a homage to Israel that includes articles, speeches and statements regarding the mission and successful accomplishments of the Jewish state, contributors included five heads of state, four prime ministers, and other distinguished figures, including Jonas Salk, Robert Oppenheimer, Martin Buber . . . and Sarnoff.

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The Judaism And Zionism Of David Sarnoff - The Jewish Press - JewishPress.com

In observance of the yahrzeit of the Zera Shimshon on 6 Elul, we have dedicated the following dvar Torah from his writings:

You shall tithe the entire crop of your planting (Devarim 14:22)

The Zera Shimshon asks: Why is it necessary to say that one should tithe his entire crop? Is it possible that one would consider tithing only a portion of his planting, and not fulfilling the mitzvah in its entirety? The individual would only stand to lose from such conduct.

The Zera Shimshon cites the medrash (Taanis 9a) which tells of a wealthy man who had a fruitful field that annually yielded 1,000 kor of produce, from which the owner gave 100 kor for maaser. When the man got old, he bequeathed his property to his only son. He made him promise that he would continue the practice of giving 100 kor for maaser for it would surely guarantee that the fields would continue to thrive.

The first year, the land indeed produced 1,000 kor and, faithful to his fathers wishes, the son gathered 100 kor and gave it to the Kohen. However, it was difficult for him to take off those 100 kor when he saw how much he was giving away. The contribution continued to bother him, and he determined that he would not do so the following year. Once again, he sowed and planted his field as in the past, the rains fell and the sun shone, but to his surprise the yield was drastically reduced to only 100 kor. It was explained to him that initially he had been the owner of the field, and Hashem was the Kohen. Thus, he earned 90 percent of the crops and Hashem got 10 percent. When he was not satisfied with that arrangement and decided not to give maaser, Hashem said, Now Ill be the owner and you be the Kohen, and therefore the field only yielded 100 kor.

The Zera Shimshon explains that the Talmud in Brachos does, in fact, suggest instances whereby a limited form of tithing could be performed and one would have fulfilled his obligation. However, one must bring all of the tithes as it says (Malachi 3:10), Bring all of the tithes into the storage house and test Me with this to see if I will not open for you the windows of the heavens and pour down for you blessing without end, if he wishes to benefit from the blessing of wealth that is promised by Hashem.

HaGaon R Chaim Shmulevitz, the rosh yeshiva of Mir in Poland and Yerushalayim, once hosted an evening in his home on behalf of a charity organization in Yerushalayim. A guest speaker, R Yitzchak Dovid Gutfarb, one of the tzaddikim of the city, related the following:

A destitute individual had been knocking on the doors of residents in Yerushalayim erev Pesach asking for money for maos chitim. One of the homeowners who opened his door explained that every year he did his utmost to contribute as much as he could to the needy. Unfortunately, though, this year he too was penniless, and he had barely managed to collect a few portions of chicken for his family for the chag. Aside from that little bit of food, his large family did not have much else.

The poor man was unrelenting and begged for mercy because his situation was very dire. Sensing the beggars desperate plight, the homeowner realized he would have to extend himself beyond his means and share what he had with the poor man. He invited the beggar into his house, and went over to the refrigerator to give him some of the chicken he had for his own family. Imagine his horror, when he opened the refrigerator door and saw his little boy lying still inside, ice cold and barely breathing. The child was immediately rushed to the hospital, where the doctors were thankfully able to revive him. The doctors disclosed that the childs recovery had been miraculous, for if he had remained in the cold for only a few more minutes he would have lost his life.

At that moment, the Jew fully appreciated the words of our sages (Mishlei 10:2), Charity rescues from death.

Rabbi Shimshon Chaim ben Rabbi Nachman Michal Nachmani, known as the Zera Shimshon (1706-1770), was blessed with only one son, who passed on at a young age. Having been left bereft, Rabbi Shimshon Chaim dedicated his sefarim on the Written and Oral Law, imparting unique insights and profound lessons, to carry on his legacy with the name Zera Shimshon.

Prefacing his writings, the author beseeches people to study his books and promises that those who do so will be granted family, life, wealth and honor in that merit. Indeed, the anecdotal evidence of simchas and yeshuos that people have been experiencing is remarkable, just as the author affirms. The significance of the merit accrued learning these works has garnered much enthusiasm and interest, creating a worldwide revolution. Today, the sefarim of the Zera Shimshon are studied on every continent, with shiurim given in multiple languages on numerous media platforms.

For the last four years I have been giving a daily shiur at 4:00 p.m. EST, via a conference call, to over a thousand participants, creating a daily unparalleled united learning experience with like-minded individuals committed to delving into the secrets of the Zera Shimshon.

Over the last two years, I have been working on an anthology of the divrei Torah of the Zera Shimshon to commemorate his yahrzeit. Baruch Hashem, the book will be available to the public on 6 Elul. Titled The Promise, the book contains a compilation of the Zera Shimshons Torah thoughts specifically on the topic of teshuvah repentance and connecting to Hashem. Each chapter includes soul-stirring stories and insights.

Further details will be forthcoming.

Excerpt from:

Blessings From Studying The Zera Shimshon - The Jewish Press - JewishPress.com

From an early age, we have been taught to tell the truth. In his sefer, Sefat Tamim, the Chofetz Chaim writes that falsehood is the only sin in the Torah where we are explicitly required to keep a distance from, as it says; Keep away from anything false (Shmot 23:7). When you think about it, its truly amazing. We know how serious sins are, especially idol worship, murder, kidnapping and forbidden sexual relationships (among others) yet the only time the Torah shows us that big yellow sign: Caution Stay away is when it comes to lying.

The wonderful ArtScroll sefer Iggeres haGra A Letter for the Ages quotes the Vilna Gaon and how he impressed upon his family the need to always speak the truth. On page 66, Rabbi Shai Graucher, author of the sefer, brings several sources to explain this point. The first is the Talmud Bavli (Succah 46b) which admonishes a person to keep his word to a child for failing to do so will train them to lie. His second source is the Shela HaKadosh who advises parents who want their children to stay on the right path to only speak the truth and stress to them the evils of falsehood.

In short, there are no Pinocchios in Judaism. We are an honest people in words, texts, thoughts, and actions. Based on that, lets take a look at some of the things we say in our davening. (All translations are from the Complete ArtScroll Siddur)

Three times a day, in the Shemoneh Esrei, we ask that HaShem bring us to Israel (and not for a 10-day trip) Sound the great shofar for our freedom, raise the banner to gather our exiles and speedily gather us together from the four corners of the earth to our Land. Is this something you want? Do you really want HaShem to move you and your family out of your present location to Israel permanently?

In the Avinu Malkeinu prayer we ask for health, redemption, forgiveness, financial support but we also say; Our Father, our King, avenge before our eyes the spilled blood of your servants. We are not only asking for HaShem to take revenge, we are asking that He do it with us watching! We want to see the revenge on those who hurt our people! This is definitely not a politically correct prayer, but very soon in the days between Rosh HaShanah and Yom Kippur we will be saying this twice each day. Do you mean it?

Towards the end of the daily davening, we recite chapter 20 of Tehillim with the famous words; Some with chariots, and some with horses, but we in the Name of HaShem our G-d, we call out. They slumped and fell, but we arose and were invigorated. This is the ultimate tefilla of Emunah! The nations of the world have super advanced weapons and large armies, but we will triumph because our faith is in HaShem. Yet, despite the fact that we say these words daily, how many of us are worried about Iran, Hamas and Hezbollah? How many times do we question if the current USA administration will truly stand with Israel yet we say every morning that it is to HaShem we call out, not to the Americans. Do we believe what we say?

These themes are repeated on Shabbat during Mussaf (in Av HaRachamim) when, once again, we say; May He, before our eyes, exact retribution Let there be known among the nations, before our eyes, revenge. Then, during Mussaf Shemoneh Esrei we, once again, ask that HaShem bring us to Eretz Yisrael; May it be Your will, HaShem, our G-d and the G-d of our forefathers, that You bring us up in gladness to our land and plant us within our boundaries.

These tefillot are repeated, throughout our davening. Since this is an article, and not a thesis, I listed just a few examples but know, that over the course of the Jewish year we literally daven hundreds of times for vengeance against our enemies, the ingathering of the Jews from across the globe to Eretz Yisrael and for the Knesset to be replaced by the Davidic dynasty!

It is essential that we believe what we are saying! If we are warned many times against falsehood between friends, how much more does that apply when speaking to our Father in Heaven! Its terrible to lie to anyone but its simply unfathomable to lie to HaShem. Therefore, when asking for HaShem to smash our enemies (and to see it live!!) and to bring us home once and for all to Eretz HaKodesh, lets truly mean what we say!

Am Yisrael Chai!

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You Say it but Do You Believe it? - The Jewish Press - JewishPress.com

Jerry Stahl promoting "Nein, Nein, Nein!" at The 92nd Street Y. Photo by Mark Sagliocco/Getty Images

By Jim SullivanAugust 25, 2022

Editors note: This article contains discussion of suicide.

Jerry Stahl was on a bus tour of what he calls Naziland three concentration camps and related museums in Eastern Europe six years ago when his understanding of how the world perceives the Shoah did a somersault.

Stahl, the 68-year-old author best known for his 1995 memoir Permanent Midnight, knew hed be trodding upon, as he said in an interview, ground where the bones of the dead are buried and ashes had drifted. He had some inherent trepidation, and expectations of somber reflection.

My heart is open. Im one big emotion waiting to happen, Stahl said on the phone from his home in Los Angeles. Who do I think I am to think I can grasp the enormity of this suffering and honor it?

Yet grasping that enormity is precisely what Stahl tries to do in his new book, Nein, Nein, Nein!: One Mans Tale of Depression, Psychic Torment and a Bus Tour of the Holocaust. The account contains a crazy quilt of emotions captured with dark humor and keen insight.

The book, Stahl said, is a chronicle of what he felt on the trip as a human, as a Jew, as a man, as a citizen of the planet.

What it isnt at least, not always is an account of the somber reflection Stahl expected. The first thing he saw in Auschwitz, he said, was a guy in an Im With Stupid T-shirt slamming a Fanta and stuffing his face with pizza.

I just wasnt ready for it. I dont know why.

So, it wasnt the historic horror that struck him first. It was the mundane nature of people doing what people do in their day-to-day lives, no matter where they are. They eat, drink, crack bad jokes, respond in almost comically inept ways to their circumstances. Three Filipina girls who spotted Stahl became convinced that he was Michael Richards the actor who played Kramer in Seinfeld and kept yelling Kramer! because they wanted a selfie with him.

He let them snap the picture.

I agreed to do the most grotesque thing you can do, especially in a death camp, Stahl said of the selfie, but I think there is a certain human truth to people acting that way.

While Stahl took his trip in 2016, he only wrote about it during the 2021 pandemic-driven lockdown. Stahl faced serious roadblocks in finally beginning the book. He had lost many of his notes from the tour, and there were continual distractions from other projects mostly failed projects for TV, film and print.

And the subjects he planned to write about were challenging to revisit. As he writes in Nein, Nein, Nein!, he was not in a good place before taking the trip. He felt his career had run aground. His third marriage was in tatters.

He peered into the abyss or more precisely, looked down from a bridge in Southern California. He was discouraged from doing it, he writes, when he realized hed have to climb a fence and likely be caught by the suicide-prevention mechanism he described in our interview as these weird chain-link macrame large-enough-for-a-human-being bags.

Theres a lot of athletics involved, Stahl said. They make it hard. I would have been News at 11 Worlds Biggest Baby Caught in a Net, Swaddling.

So, Stahl said he thought, Why not go somewhere where complete and utter despair and depression is wholly appropriate? Like Auschwitz, Buchenwald and Dachau.

Another factor in his decision: Donald Trump was ascendent, and more than a few people were equating Trumps tactics and autocratic bellicosity with Hitlers. With Nazism on the rise here, Stahl said, it was almost like, Why sit here and watch the previews? Why dont we go to where it happened and where it was shot?

The book examines how Stahls own personal demons collided with the ghostly demons of the Holocaust, with a dose of absurdity added by his being on a tour with mostly Midwestern tourists early on the journey, he likened it to a 4-H Club trip complete with a forced, though not entirely unwelcome, camaraderie.

He told his tour guide, Suzannah, and his fellow tourists that he planned to write about the trip. I made the decision to be straight up about that, Stahl says. Being a writer, youre a little bit outside the main community. Everybody can take you aside and tell you their deepest and darkest. As cornball as it sounds, I grew to love these people at the end.

Part of what makes Nein, Nein, Nein! an engaging read are Stahls (sometimes) purposeful digressions. Some of these are whimsical, but all are pointed, like one about little salt-shaker-sized Lucky Jews statuettes of rabbis clutching coins sold at Warsaw gift shops. The idea: Place one at the door so money wont leave the house.

In Poland, we have a saying: A Jew in the hallway a coin in the pocket, the shop owner told Stahl.

I take six, Stahl writes. Because why not? Yes, theyre a racial stereotype, but in Stahls eyes, compared to the range of offensive depictions of Jews, these rabbi dolls feel almost benign. All Talmudic beard and soulful eyes. But maybe benign is more insidious.

There are gruesome details about the Nazis ingenious forms of torture and Josef Mengeles medical experiments. There are stomach-churning accounts about Ilse Koch, The Bitch of Buchenwald,who used her victims tattooed skin and body parts for crafting.

As to experiencing the camps themselves, Stahl notes the contrast in presentation of the museums at each. Though the high-tech, immersive exhibition at Dachau is more informative and far-reaching, he writes, for him it had a less powerful effect than the silent horror of Auschwitz.

Stahl also realized that being overwhelmed by an experience can also leave you underwhelmed. I cant remember a time when I wasnt aware of bodies piled up in mounds, he said, citing Lou Reeds song Heroin. Through no fault of its own, these images are so numbing and so overwhelming.

At one point late in the trek, Stahl found himself getting burned out on the concentration camps, he writes.

Ive become the weird guy who doesnt talk much on the bus. I try to front that Im gripped by the torment, soul-savaged by the in-your-faceness of strolling down the landscape where Hitler ripped the world apart, like a child tearing the head off a doll.

In the end, Stahl attempts to step back from the statistics and the stock images of the Holocaust to cast an eye on the lives of its victims, and what they may have been like before Hitler came on the scene. He considers how terrifying it must have been to have their ordinary lives stripped away the futility of all those wasted hours thinking about sex and money, did their hair look right, success and failure and all the things that drain the life out of life when life is so fucking vulnerable and fragile and easy to pluck away?

With a book so stark and revelatory as is pretty much anything Stahl touches one wonders, what didnt make the cut? Are there worse, more self-denigrating points not in print?

The eternal question, said Stahl, with a laugh. I think that answers going to go to my grave, but I dont know if theres much worse than what is actually in there. If I think about it too much, I will start pulling back, which for my purposes wouldnt ring true.

To bring up another great Jewish writer, Bruce Jay Friedman he said, If you write a sentence that makes you squirm, keep going. Somehow, I squirmed my way through this book.

Stahl has got two more books and another movie project in the works in addition to a possible film adaptation of Nein, Nein, Nein! which has been optioned by Robert Downey, Jr. but fears talking about them may be a detriment to doing them.

At my age, Im a lot closer to a man being dead than being 40, he said, so Im writing like a man being chased.

Jim Sullivan wrote about music and pop culture for The Boston Globe from 1979 to 2005. Currently, he writes for WBURs ARTery, among other sites.

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Facing a personal reckoning, with a dose of absurdity, on a bus tour of Naziland - Forward

Like much of her work, All of Us Flames is informed by a practice of Judaism if not in an immediate aesthetic sense (my suggestion of alter ego Klezra Furman gets a laugh but probably not real consideration). "I am often thinking, in between sips of coffee, [of Jewish theologian Heschels quote]: 'who is worthy to be present at the unfolding of time?' But I cant really seem to work that in," she sighs.

All of Us Flames is religious music in its dutiful ethic towards work and gratitude, in its responsibility towards history. She quotes the ancient book of Jewish law, the Talmud: Its not your obligation to complete the work, and you are not free to desist from the work. Basically, were not gonna finish the job of making a better world. Were just not. And yet were still supposed to work. Perhaps this is what it takes to get in touch with the divine. The dogged determination that grinds through All of Us Flames arrives at moments of true ecstasy (like Forever in Sunsets sudden explosion into exultant, Springsteenian glory), just as a disciplined practice of spirituality can help us access moments of true transcendence.

Its rabbinically emphasised that the mundane is more important than the peak experience moments, she says. The Torah, after all, is not all high drama. Theres a lot of miracles and smiting, but theres also a lot of boring tasks. The weekly portion for my own Bar Mitzvah a passage from the Torah that corresponds with the week of the ceremony, as per for the Hebrew Calendar was mostly instructional text on preparing garments. Not so thrilling. I mention this and Furman, miraculously, is familiar with the specific portion. Those boring parts, the menial tasks, she says, are the most important. Theres this wonderful conversation in the Talmud about whats the most important line in the Torah. And all these people have their different ideas God is one, Love your neighbour as yourself, etc. And then somebody else says, The most important line is, Slaughter one calf in the morning and one calf in the afternoon every day. And everyones like, Okay, thats the correct answer. The idea is that a high-minded moral principle may be really important, but what do you actually do everyday? Thats what holds us together.

You keep going, and thats how you keep going; forever in sunset. We owe it to ourselves and each other and everyone else to figure it out and keep figuring it out, she muses. One of the promises of a religious practice is that by taking part in a choreography a prayer, a ritual, a song we can unite ourselves with both everyone who has and everyone who will take part, living and dead. It can be a key into eternity, in both directions every apocalypse before and every apocalypse to come: every sunset in every forever. Thats whats inspiring its sustained. Its everywhere. At all moments we have to try, somehow, to weave love and devotion into our mundane life, she says, sitting on her patio. We both fall silent for a moment and listen to the birds chirping around us.

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Ezra Furman and the Tireless, Sacred Work of Being Alive | Interview - The Line of Best Fit

We often refer to summer Shabbosim as long Shabbos and winter Shabbosim as short Shabbos, based on the time Shabbos ends. But the truth is, Shabbos is always the same 25 hours every single week, and from my perspective, it is definitely not long enough! It is still only a fraction of our week. Given the potential of Shabbos to impact us on a weekly basis, we may have high expectations of what we want our Shabbosim to look like. Of course, while we may have had certain expectations before the pandemic, our experiences during the pandemic may have given us a different frame of reference for what Shabbos can be in our lives.

How might we frame what a successful Shabbos looks like? Is there a method for how we can approach this? In my own experience, I realized that I do not aspire to have davening to take longer than is necessary. But I also do not want to nap for too long. And I dont want to be at the lunch table until 5:00 p.m. Is any of this blasphemous? Am I too caught up on time? It occurred to me recently that while I had certain disparate expectations of my own of what I want to get out of Shabbos, there is potentially a systematic way of looking at this from the lens of halacha that could help us on a communal level to frame our Shabbosim, which I am calling the Well-Rounded Shabbos.

The Talmud (Pesachim 68b) tells us that half of Shabbos is for Hashem and half is for us. Therefore, a good Shabbos does contain a few different components: tefillah, oneg (i.e., kiddush and meals), Torah study, and napping. While we may be aware of these components in isolation, I began to wonder, how does one balance all of these? How should these different parts of the Shabbos experience interact to ensure that all have their proper place and time?

Lets begin with tefillah. It should be stated from the outset that tefillah should not be a burden. While we are in Hashems home and standing before Hashem, we should seek ways to make it meaningful. With that said, the pandemic raised many conversations about the length of tefillah in shul. There is clearly a large contingency of people who want a more streamlined tefillah. The truth is, this is not a new discussion. Although tefillah is not supposed to be a burden, poskim throughout the ages have argued that this does not mean the length of davening in shul should be indefinite. The Sages instituted only seven blessings in the amidah in an effort to avoid burdening people with lengthy tefillah on the day of rest. While I enjoy singing in tefillah, poskim encourage a balance to ensure tefillah is not too long; in fact, Maharshal writes that even if the community desires it, singing should not be stretched out on Shabbos and Yom Tov. Peri Chadash and R. Yaakov Emden both write in teshuvot that if our Sages instituted only seven blessings in order to eschew long tefillah, then that should be reflected in the amount of singing and Mi Shebeirachs.

But when I discussed these ideas in a shiur recently, someone said, Well, where are people rushing to if they make davening short? To kiddush, to shmooze?

Yes, kiddush and our Shabbos meals are part of our Well-Rounded Shabbos as well. We encounter the verse (Yeshayahu 58:13) vkarata la-Shabbat oneg, which is understood to refer to partaking of food to our delight. The Gemara (Shabbat 118b) says one who delights in Shabbat will be granted the desires of their heart. Kiddush in shul is not just a way to entice people to come to shul but is a fulfillment of the directive to have oneg Shabbat. Likewise, Shabbat meals shared between families are not merely a concession to social needs but rather a true fulfillment of the opportunity of oneg Shabbos. In addition, the opportunity for people to gather both at kiddushim and in each others homes for Shabbos meals contributes to the fabric that holds communities together. I stress that these are not bdieved concessions; they are vital for the vibrancy of our kehillot kedoshot.

Yet, with the great value that Shabbos meals hold, it is appropriate to ensure they come to a close in a timely fashion. The Rama writes that if one regularly naps on Shabbos afternoon, they should not skip it because this, too, is oneg (Orach Chayim 290:1). For those who nap on Shabbos, this opportunity may be part of a Well-Rounded Shabbos. I think it would be worthwhile to set a norm that Birkat Hamazon is said around two to two-and-a-half hours after a meal begins. This does not mean that guests have to leave if everyone is enjoying themselves and wants to stay longer. Yet, having the closure sooner than later will give people the opportunity to go home for their nap when they are ready without having to wait for their hosts to get the hint that some people are about to (or are trying not to) fall asleep at the table!

Still, as praiseworthy as the Shabbos nap is in a Well-Rounded Shabbos, I usually set an alarm for Shabbos afternoon to wake up from my nap (that I still usually sleep through). This may sound ridiculous, but the Mishnah Berurah (290:3) reminds us that our naps should not extend too long, as it is important to learn Torah on Shabbos as well. Indeed, the Talmud Yerushalmi (Shabbat 15:3) tells us that the whole purpose of Shabbos and Yom Tov is for the Jewish people to learn Torah. Rav Eliezer Melamed, author of Peninei Halacha, gives a quantified amount of time one should spend learning: six hours. How does he derive this? He explains that assuming one legitimately has to sleep seven hours every night, that leaves 18 hours to be divided between what we do for Hashem and what we do for ourselves. This leaves nine hours for our own enjoyment and nine hours for Torah/tefillah. If one is in shul for three hours, that would leave six hours of learning. Perhaps, based on average shul schedules in America, maybe it is four hours of tefillah and five hours of learning. Indeed, to make any sort of meaningful progress in what they are reading or learning, one probably needs a few hours. Whether one has a Gemara open or is reading an actual book as part of Rabbi Dovid Bashevkins I Read This Over Shabbos movement on Twitter, spending time engaged in wisdom is a crucial component of the Well-Rounded Shabbos.

When we take these different opportunities together, we see that not only are we fulfilling half for Hashem and half for ourselves, but were also including three major components of mitzvah categories. Torah and tefillah help us develop our Bein Adam La-Makom, while our kiddush/meal times help us develop our Bein Adam La-chaveiro, and our napping (and to some extent, learning/reading) helps us develop our Bein Adam Le-atzmo.

Shabbos is supposed to be relaxing and bnachat, not a day of time pressure. I do not suggest that it is worthwhile to time all of our Shabbos activities and rush from one thing to another. In fact, running is forbidden on Shabbos! Furthermore, it is obviously up to each individual to emphasize the parts of Shabbos they enjoy most.

However, I think it could be helpful to use these halachic perspectives to create a communal framework and language for what Shabbos can look like. We may have already been aware of these individual components, but I hope this perspective can give us a vision of implementing this type of Shabbos experience on a wider scale. With a bit of mindfulness about what we want our own Shabbos to look like and how we can help others create their ideal Shabbos experiences, we can ensure that the Jewish people is having a Well-Rounded Shabbos experience.

Rabbi Judah Kerbel is the rabbi of Queens Jewish Center and a middle school rebbe at Yeshiva Har Torah.

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The Long and Short of a Well-Rounded Shabbos - The Jewish Press - JewishPress.com

The golden-domed sanctuary at Congregation Sherith Israel is known for its glorious stained-glass windows. Its most famous one depicts Moses receiving the Ten Commandments in Yosemite Valley a modern promised land.

In another, a Biblical woman hands out food to the needy, with the words Feed the hungry Clothe the naked Shelter the homeless above her head. The message is one that resonates with Nancy Sheftel-Gomes, who considers it a call to social action for her synagogue community.

Its a commandment thats repeated in Torah over and over again. Its really a basis of humanity, she said. I think thats why it means a lot to people to participate because they know that theyre making a difference in somebodys life.

Sheftel-Gomes is a longtime member at the Reform S.F. synagogue, where she helps to run the HaMotzi program, a food-assistance initiative started in 1993. Every Sunday, she and her volunteers meet to prepare more than 100 meals for Compass Family Services, the San Francisco Womens Shelter and various community members in need. Once a month, Sheftel-Gomes also heads the Chicken Soupers meal program. Founded in 1988 to support those with AIDS, it now feeds the community at large.

We have an obligation to do this, she said. Thats our covenant with God.

Sherith Israel is not uncommon in its commitment to social action. Nearly all synagogues have similar projects in one form or another, whether its starting a community garden or building a homeless shelter from the ground up. For many Jews, social action is a mitzvah and an important part of their religious practice. Across the Bay Area, different communities have committed to a range of social justice issues to better themselves, their fellow humans and the world.

One of the projects at Or Shalom Jewish Community, a Reconstructionist synagogue in San Francisco, is called Sanctuary Or Shalom. A congregation-wide initiative to support immigrants in California, its reach is broad: accompanying people to their immigration hearings, protesting outside Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) centers and calling elected officials to advocate for legislative change.

Social action is part of the fabric at Or Shalom. In fact, social action is one of just five tabs on the homepage. Clicking on it leads to the Safety Net Action Committee (dedicated to advocating for universal health care), the Environmental Action Committee, and the Interfaith Action Committee (which works with Faith in Action Bay Area on issues of voter engagement, gun control and housing reform). Another project was a 2016 listening campaign that asked congregants to suggest social issues they wanted the synagogue to address before the election, and myriad topics were raised.

Leslie Roffman, a longtime member and the chair of the Sanctuary Or Shalom project, said this kind of work is part of how her community practices Judaism. Social justice is at our core, she said.

Similarly, at Bnai Israel Jewish Center in Petaluma, the social action team doesnt have just one project it has many.

Congregants are part of a rotation that helps run the Interfaith Food Pantry at Elim Lutheran Church in Petaluma. Members of the Social Action Committee have taken up a green mitzvah to reduce the synagogues carbon footprint, removing cleaning supplies, paper towels and anything else at the synagogue that can be replaced with more environmentally friendly alternatives. And at Hanukkah, the independent synagogue works with Jewish Family and Childrens Services in Santa Rosa to provide gifts for children in low-income families.

This month, volunteers held a drive to collect school supplies for the children of farm workers, collecting notebooks, art materials and water bottles to be distributed to children across the state. Last year, they donated more than 300 filled backpacks.

Abbey Levine, co-chair of the Social Action Committee and executive vice president of the Bnai Israel board, said her fellow congregants are always ready and eager to become involved in a new project. Social justice work is a fundamental part of Judaism and being Jewish, she said.

I think that as Jews and as survivors of so many things ourselves, to repair the world is really critical.

In Berkeley, members of Modern Orthodox Congregation Beth Israel have been volunteering at a local mens shelter for more than 15 years. Before the pandemic, they would cook and serve food to the shelters guests once a month. For now, with the kitchen closed for safety concerns, the program is on hiatus, although the shul still supports the shelter with donations and other supplies.

The popular program has helped connect Beth Israel to the larger community, said Maharat Victoria Sutton, who retired from the shul Aug. 1 after eight years as director of education and community engagement. She was among the many volunteers, and she brought her young daughter along to help out.

Chesed is a foundation of Judaism, she said. Often translated as lovingkindness, chesed means giving oneself fully, with love and compassion.

Meanwhile, the Tikkun Olam leadership team at Congregation Beth El in Berkeley has spent two years focused on the Care First Community Coalition, an organization dedicated to reducing the arrests and incarceration of people with mental health issues. Congregants at the Reform synagogue have lobbied the Alameda County Board of Supervisors to earmark funds to improve services for mentally ill people, and in 2021 the board approved a Care First, Jails Last policy resolution and set aside $8 million for services. Theyve been involved at every stage, helping to draft budget recommendations, facilitate connections between Care First and other local organizations, and publicize the coalitions mission.

The challenge is how do we bring this [mission] forward in a way that makes [Alameda County residents] care and helps them feel connected, said Becki Cohn-Vars, co-chair of the Tikkun Olam leadership team. The Care First Community Coalition is lobbying the county to again set aside funds for these services for another year.

Rabbi Rebekah Stern, Beth Els senior rabbi, said for her, like others, social justice work is integral to her Judaism. You cant read the Books of the Prophets without understanding that outcry against injustice is core to who we are as Jews, she said.

At Kehilla Community Synagogue in Piedmont, a commitment to social action is at the core of its mission statement. In 2017, inspired by the Black Lives Matter movement, congregants formed the Belonging and Allyship Project, an initiative to address white supremacy and racial justice internally within Kehilla, at all levels of our organization and community, according to the website.

Ruthie Levin, a Kehilla congregant for more than 16 years, oversees the Belonging and Allyship Project as the synagogues people of color organizer. A Black Jew, Levin had experienced her fair share of prejudice, both within the Kehilla community and out.

What we want to work on is ways of improving how folks of color experience Kehilla moving forward, Levin said.

Kehilla now hosts a number of affinity groups to foster discussions on shifting focus away from whiteness and white supremacy in the community. A diversity, equity and inclusion team has been formed to offer training and advice to synagogue leaders. Levin wants to see everyone involved.

Its one thing to show up at synagogue and listen to a sermon and hear [tikkun olam] talked about in passing, she said. But to really embody it, in all that you do thats my goal.

At Peninsula Temple Beth El, Covid threw a wrench into its plans for an ambitious green initiative, launched shortly before the pandemic started. Following a listening campaign at the San Mateo Reform synagogue, where climate change emerged as members greatest concern, leaders of its Rodfei Tzedek (pursuing justice) team began focusing on steps they could take to reduce the synagogues carbon footprint.

PTBE members have started a community garden at the shul, donating what is grown there to Samaritan House; attended rallies for climate justice; and plan to install solar panels to help power the synagogue with clean energy. Yet the campaign has been different from what leadership imagined, said Marla Becker, one of the team members. Their vision for environmental justice work was based in group action, in the community with others. But the pandemic-led shift has not diminished their commitment to the cause, Becker said.

Theres a quote from the Talmud that we refer to often: Do not be daunted by the enormity of the worlds grief. Do justly now, love mercy now, walk humbly now. You are not obligated to complete the work, but neither are you free to abandon it, she said. We really believe that.

At Congregation Beth Jacob in Redwood City, social action has always been a priority, said Rabbi Nathaniel Ezray, who has been at the Conservative synagogue for 28 years. The communitys most recent work has been with United Hatzalah, a volunteer-based, free-of-charge emergency medical service throughout Israel.

Beth Jacob supports United Hatzalah through fundraising and spreading awareness about the organization. Bill Futornick, the synagogues ritual director, also leads trips for congregants to visit United Hatzalahs headquarters in Jerusalem and see its work in action. Ezray called the experience of visiting the sites in Israel that Beth Jacob supports transformative.

Social action is fundamental to the practice of Judaism, he said, and has been from the beginning.

I think that when we have a religion that talks about basic human dignity, about connecting our core story of having been slaves with the obligation to help others who are enslaved, when we have a series of values that say you may not stand idly by, when we define ourselves by loving our fellow human those things all create an imperative to act when somebody is suffering, Ezray said.

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At many Bay Area synagogues, the real action is social action J. - The Jewish News of Northern California