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May 5, 2023 (14 Iyar 5783) Take a Break!
Dear Friends, I hope this correspondence finds you well and in good health. Please join us in the sanctuary this Saturday morning at 10:15am for our weekly Shabbat services. This gathering, or Moed (see below), will also be available on our regular Zoom prayer link. As a reminder, we are embarking on a new electronic initiative entitled Shir Shel Shavua, or song of the week. In these entries you will find out about the meaning and history of some favorite Hebrew, Jewish, Yiddish, and Israeli songs. Please feel free to share your favorites with Cantor Zim or me, so we can research them and share recordings to enhance each Shabbat. This week, we learn about the origins of the famous Hava Nagila melody. In a familiar type of exchange, Shloimy texts Mendel and says (or rather types), “Hey Mendel, can we get the kids together for a playdate this week?” Almost instantaneously, Mendel responds, “Hey Shloimy, what a great idea! What did you have in mind?” Shloimy (somewhat) quickly responds, after checking his Outlook and Google calendars on which are documented the various after-school activities of his Kinderlach (children), “How is Tuesday? Avramele has soccer on Monday and Saraleh has basketball on Wednesday.” An hour later, after scrolling through his Apple watch, Mendel answers, “Oy, my meeting for Thursday just got changed to Tuesday, and the wife is working late that night for a conference that runs from Monday to Friday.” Despite their best efforts to get together, this non-planning continues until shortly before the end of the school year, when both Avramele and Saraleh are preparing to leave for overnight camp and Mendel’s kids are prepping with their tutor for high school advanced-placement tests while simultaneously completing their middle school-mandated community service hours, all before the end of the academic year. In this week’s Torah portion of Emor, we learn of the pulse of the Jewish calendar. While the text certainly gives us an idea for the planning of upcoming Yuntif (holiday) services, more importantly, it refers to these occasions as "אלה מועדי ה"" אלה מועדי ה“ or sanctified “Moed” occasions. Shabbat is of course the most regular such occasion, celebrated each week. Pesach and Shavuot, as well as Sukkoth, Rosh HaShana, Yom Kippur and Rosh Chodesh, further highlight the rhythm of our year. Hashem says, “These are My fixed times, My holy occasions.” I think that when God says, “These are My fixed times,” we need focus on the meaning of the word מועד. To investigate the meaning of a word in the Torah, we often look at various other places in which it appears to clarify the meaning of the original word. Arguably, Moed means more than time. Throughout the Torah, the term Ohel Moed is the Tent of Meeting and as you will recall, it is the place where Moses, and sometimes the B’nei Yisrael (Jewish people), go to encounter God’s direct presence. Ironically, in modern Hebrew, a Moadon (from the same root as Moed) is a communal gathering place, a public lounge, a place of ultimate togetherness. Hashem does not introduce the pulse of Jewish time and the annual calendar with the exclusive language of time, but rather also with the language of relationship and being together. Parashat Emor therefore may be encouraging Shloimy and Mendel, as well as each of us, to set aside in our lives not only time, but space as well. The text seems to express holiness as the ability to connect with what matters and with whom, in places that matter. That place may be around your dining room table on Friday nights or in a sanctuary at your local Shul on Saturday mornings (preferably ours, which is located on the second floor at 1585 Center Avenue in Fort Lee!). Either way, Shabbat, as the most regularly occurring Moed, exclaims to us as Jewish families and Jewish communities, “No excuses. No ignoring. No ghosting. This is the time. This is what counts: family; friends; neighbors; and community.” Let’s put down the phones, ease up on the efficiency of the schedule, and challenge ourselves and each other to reflect in prayer, breathe in holiness, support our shul, and gather always in sacredness of time and space. Shabbat Shalom, Rabbi Eric L. Wasser, EdD, Hon.DM
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