Judaism – Page 21

Revitalizing community

Torah West wants to make Metro Vancouver a destination for more Orthodox newcomers. (photo by Cynthia Ramsay)

A new initiative, called Torah West, aims to grow Metro Vancouver’s Jewish population and make it more attractive to Orthodox newcomers – a goal that proponents say will strengthen every component of the community.

Torah West is focused on three Rs: retain, recruit and revitalize. It seeks to stanch the departure of Orthodox families from the region, recruit newcomers and, in the process, revitalize not only the institutions that serve specifically Orthodox families but increase demand and support for services that enhance life for all Jewish British Columbians.

“The more people who come, the more services we’re going to need to be able to sustain those people,” said Dr. Jonathon Leipsic, who co-chairs Torah West with Hodie Kahn. “More kosher restaurants, more people availing themselves of kosher food, more camps, more campers, more kids in Jewish day schools, more synagogue memberships, more Jewish community members, more people taking leadership roles in the community, more people investing in the community and on and on and on.”

Among many other community roles, Leipsic is president of Congregation Schara Tzedeck and Kahn is a past president. Together, they saw a growing challenge in the community and decided to act. They credit the Diamond Foundation for funding a 2020 study of the challenges facing the Orthodox community here, and the Jewish Federation of Greater Vancouver, especially vice-president Shelley Rivkin, for taking Torah West under their umbrella. The initiative will not see brick-and-mortar projects, but rather seeks to close gaps that make observing an Orthodox life in the city challenging.

Facilitating relocation to British Columbia might mean something as simple and comparatively affordable as helping a family with first and last months’ rent. If families want to live in Vancouver but send their kids to yeshivah in Las Vegas or Denver or elsewhere, Torah West can help fund flights home for the holidays, for example, if that tips the scales for the family’s place-of-residence decision. Other angles might include deferred membership fees to synagogues, the Jewish Community Centre of Greater Vancouver or other institutions. The community has systems in place to make Jewish summer camps accessible for all families and, if helping fund travel to the East or to the United States to access another form of camp would encourage families to relocate here, Torah West would support that.

Torah West will work with the Provincial Nominee Program, in which the federal government invites provinces to designate streams of immigrants that fill regional needs. Guiding newcomers through the immigration process, helping them get their credentials assessed and assisting in finding employment will ease some of the logistical challenges of relocation.

The initiative is loosely based on GROWWINNIPEG, a project of Manitoba’s Jewish community that has helped facilitate as many as 1,800 Jewish families migrating there, although there are distinct differences – cost of living, notably – that require unique responses.

Part of the motivation for Torah West was the loss of the Pacific Torah Institute yeshivah and limited Orthodox educational options in the city. But that is merely part of a longer trajectory. In her lifetime, Kahn said, she has witnessed waves in the community, in which there were more or fewer Orthodox families and, in turn, educators and infrastructure to serve them. The end of PTI was just part of a trend, she said, but it was a big blow.

“As they say, every crisis is an opportunity,” she said. “This crisis is that opportunity. Torah West is the response to that opportunity.”

Kahn said a notable aspect of Torah West is the buy-in from every single Orthodox group in the region.

“What’s innovative and fresh about the initiative is that it was developed collaboratively with all the Orthodox institutions and the Chabad centres across the Lower Mainland,” she said. “It’s very groundbreaking in that sense.”

That sort of collegiality is symptomatic not only of the Orthodox community but of the entire Vancouver Jewish community, Kahn said, something she sees as remarkable.

“Granted, we all have our little tiny silos of religious observance, which is reflected in the religious institutions that we choose to align ourselves with,” said Kahn. “But when it comes to the community, Orthodox rabbis play with Reform rabbis … Conservative rabbis play with Chabad. It’s a very unique kind of cultural experience that we have here and it’s reflected in the individuals who share the community and build the community. In a lot of other communities, those silos are very wide and very deep and they do not cross-pollinate or necessarily engage with one another to the extent that we do here.”

Both Kahn and Leipsic stress that a larger Orthodox community means a strengthening of every aspect of the community, to the benefit of all.

“We need to look at undergirding the Orthodox community because, at the end of the day, they provide the Jewish educators for our community, they provide the consumers for Jewish infrastructure like kosher restaurants or other services that are not just Orthodox-centric, they are Jewish-centric,” Kahn said. “That is what our vision is, to make sure that we have the proper foundation that will accrue to the benefit of the entire community at large.”

Similarly, while Torah West aims to draw new Orthodox families, the services the program provides will be available to anyone across the spectrum.

“We welcome everybody,” said Kahn. “There’s nobody who is going to, as they say, measure the length of your tzitzit. But we do have a hope and a dream and maybe some expectation that, if you become part of the Torah West initiative, you will, in turn, become part of the initiative in every respect. That means becoming a member of a synagogue, becoming a consumer of the kosher restaurant, or start another kosher restaurant, ensuring that the kosher butcher can stay in business.… We have a dream that we can create in Vancouver a nexus that combines the gloriousness of life in Vancouver with the ability to sustain a Torah lifestyle and the infrastructure that makes that possible.”

Nobody can talk about migrating to Vancouver without addressing the economic elephant in the room.

“The cost of living in Vancouver obviously has an impact,” said Leipsic, adding that the community is addressing macroeconomic issues and will continue to do so. “As far as people we want to recruit, we think that there are a number of people with capacity, who seek freedom and the opportunity to live a Torah-observant life or a traditional life in a nonjudgmental, diverse community with a lot of richness in it.”

Economic, political and social challenges in South America make that a target market of Torah West. In these cases, migration may be less an economic decision than one based on a desire for political stability.

Not coincidentally, the manager and community liaison of Torah West, Amanda Aron Chimanovitch, is herself a Brazilian-Canadian who came here via the Winnipeg project.

“Our goal is to make sure that there are economic and social and other supports for families who do want to come here,” said Kahn. “Ideally, families that are self-sustaining is a fantastic thing; it’s fantastic for all of us. But we’re not about to turn ourselves blind to the idea that, if you’re a Jewish educator, as an example, Vancouver is a very challenging place to be able to live independently without some support. I think we’re looking to help bridge that gap a little bit.”

Torah West is a three-year pilot project that Kahn and Leipsic are hopeful will prove permanent. Just putting Vancouver on the map as a possible home will be a success.

“When people are thinking about relocating, Vancouver is not even in their consciousness,” Kahn said of many Orthodox families. “Our goal is to create Vancouver as an option for them – whether it becomes the ultimate choice, we can’t control that. But we at least want to put Vancouver on the map.… You need a little bit of pioneer spirit to come here. If you’re looking for a place that’s already got all the amenities and got all the infrastructure, Vancouver is probably not your place. If you’re looking for a place of insurmountable geographical beauty and a real special feeling in the community and the landscape upon which you can plant your own trees and nurture them and make them part of the forest, this is the place for you.”

Rivkin, vice-president of planning, allocations and community affairs at the Jewish Federation, credits the Winnipeg project as a model but acknowledged differences. While Winnipeg was experiencing a declining Jewish population, that is not the case in Vancouver. This is one of North America’s fastest-growing Jewish communities.

“We don’t actually have a diminishing Jewish community, we have a diminishing community of people who are traditional or Orthodox,” said Rivkin. The reasons are straightforward. “We don’t have a yeshivah anymore, we don’t have summer camps that meet the needs of the Orthodox community, we don’t have a nice [kosher] restaurant here anymore.”

Rivkin said studies indicate that new Canadians tend to earn lower salaries than other Canadians in a similar role for up to 10 years after arrival. Helping people through the first challenging years is part of Torah West’s mission.

Kahn summed it up simply.

“There’s something very beautiful about a small community, something especially beautiful about the Vancouver Jewish community,” she said. “What we would love to see is just more opportunity for people who are seeking a halachic Torah lifestyle to be able to do that in Vancouver.”

A new story every year

Each year, we revisit the same Torah portions but, while the words remain the same, our understandings change based on what is happening in our world or in our lives. The exodus story, the story of Passover, remains as relevant as ever, as people in many parts of the world are being oppressed, are stateless or are living amid war.

As Russia’s attack on Ukraine continues, citizens of that besieged country are seeking refuge in neighbouring states. It does not appear, at present, that Jewish Ukrainians are suffering any more or less than any other citizens of that state. However, history has shown that whenever and wherever upheaval occurs, it almost inevitably affects Jewish people in some particular way.

The age-old question, “What does it mean for the Jews?” is an acknowledgement that events that ostensibly appear unrelated to Jewish people specifically will have unique consequences for Jews.

As Russia’s invasion has faced an unexpected reply from the Ukrainian military and people, the risk of Vladimir Putin being backed into a corner opens the door to worrying potentials. He has already made threatening noises about chemical weapons and, even more worryingly, nuclear weapons – the very suggestions being an untenable line to cross for any nuclear-capable world leader.

It should be remembered, but it has been too infrequently mentioned during this crisis, that Ukraine once had the third-largest nuclear arsenal in the world, a legacy of the dismantling of the Soviet Union. In 1994, Ukraine was persuaded to transfer its entire arsenal to Russia to be decommissioned with the promise from the Western world that we would ensure that country’s security in return. As Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky continues his virtual global tour, prevailing upon the West to provide more military aid, we should remember that he is asking for the Western world to fulfil the promise it made to his country less than three decades ago.

We should also not need reminding that the existence of a Jewish state is a modern miracle that provides a place of refuge, mere decades after the absence of a homeland led to Jewish history’s worst cataclysm. There are some 200,000 Ukrainians who would qualify for Israeli citizenship under the Law of Return, and planeloads of Jewish Ukrainians are making their way to Israel, fleeing a modern-day pharaoh.

Of course, the land of milk and honey is, in reality, a real-world country facing an enormous range of problems. Recent terror attacks have some people fearing a third intifada or, at least, a season of upheaval like we saw last year when violence erupted. In turn, that hostility spread worldwide, with spikes in antisemitic incidents around the world, including in Canada. While Jews are securely ensconced in the Promised Land, Israelis still seek liberation from the figurative enslavement by terrorists and their supporters. And, at the same time, Palestinians also do not have the freedom they desire and deserve. This latest violence does not serve either people’s dreams of peace or justice; it further enslaves us to cycles of justifications of more violence and pain.

Meanwhile, Jewish families in North America are excited to return to comparatively normal seders and celebrations after two years of pandemic. This is itself a form of liberation. As we reenact the ancient exodus at our seder tables, we will hope for and commit ourselves to a world where all who are oppressed find freedom. This is not a rote rereading and it is not a theoretical wish. In a world with so many challenges and dangers, the story of escape from bondage remains as relevant and urgent as ever.

Synagogue’s milestone

Montreal’s Congregation Shaar Hashomayim has been at its Kensington Avenue home for 100 years. (photo by Lainie Berger / unsplash.com)

Montreal’s Congregation Shaar Hashomayim is 176 years old – and it has been in its current building for 100 years now. Among those who have attended the shul over its long history are Rav Abraham Isaac Kook (who was chief rabbi of British Mandate Palestine), former prime minister Pierre Elliott Trudeau and current Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, legendary musician Leonard Cohen and various members of the Bronfman family. Recently, the historic congregation made history, when it hired Rabba Rachel Kohl Finegold, the first Orthodox woman in Canada to become ordained.

“It remains a traditional synagogue that follows traditional Jewish law,” Finegold told the Independent. “Me being the first female member of the clergy may have been significant, but it only did so in complete consistency with halachah (Jewish law).”

Finegold was among the first group of female students to graduate from Yeshivat Maharat, which is located in the Bronx, N.Y., in 2013. She has chosen as her title the term rabba, although female rabbis exist in other streams of Judaism.

“I walk up to the bimah [pulpit] like my male colleagues, but I go back and sit in the female section, because our building is 100 years old and the bimah resides in the central/men’s part of the sanctuary,” she said. “That is just what the architecture allows.”

Shaar Hashomayim split off from Congregation Shearith Israel (also known as the Spanish and Portuguese Synagogue of Montreal) in 1846. Ashkenazi members – English, German and Polish Jews – wanted to practise rituals and observances more akin to what they were familiar with, rather than what was traditional for the Sephardim. In September 1922, Congregation Shaar Hashomayim moved to 450 Kensington Ave. in Westmount, where it resides to this day. After the Second World War, a school was added to accommodate the new families who had joined the congregation. Further expansion happened in 1967.

“This is among the most grand of Montreal’s synagogues. Their choir is simply like no other and the sound permeates the walls throughout during services,” said Lucy Verebes Shapiro, who, while not a member of Shaar Hashomayim, has visited the shul many times. “There is a notion of great importance about all that transpires within,” she said.

The synagogue cemetery also gets visitors, Jewish and non-Jewish, who are attracted by its denizens.

“I’m a Leonard Cohen fan and visit the cemetery every year on the anniversary of his death,” said Marta Etynkowski. “I’ve never met him, but his poetry and music have helped me through many deep, private, emotional moments throughout my life and it’s one of my biggest regrets that I never saw him while alive. It has become a bit of an annual tradition for many of his fans to pay their respects – some people leave mementos, some play his music there, others just have a private moment in front of his grave. It’s quite beautiful.”

Shaar Hashomayim has a long and rich music tradition. The services are centred around a cantor, who is accompanied by an all-male choir, the origin of which dates back to 1887.

Its museum – the Edward Bronfman Museum – holds much Judaica, including a shofar from Yemen and a few books that are centuries old. It features rotating exhibits and is open to the public.

“In the wake of the COVID pandemic, people often ask, are synagogues still relevant? I think that is because there is a misconception that synagogues are just a place of prayer alone,” said Finegold. “However, many synagogues, and ours in particular, offer a connection to community – that’s something people want. After being isolated and at home for so long, to know that there is a place that has so many doorways to access, is something that will keep the relevance and people coming in for years to come.”

Avi Kumar is an historian and freelance writer. He has lived in six countries and speaks 10 languages. His work has been published in many countries, from his native Sri Lanka to Israel and Ireland, and he has written on a variety of topics, including history, wildlife and linguistics.

Puddle splashing and balance

If you’ve ever slogged through a spring melt in a place, like, say, Winnipeg, you know about the odd balance … the one where it’s best if the snow melts slowly, even painfully, with a freeze at night. Why? Too fast a melt and everything is flooded.

On the prairies – or, frankly, any place without good drainage – basements, wellies and everything else can be in trouble if a big pile of snow hits a too-warm sunny spring. In these places, and I’ve lived in three, now that I think of it: Buffalo and Ithaca, New York, and also Winnipeg … spring is both desperately, sorely anticipated and, well, sometimes gross. It’s full of dirty snow, big puddles and treacherous ice.

Yet we continue, every winter, to long for spring and better weather to come. It’s like we have amnesia and forget this long dirty shoulder season. Years ago, I told myself that, obviously, the snowbirds had it wrong. The best time to travel, if it could ever be managed, would be during the puddle period.

I was thinking about the puddles, Passover and, also, the talmudic tractate I am currently studying as part of Daf Yomi, a page of Talmud a day. From now until the summer, that tractate is Yevamot – the tractate that deals with the notion of levirate marriage. What’s that, you say? It’s the ancient obligation for a childless widow to either marry her husband’s brother to produce a child after her husband’s death, or perform a ceremony called halitzah, in which she is freed from this obligation.

This is probably the first time in more than two years of doing this Daf Yomi study when I seriously just wanted to quit. Yes, studying an ancient text, no matter how holy or intellectually stimulating, can sometimes feel irrelevant. Yevamot goes way beyond “slightly boring” or irrelevant. It wanders into the gross, mucky puddles for me. It’s right up there in the news articles that come with trigger warnings because of issues containing abuse. For a modern person, particularly a woman, some of these rabbis’ discussions in Yevamot really wear me down – because rape, child marriage and other issues really unacceptable to the modern reader arise frequently.

I was proceeding, reading late at night out of duty, and using an approach I perfected in graduate school. This involves skimming the thing as fast as possible so that, if one day I am ever asked about this in a weekly seminar, I can nod somewhat knowingly and bring up the one or two points I can remember. This worked when the professor assigned three academic tomes a week and expected us all to discuss them. (Later, I learned he did this in hopes we would drop the course due to the workload. He felt guilty when we all took it anyway and bought us coffees while we soldiered onwards.)

Of course, I’m learning for the sake of learning now, not because I expect to be tested or, heaven forbid, asked to lead the seminar at a moment’s notice.

This is one of those few times when I was saved by social media. I was on Twitter and, because I follow others who are also learning this way, I started seeing their comments. Several of them summed up, in 280 characters or less (or a TikTok), that they too were struggling. Eye-rolling and other more disgusting noises may have come out of their mouths at some of this. I had a huge sense of relief. I wasn’t alone. Others felt exactly the way I felt. We were part of some internet club I’d forgotten I’d joined. Whew.

There’s a reason why, traditionally, Talmud is studied in a hevruta, a pair or group setting. Some of the topics are hard to understand, for all sorts of reasons. I don’t have a physical study group. Heck, that’s OK, I’ve done nearly this entire thing during a pandemic. I’m a busy mom who stays up too late to read this stuff. I’m lucky to have access to it at all, as a woman, and also for free, online at Sefaria. There’s a lot of support online now that got me to this point, since this kind of study was traditionally dominated by men.

However, I know that feeling a sense of camaraderie and the insights that come from studying with others are important. They certainly helped spur me to continue when I thought the subject matter of Yevamot wasn’t for me and I wanted to quit.

To bring this back to those dirty spring puddles, well, this time of year, while it can be a slog, is also prime time to prep for Passover. This, too, can feel like a struggle. However much preparation you take on for this holiday, it can feel too hard. Cleaning up and scrubbing and eating down your chametz (bread products) can get to be too much.

For many, there’s pressure from those more traditional. Have you cleaned between the sofa cushions thoroughly? How about the stroller?

Those who are secular or less involved pressure me in another way, asking why I make myself “crazy” with any of this.

Passover preparations can feel like one long walk through Winnipeg’s springtime: navigating endless icy puddles, black ice and snow mold.

What helps me continue? It’s that whiff of spring air, or maybe the matzah ball soup, cooked in advance of the holiday. It’s the photo or long ago trip to a warmer climate, where the flowers were already in bloom. Also, it’s taking myself back to the Babylonian Talmud, in Yevamot 13. That’s the page with the reminder that the rabbis teach us not to divide ourselves into factions. That is, we are to value our diversity, our various customs, rather than let our disagreements divide us.

Some people love Passover. Some people love splashing in puddles. Life is a balancing act, and we’re lucky that we’re all unique and different. There’s sometimes a huge sense of shame that rises up when we admit that, actually, no, this text/season/holiday might not be the best thing since, say, sliced bread. Finding out, via a study partner, a friend or even a stranger online that we’re not alone can be so reassuring.

We’re not all the same, but the rabbis encouraged us not to create factions or separate ourselves unnecessarily, either. This is useful wisdom because, after Passover, Shavuot’s not far behind. Pesach’s cold in Winnipeg, and even Lag b’Omer picnics can be snowed or rained out. But Shavuot? That’s a holiday I love. It takes all kinds, as we teeter totter our way through the Jewish year, balancing between seasons. That balance is what makes our holiday observances, and even the talmudic tractates I struggle through, rich indeed.

Joanne Seiff has written regularly for CBC Manitoba and various Jewish publications. She is the author of three books, including From the Outside In: Jewish Post Columns 2015-2016, a collection of essays available for digital download or as a paperback from Amazon. Check her out on Instagram @yrnspinner or at joanneseiff.blogspot.com.

BI scholar-in-residence

Rabbi Eliezer Diamond (photo from jtsa.edu)

“I am particularly interested in the way that Torah can help us look inward. Each of the topics is about religious character formation, various ways in which we create a more godly character and personality,” said Rabbi Eliezer Diamond in a Zoom conversation with the Jewish Independent ahead of his visit to Vancouver next month.

Congregation Beth Israel will be hosting Diamond as its scholar-in-residence for three in-person talks under the collective title Making a Life of Meaning. A professor of Talmud and rabbinics at the Jewish Theological Seminary of America, in New York, Diamond will speak on Addiction and Judaism (April 28, 7:30 p.m.), the Power of Gratitude (April 29, 6 p.m., with a dinner to follow) and Seeking and Granting Forgiveness (April 30, 9:30 a.m.).

In regard to addiction, the rabbi compares the 12-step process of Alcoholics Anonymous with the laws of repentance by Maimonides and notes the parallel paths taken towards sobriety and repentance: acknowledgement, regret and acceptance.

“Not drinking and being sober are not the same thing. To recover from alcoholism, one has to change one’s way of living and thinking,” said Diamond, who discusses addiction from both a personal and professional perspective.

“I am a recovering alcoholic and I know about addiction from the inside,” he said. “Even though I am not a therapist or addiction counselor, what I can do is help people to be honest with themselves and say ‘I have a problem,’ which is an acknowledgement of the sin and a step towards repentance. It is important to help people see where they are at so that they can begin to make changes.”

It is also helpful, he added, for his rabbinical students to know that their teacher is a recovering alcoholic because there is frequently a shame involved in addiction and a sense that one is a diminished person as a result.

“I am there to say to them, those may be the cards one has been dealt. You can still be a productive human being and, if you take the steps you need to take to deal with addiction, there is no reason for shame. On the contrary, there is a reason for pride. You have been faced with a challenge and you have addressed it,” he said.

Diamond pointed out that, in a broad sense, there has been an acknowledgement in the past couple of decades within the Jewish community that Jews, like everyone else, have problems with addiction.

“We are not immune to addiction, as people think or would like to think,” he said. “In my own lifetime, the community has become more open. The founding of Jewish Addiction Community Services [JACS] is an example of that.”

In addition to Congregation Beth Israel, Diamond’s talks in Vancouver are being sponsored by JACS Vancouver, Jewish Family Services Vancouver and Jewish Federation of Greater Vancouver.

Diamond’s discussion on gratitude is tied to the teachings of Rabbi Eliyahu Eliezer Dessler, an early 20th-century leader in the mussar (Jewish ethics or values) movement, who saw giving as being at the heart of the religious personality. In Dessler’s teachings, God, by providing life, is the ultimate giver. Therefore, to follow in God’s path, we must be givers ourselves. There are times, however, when we must also be receivers, and the best way to receive is through gratitude, Diamond explained.

Expanding on the theme of gratitude, Diamond added, “Ultimately, whether or not we experience ourselves as wealthy or poor is intimately connected to finding happiness and satisfaction with what we have. If we focus on what we have and the happiness that it can bring us, then we can feel wealthy. This is a choice that all of us, especially in a first-world situation, have.”

On forgiveness, the rabbi cited Christian theologian C.S. Lewis, who spoke of the human desire to seek forgiveness yet the difficulty humans have in granting it.

“Forgiving is a hard thing to do,” said Diamond. “What does it actually mean to forgive someone? Because, unless we lobotomize ourselves, we are not going to forget what happened. The essence of what I will be talking about is the relationship between forgiveness and recognizing the essential humanity of every human being, including those who have wronged us.”

What often stands in the way of forgiveness, he said, is the inability to view another person as anything other than evil, and not as a flawed individual who has stumbled, as we all stumble. The path towards forgiveness, according to Diamond, is to make that distinction.

Amid social and political divisiveness, which causes rifts in families and communities, Diamond further emphasized the importance of being able to listen to and appreciate the inherent humanity and sincerity in belief of those with whom we may strongly disagree.

“Rabbi Diamond is one of most well-respected scholars in the Conservative movement today,” said Beth Israel’s Rabbi Jonathan Infeld. “He is exceedingly bright, knowledgeable and eloquent. He is also passionate about the human value of gratitude and the importance of recovery. Considering the fact that drug and alcohol addictions and overdoses have been less spoken about during the pandemic, we knew that Rabbi Diamond should be our first in-person scholar-in-residence since the beginning of COVID-19. We are so happy that other community agencies are joining us. We look forward to welcoming Rabbi Diamond to Vancouver and learning from this incredible rabbi.”

To register for the April 29 dinner, visit bethisrael.ca.

Sam Margolis has written for the Globe and Mail, the National Post, UPI and MSNBC.

Experiences shape identity

I recently studied the Pardes story in Tractate Chagigah of the Babylonian Talmud. This story is a complicated, mystical journey. The Mishnah starts by asking what extremely sensitive topics are difficult and, therefore, should only be taught in small groups. The presence of G-d is one of those topics. In the Pardes (literally “Orchard”) narrative, four rabbis go in search of G-d’s presence. It’s a life-changing event. Only Rabbi Akiva comes out alive and intact. Ben Azzai dies. Ben Zoma “was harmed” – this is interpreted to mean that he lost his mind. Elisha Ben Abuya becomes acher, or other, a heretic who is forever changed by his experience.

This narrative stuck with me, particularly the stories about Elisha Ben Abuya, who, although still respectful and learned, remains forever “othered” by his experience. He’s unable to be included, or to properly reconnect or embrace communal Jewish life again.

When I was 14, I decided I wanted to become a rabbi. For years, this was my goal. I was actively involved in my congregation. My mom, a Jewish professional, started a Jewish nursery school, and then went on to become a director of education and, finally, a temple administrator/executive director. That building and community were like my house. I knew it inside and out. The rabbi’s family was extended family to me. We had picnics and cookouts, I played with their kids. I knew that Jewish professionals were people I loved. It made becoming a rabbi seem attainable.

I lived in Israel for a year in high school. I went to and worked at Jewish camps, studied Hebrew and Near Eastern studies in university, taught religious school and Jewish music and served on a religious school committee. I helped lead services. Then, in my last year of university, I interviewed at not one, but two rabbinical schools. I started with the Reform Movement’s Hebrew Union College (HUC). I later interviewed at the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College (RRC).

I wasn’t accepted. Looking back, with a lot more interview experience, I can easily see that the interview process was flawed. The committee asked illegal, uncomfortable questions. The process didn’t judge me on my academic skills, Jewish involvement or merits. I was told, after the “try again next year” rejection, that I needed counseling. (Not career counseling, but just vague “counseling.”) Since my family was closely tied to the Reform movement, I heard later that, in that cohort, the competition for women to be accepted was much harder than it was for men. Many more women applied than men did, and there were reportedly quotas. At the time, women hadn’t reached parity in the field. The seminary didn’t want to accept more than 50% women.

Later, I watched several people, including a guy I had dated in university, get into rabbinical school and become a successful rabbi. He had lower academic grades and less Hebrew proficiency than I did.

RRC’s interview was much more respectful. I appreciated it, but they suggested that they weren’t sure I was Reconstructionist. They also rejected my application, again with an invitation to resubmit later, when I was “sure.”

Losing the life goal of becoming a rabbi was a difficult identity shift. I focused on what I had wanted out of the rabbinate: Jewish learning, chances to teach and lead services, build community and write about Jewish topics. I pursued a master’s in education and started teaching. I moved, got a dog, and got engaged … all serious commitments. It meant I wouldn’t suddenly be reapplying to rabbinical school and flying off to spend a year in Israel. I didn’t want to put off my life any longer to face rejection again.

On social media, I recently watched a long-time teacher transition out of the classroom to another kind of consultancy work. It was a flashback moment. More than 20 years ago, I was a high school teacher. I also taught religious school and tutored kids for b’nai mitzvah. Teaching was a huge part of who I was as a person. However, I wasn’t sure that my position was ideal. I still wanted to study more. I decided to go back to graduate school. This coincided with getting married. When I returned to get a religious studies degree, it felt like I’d lost any sense of authority, despite having a master’s degree and teaching experience.

In the graduate program, I earned a tiny stipend as a teaching assistant. Nobody cared that I already knew how to teach. While I did learn a lot, mostly on my own, I had the bad luck to enter a program that was splintering. A lot of faculty left, including my advisor. Without an advisor, I finished with only a second master’s degree, and went back into an educational administration job. I continued moving for my husband’s academic career, becoming a shape-changer in terms of my freelance work life.

I’m now in mid-career and, while I’m not a rabbi, I achieved some of my goals. I study more, have taught some, and I write about Judaism. That said, reading about Elisha Ben Abuya’s “othering” as a result of his experiences really struck home. Many of us have had these life-altering shifts of identity. Sometimes, it is individual, like a teacher’s career change or a divorce or the death of a loved one. Sometimes, like the millions fleeing war in Ukraine, Syria or Afghanistan, it’s a complete departure from life as they knew it. It can be soul-crushing. Some die, like Ben Azzai. Some are unable to maintain their sanity, like Ben Zoma.

One’s career or life can change gently, but often it’s sudden, like in war or with a swift rejection. Sometimes, it is a sapling or “shoot,” a hope for new direction, cut down, as Ben Abuya’s experience relates. Our lives shift. We change identities and directions. However, through all this, Jewish traditions can offer us a story or a metaphor from which we can learn or with which to identify.

Elisha Ben Abuya’s story is a tough and sad one. It also offers solace. I suspect more of us have had this gut-wrenching experience than we want to admit. Acher/Ben Abuya was public about his angst and struggle – and his community did try to help. Perhaps there’s a lot to be gained through processing and acknowledging our hardest experiences, even if, in Acher’s situation, his relief and resolution came only long after he died.

The excitement of holidays

As meaningful and fun as most of the Jewish holidays are, there’s a lot of running around, cleaning, cooking and other preparation that generally goes into them. Three recently published children’s books – two about Passover and one on Shabbat – capture the joys of the holidays, and the craziness that can sometimes precede them.

Passover, Here I Come!, written by D.J. Steinberg and illustrated by Emanuel Wiemans was put out this year by Grosset & Dunlap. It’s a compilation of short poems, all related to Passover, from “Scrub-A-Dub-Dub!” preparations to “Bye-bye, Bread!” and “Hello, Matzoh!” it goes through pretty much every aspect, including the Passover story, what’s for dinner and the search for the afikomen.

“Made by Me!” is about making up the seder plate, and all the plate’s items and their symbols are noted alongside the illustration. For the poem “Our Magic Table,” the drawings and words again combine to wonderful effect. We see the tables from set-up to guest-filled, and the typesetting, leaving gaps between the letters forming the words “g r o w s a n d g r o w s,” communicate the truly magic nature of a Pesach table that does seem to fit an enormous number of people, when we’re lucky to have many friends and family join in our celebrations.

Steinberg’s verse and Wiemans’ drawings work well together, simultaneously entertaining and teaching. The basics of Passover are all covered in Passover, Here I Come! which even includes a recipe for Mom’s Matzoh Brei after the four-line poem “World’s Best Breakfast.”

A Persian Passover (Kalaniot Books) by Etan Basseri with illustrations by Rashin Kheiriyeh, also contains a recipe – for hallaq, which is Persian-style charoset. In addition, the end of the book features a brief description of Passover and what goes on the seder plate, a glossary of Persian and Hebrew words used in the story, and a couple of paragraphs on Jews in Persia, known today as Iran, though, notes Basseri, “the culture and main language of this region is still called ‘Persian.’”

Set in Iran in the 1950s, A Persian Passover follows siblings Ezra and Roza, who are helping their family get ready for the holiday. Everyone is put to work and Roza is finally old to enough to accompany older brother Ezra to the synagogue, where families bring their own flour “to be mixed, rolled and baked into soft, delicious matzah.” Though older, Ezra is not necessarily wiser and he’s still a kid, with energy to burn. Not having learned from an earlier collision with a neighbour – as he ran a lap around the house, being timed by Roza – Ezra once again asks Roza to measure how fast he can run to the next street corner, freshly baked matzah in hand.

“But he didn’t see the rut in the road up ahead. ‘Oof!’ yelped Ezra as he tripped and fell. Splat! went the bag of matzah as it dropped into a puddle.

“‘The matzah!’ they exclaimed together.

“‘That was all the matzah we had for the week. Now it’s gone. What will we tell Mama and Baba?’ asked Roza.” (The glossary notes that baba means dad in Persian.)

Ezra and Roza set out to find replacement matzah before the seder starts, and we meet more of the neighbourhood folk. Hopefully, it won’t be too much of a spoiler to know that the kids succeed – not only receiving kindness, but also showing kindness to others along the way.

The last book that recently came out has to do with matzah, but not with Passover, which is why it’s included in this brief roundup even though it’s about Shabbat. Good for year-round reading, Bubbe and Bart’s Matzoh Ball Mayhem, written by Bonnie Grubman and illustrated by Deborah Melmon, was published by Seattle’s Intergalactic Afikoman last November. Created by two dog lovers, it begins, “This is Bubbe’s story. Believe me that it’s true. Her puppy loved each Friday night like Jewish puppies do.

“When Bubbe made her matzoh balls, Bart was at her feet, waiting for a ball to fall, and not some doggie treat.”

While Bart’s begging doesn’t achieve the desired result, he does get to eat all the matzah balls he’s able to catch. Bubbling away in the pot on the stove, the matzah balls grow so large that they blow off the lid and zoom all over the room. Not to be held back by “a better lid, and some very sticky tape,” the balls continue to fly. And we get to count them as they do. (Another spoiler alert: Bart gets to eat an awful lot of matzah.)

Eventually, with a little magic, calmness is restored and dog and house are cleaned up in time for Shabbat dinner with the family.

Bubbe and Bart’s Matzoh Ball Mayhem ends with a couple of paragraphs about Shabbat, “a very special day of the week,” and a short glossary.

PJ Library resources

One PJ Library holiday offering is Passover is Coming by Tracy Newman and Viviana Garofoli.

Long a trusted resource for Jewish families in more than 35 countries around the world who receive their free books each month, PJ Library offers fresh reading, audio stories and tasty treats for families celebrating Passover this year, April 15 to 23.

Hundreds of thousands of children are receiving new books this month, each providing a carefully curated selection of age-appropriate reading related to Passover. New this year, families will also receive a colourful illustrated “Matzah Mania” fold-out that includes recipes for homemade matzah, matzah trail mix, and matzah pizza lasagna, along with ideas for serving a seder grazing board. The keepsake fold-out includes culturally inclusive information about seder traditions, and the Four Questions of the seder, which are printed in English and Hebrew.

image - In Every Generation Haggadah cover English — PJ Library’s Haggadah is available in five languages, including English and French. As well, PJ Library has many other Passover resources, such as children’s books about the holiday.

In the PJ Library program, which was created by the Harold Grinspoon Foundation, families who sign up may receive free books for children from birth through age 8. For kids ages 9 and up, PJ Our Way allows kids to select and review books on their own each month.

In April, two new Passover-themed episodes of the PJ Library Presents podcast network will launch. These new podcasts bring Jewish traditions, culture, holidays and values to life through audio storytelling. On April 4, Kiddo Learns about Passover will be the latest Afternoons with Mimi audio story, and Humpty Dumpty and the Passover Feast will be the newest tale in the Beyond the Bookcase series. Families may listen to the award-winning podcasts on all major streaming sources, and more information is at pjlibrary.org/podcast.

PJ Library has become one of the leading sources for family-friendly Haggadot, with its illustrated In Every Generation: A PJ Library Family Haggadah. Since 2018, the organization has shipped more than 675,000 individual Haggadot to more than 110,000 PJ Library families for free. (For non-subscribers, the printed Haggadah is available for purchase via Amazon.) PJ Library also offers a digital version that can be downloaded in five languages: English, Spanish, Portuguese, Russian and French. This Haggadah is filled with songs, blessings and explanations and is available as a free printable PDF from pjlibrary.org/haggadah.

This year, PJ Library has updated its Passover hub – pjlibrary.org/passover – with new book lists and dozens of fresh ideas and resources for families, including stories and songs, games, activities and recipes.

– Courtesy PJ Library

Weddings to stop plagues

According to the Nov. 11, 1918, Winnipeg Tribune, Rose Schwartz and Abraham Lachterman were married in a plague wedding in Winnipeg, Man. More than 1,000 people attended, Jews and non-Jews.

Relatively early in the evolution of the coronavirus pandemic, in March 2020, there was an unusual wedding in Israel. The ceremony took place in Bnei Brak’s Ponevezh Cemetery. The bride (kallah) and groom (hatan), both orphans, had not previously known each other. Even in the ultra-Orthodox community, where there is a range of arranged to forced marriages, such an event – a black (shvartse) or plague (mageyfe) wedding – is extremely rare.

Written accounts of plague weddings date back almost 200 years, to eastern Europe. In these accounts, one learns that “targeted” couples were people who were orphaned, homeless, or had physical or intellectual challenges. In these scenarios, the community contends it is doing a favour to these brides and grooms, as it assumes that the couple has only a slim chance of marrying otherwise.

Had this contemporary couple under the wedding canopy been free to choose, or had they been coerced or something in between? Were they promised something to get them under the chuppah? Maybe they were gifted, respectively, their wedding dress and suit? There again, however, these outfits could have come from a wedding gemach, a charity warehouse from which people borrow items of clothing. Or perhaps, as was customary in earlier times, some well-to-do community member offered to “set up house” for them.

One thing is clear: even though it wasn’t their families who sat down and discussed terms, this was an arranged marriage. The couple had been picked to stop the ravages of the coronavirus. In a way, they were a sacrificial appeasement to G-d, who was thought to have brought on the pandemic.

The wedding was purposely not conducted in a synagogue, in a wedding hall or in someone’s house. The reasoning was that the community hoped that the souls of those interred in the cemetery would reward this act of marrying two orphans and intercede to block the evil decree. Perhaps, G-d would be induced to have pity on the couple and, by extension, halt the spread of disease.

The first record of a plague wedding goes back to 1831, in Russia, during a cholera pandemic. Another written reference to this type of ceremony dates to 1849, in Krakow, Poland. Another publication, from the early 20th century, deals with stories about Rabbi Elimelekh Weisblum of Lizhensk, who apparently arranged such a marriage in 1785, during a cholera outbreak. Some historians argue that the tradition is older still. In any case, the ritual became firmly entrenched in the Jewish communities of the Russian Empire during the 1892 cholera outbreak. (See Jeremy Brown’s comprehensive article, “The plague wedding,” at traditiononline.org/plague-weddings.)

Over time, the ceremonies became more elaborate. Hanna Wegrzynek writes of “several instances” where part of the cemetery was demarcated, symbolically closing off the affected area, so to speak. Some ceremonies were accompanied by feasts and dancing.

Brown notes that Eastern European Jews who resettled in the United States early in the 20th century brought the plague wedding custom with them. Across the country, during the Spanish flu epidemic (in which my own maternal grandfather almost died), desperate Jewish communities married off dozens of young couples. One of the most celebrated and widely reported plague weddings took place between Harry Rosenberg and Fanny Jacobs in October 1918 at a cemetery near Cobbs Creek in Philadelphia. The event was attended by more than 1,000 people. Unfortunately, genealogical research suggests that neither Harry nor Fanny survived the Spanish Flu, dying along with 50 million others.

In November 1918, Rose Schwartz and Abraham Lachterman were reportedly married in a similar ceremony in Winnipeg, Man.

Yizkor, or memorial, books of Jewish communities wiped out in the Holocaust record a number of black weddings. And three of the most famous 20th-century Yiddish and Hebrew writers make reference to plague weddings.

In 1945, I.B. Singer wrote about a cemetery wedding in his short story Gimpel the Fool: “It so happened that there was a dysentery epidemic…. The ceremony was held at the cemetery gates, near the little corpse-washing hut. The fellows got drunk. While the marriage contract was being drawn up I heard the most pious high rabbi ask, ‘Is the bride a widow or a divorced woman?’ And the sexton’s wife answered…. ‘Both a widow and divorced.’ It was a black moment for me. But what was I to do, run away from under the marriage canopy?”

S.Y. Agnon mentions such a wedding in his 1945 Only Yesterday – “and they’ve already held a wedding for two orphans on the Mount of Olives to stop the plague.”

This past summer, Jerusalem’s Khan Theatre performed a dramatic adaptation of I.L. Peretz’s 1909 short story In the Time of Pestilence, in which there is a discussion about orphans marrying during an outbreak. The theatre company performed the work at Hansen House, the site of a former hospital for people suffering from Hansen’s disease (also called leprosy).

Since the 1800s, when the first plague wedding was reported, there have been a number of global pandemics. In chronological order, they include cholera, bubonic plague, measles, Russian flu, Spanish flu, Asian flu, HIV/AIDS, SARS and COVID-19. (See “Pandemics That Changed History,” at history.com/topics/middle-ages/pandemics-timeline.)

Even though plague weddings don’t seem to be at all effective in stopping outbreaks of diseases, for the guests, at least, the ceremonies could be seen as a means of escape, for a short time, from worry and despair.

Deborah Rubin Fields is an Israel-based features writer. She is also the author of Take a Peek Inside: A Child’s Guide to Radiology Exams, published in English, Hebrew and Arabic.

Positive Jewish leaders online

It’s hard not to doom scroll lately, but I’ve been heartened by watching Jewish leaders take centre stage via social media. These are bright spots in a difficult time. Here are a few to Google and follow. I’ve learned a lot online this way. Perhaps you might, too.

In the world of social media and Talmud study (yes, that’s a thing!), the short social media videos of Miriam Anzovin have gotten a lot of attention. She offers TikTok, YouTube and Instagram posts and links via Twitter. These are on the Daf Yomi, the 7.5-year cycle where one studies a page of Talmud a day. Anzovin’s amazing effort offers a brief summary and analysis of some of the big rabbinic issues. It’s also a breath of fresh air in a field historically dominated by men. Anzovin is a writer and visual artist. She describes her videos as “Daf Yomi reaction videos.” These takes often include slang, curse words, and perhaps difficult interpretations for the usual Jewish text study audience.

Some Orthodox men have voiced criticism to this approach to Talmud study. I would argue that this is a defensive, unhelpful reaction. More Talmud study is good. Talmud study of any kind, is, quite simply – more. It brings more attention to Jewish text and ideas, which is a good thing both for Judaism and for intellectual analysis. Sometimes, the reaction stems from being forced to admit that there are other perspectives and ways of reading religious text. Anzovin centres women’s voices, issues and opinions, critical thinking, liberal and modern views of very old texts. Social media offers her a perfect platform and her work has taken off. It’s long past due. I’m thrilled to see her show up in my feed.

Rabbi Sandra Lawson has been one to follow for awhile. She’s a leader – an activist, a musician and a teacher. Her social media presence allows me to learn a lot. I’ve learned Torah, said Kaddish, and more. Through her anecdotes, she’s encouraged hard examination of ways in which racism is a problem in Jewish life. She’s taken on a lot of firsts in both her former role as the associate chaplain for Jewish life at Elon University and is now the first director of racial diversity, equity and inclusion at Reconstructing Judaism. She was the first African American and first openly gay African American accepted by the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College. Her open, strong online presence embodies many things Judaism needs to see: her identity as a veteran, vegan, personal trainer, musician and wise educator pushes the boundaries of what some people think Jews or rabbis look like. For younger Jews on the web, seeing her laughing with her wife Susan, featuring her little dogs as she makes music – these are models of joyful, modern Jewish life that we need now more than ever.

What does informal Jewish education look like on Instagram? Well, many people source Jewish news specifically from A Wider Frame (@awiderframe).

Debbie, the jewelry designer behind @rootsmetals, posts deep dives into very specific historic, geographic and cultural Jewish topics. It comes complete with bibliographies. Prepare for her snarky responses to trolls (ever present online) who try to threaten her well-being.

Ashager Araro, @blackjewishmagic, is a liberal, feminist, Black Israeli. She does incredible work as an educator in person in Israel. She’s also on Instagram and Twitter, and travels to speak at Hillels and Jewish student centres in the United States. Her focus on Ethiopian Israeli history and modern Jewish life is illuminating, particularly for those who view race only through a parochial North American lens.

Some social media education targets a specific group. For example, Shoshanna Keats-Jaskoll speaks out for others who aren’t able to in the Orthodox world. She tackles the issue of agunot. Agunot are women who cannot obtain a Jewish divorce from their husbands and are unable to remarry according to Jewish law. Keats-Jaskoll also works to provide modest images of women through an internationally sourced photo bank. This works to combat the erasure of women’s faces and bodies and imagery in Orthodox photos, publications and Israeli billboards. Chochmat-Nashim (Women’s Wisdom), her organization, advocates for Orthodox women, including both modern Orthodox and Haredi groups in Israel and the diaspora.

This is just a taste of what’s out there. It’s a start to diversifying your feed. You may have noticed that I started by writing about leaders I admire and, guess what? They’re all women. It’s not that I don’t admire some male leaders. There are plenty of them and some of them are fine human beings – but too many “leader lists” leave women out entirely. March 8 is International Women’s Day. It’s one thing to say we advocate for equality, and to celebrate women’s achievements on a specific day. It’s another to raise up, embrace and educate on a daily basis.

Our tradition offers us moments to celebrate women’s roles, such as the recitation of Woman of Valour (Eishet Chayil) in some homes on Shabbat. However, that’s not a standard practice in every household. Plus, it’s only one moment of one day of a week, when Jewish women are contributing 24/7.

Many of our paid leaders, rabbis and cantors, and even volunteers, such as synagogue board members, are men. It’s been “traditional” to embrace a male leadership model in some communities. However, in an era when more of our lives are both online and more egalitarian, it’s OK to stop the doom scrolling and open up one’s mind – and feed – to some new leaders. In this case, they also just happen to identify as Jewish women.