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2015 —⟶ March 🡄 (Previous month) :: 📅 February 2015 📅 April 2015 :: (Next month) 🡆 📅 Resources published in March 2015 Sorted Chronologically (old to new). Sort most recent first? “The wicked child asks: What does this work mean to you? Mah ha’avodah ha’zot lachem” (Exodus 12:26). I think about this question a great deal as a rabbi whose core work involves fighting modern-day slavery. I think about it when I talk to my children about what I do every day, when I call anti-trafficking activists and say, “What can rabbis do to support you?” or when I stand before Jewish audiences and urge them to put their energy behind this critical human rights issue. The answer must go deeper than simply saying, “We were slaves in Egypt once upon a time.” The memory of bitterness does not necessarily inspire action. What inspires me is not slavery but redemption. God could part the Sea of Reeds, but the Israelites could not truly be free until they had liberated themselves, after 40 years in the desert, from slavery. Categories: Tags: 21st century C.E., 58th century A.M., activism, community organizing, human trafficking, slavery, social justice Contributor(s): A haggadah supplement for suicide awareness and prevention offered at the Passover seder where Elijah the prophet is directly referenced, and the valence of personal and communal despair and distress are explicitly invoked. Categories: Tags: 21st century C.E., 58th century A.M., community support, אליהו הנביא Eliyahu haNavi, haggadah supplements, Needing Vocalization, North America, Psychopomp, still small voice, suicide, suicide awareness, suicide prevention Contributor(s): In the year 5775 (2015), the vernal equinox coincided with Rosh Ḥodesh Nissan, the Hebrew month known also as Aviv (Spring), as well as the onset of Shabbat, and a total solar eclipse. Here is a short meditation to receive the shabbat in embrace of the new season. Categories: Tags: Contributor(s): ההכרזה על יום הבחירות בנויה על נוסח ברכת החודש, ומיועדת להיאמר בשחרית של שבת לפני הבחירות. קהילות שאינן נוהגות להתפלל בשחרית מוזמנות להשתמש בתפילה בתפילת קבלת שבת של אותה השבת. נכתב על ידי הרב עודד מזור. Categories: Tags: 21st century C.E., 58th century A.M., democratic process, מדינת ישראל Medinat Yisrael, Needing Vocalization, Parliamentary Election Contributor(s): כוונה ליום הבחירות יכולה להיאמר בכל שלב של יום הבחירות עצמו. בעיניי היא מתאימה בעיקר כחלק מתפילת שחרית של אותו היום או רגע לפני הכניסה אל מאחורי הפרגוד. נכתב על ידי נועה מזור, סטודנטית לרבנות, והרבה המלווה של נוער תל״ם. What are the inner workings of such an intricately crafted story that it devolves into so much gratuitous violence at the end? Haman’s racism follows imminently upon the heels of the king’s sexism. Indeed, the root of Haman’s wrath against Mordekhai and the Jews parallels the king’s fury against Vashti and the women. Both Vashti and Mordekhai refused to submit to degradation before authority. Disdain for and subordination of women are pre-conditions for the progression toward violent evils that threaten to prevail under the jester-king. One of the fundaments of feminism is that until we fix the basic gender dyad, there will be no resolution of other derivative inequalities, prejudices, and abuses—at personal, ethnic, national, and global levels. Core relationships between woman and man must embody mutual respect, dignity, and equality in our humanity. Categories: Tags: Contributor(s): Rabbi Isaiah Horowitz (1565-1630), known as the Shlah from the name of his chief work (Shnei Luḥot HaBrit – The Two Tablets of the Covenant), was a rabbi in Central and Eastern Europe and later Chief Ashkenazi Rabbi of Jerusalem. This text is an excerpt from his kabbalistic prayer book, Siddur Shaar haShamayim (Gate of Heaven), which deals with the Shma prayer. Categories: Tags: Contributor(s): Talmudic and midrashic sources contain hymns of the creation usually based on homiletic expansions of metaphorical descriptions and personifications of the created world in the Bible. The explicitly homiletic background of some of the hymns in Perek Shira indicates a possible connection between the other hymns and Tannaitic and Amoraic homiletics, and suggests a hymnal index to well-known, but mostly unpreserved, homiletics. The origin of this work, the period of its composition and its significance may be deduced from literary parallels. A Tannaitic source in the tractate Hagiga of the Jerusalem (Hag. 2:1,77a—b) and Babylonian Talmud (Hag. 14b), in hymns of nature associated with apocalyptic visions and with the teaching of ma’aseh merkaba serves as a key to Perek Shira’s close spiritual relationship with this literature. Parallels to it can be found in apocalyptic literature, in mystic layers in Talmudic literature, in Jewish mystical prayers surviving in fourth-century Greek Christian composition, in Heikhalot literature, and in Merkaba mysticism. The affinity of Perek Shira with Heikhalot literature, which abounds in hymns, can be noted in the explicitly mystic introduction to the seven crowings of the cock — the only non-hymnal text in the collection — and the striking resemblance between the language of the additions and that of Shi’ur Koma and other examples of this literature. In Seder Rabba de-Bereshit, a Heikhalot tract, in conjunction with the description of ma’aseh bereshit, there is a clear parallel to Perek Shira’s praise of creation and to the structure of its hymns. The concept reflected in this source is based on a belief in the existence of angelic archetypes of created beings who mediate between God and His creation, and express their role through singing hymns. As the first interpretations of Perek Shira also bear witness to its mystic character and angelologic significance, it would appear to be a mystical chapter of Heikhalot literature, dating from late Tannaitic — early Amoraic period, or early Middle Ages. Categories: Erev Shabbat, Hekhalot Writings, Rosh Ḥodesh Readings, Morning Baqashot, Rosh haShanah la-Melakhim Readings, Rosh haShanah la-Behemah Readings, Rosh haShanah Readings, Tu biShvat Readings Tags: 43rd century A.M., 5th century C.E., animals, birds, cosmological, creeping creatures, Early Ammoraic, Early Middle Ages, ההיכלות ויורדי המרכבה haHeikhalot v'Yordei haMerkavah, heikhalot literature, hymns of creation, Late Tannaitic, Openers Contributor(s): | ||
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