Shabbat Nitzavim
3 Sept 2021
Dear Members and Friends,
It is hard to believe that we are standing on the threshold of a New Year. It seemed only a moment ago that we were preparing for the High Holy Days of 5781 and now, once again, the Tishri festivals are upon us. How the pandemic has flattened time – one identical day following another – without the highs and lows, the celebrations and commemorations of life before Covid to punctuate our lives.
And yet, our lives have not stood still. Behind the façade of these last seventeen months, a façade that has hidden us from each other, babies have been born and primary school children have grown into graceful and sometimes outspoken teenagers! Quiet marriages have been solemnised and as one season changed into another, we stood apart from each other – no more than ten – at too many gravesides to say our silent farewells to loved ones.
In front of me is my copy of T.S. Eliot’s ‘Four Quartets’ – a meditation on time, written before and in the midst of the Second World War – ‘for history is a pattern/Of timeless moments.’ And next to this slim volume, with its broken spine and loose pages is the Mishnah, open at the tractate on Rosh Hashanah. What stands out so prominently in its first three chapters is its focus on the role of witnesses, required to testify to the appearance of the new moon.
The Mishnah requires two eligible witnesses to come forward and match what they have seen in the sky with charts kept by the judges of the Beit Din. On the basis of their testimony, a new month would be announced and the festival dates confirmed.
Among the halakhic (Jewish legal) details, the editor has inserted a little story about Rabbi Akiva and Rabban Gamaliel:
Once more than forty pairs [of witnesses] came forward, but Rabbi Akiva in Lod restrained them. Rabban Gamaliel sent to him [saying], ‘If you restrain the multitude you will put a stumbling-block in their way for the future’ [mRosh Hashanah 1:6).What is this story saying? A large number of witnesses are making their way up to Jerusalem to declare to the Beit Din that they have seen the new moon. Akiva stops them at Lod, his hometown. There are too many of them to crowd out the Beit Din, he says, go home, only two are needed. But Rabban Gamaliel sends him a message saying, if you start sending these messengers home, then next time they see the new moon, they won’t bother to come out and then how will the rabbis of the Beit Din be able to announce the new month and festivals?
This past year and longer, we have been the confined, silent and hidden witnesses to events that have taken place on the world stage: political changes and upheavals – in the United States a presidential impeachment trial, the election of a new President, the attack on the United States Capitol on January 6, 2021, the aftermath of George Floyd’s murder and the Black Lives Matter movement, the tragic consequences of the west’s withdrawal of troops on the frightened population of Afghanistan, and the continuing effects of the pandemic on so many lives. We have been witnesses, too, to the continual assault on the environment – appalling fires, floods, hurricanes, pollution and extinction of precious species.
Many of us will have felt restrained by the lockdowns and our fear of the pandemic which has stopped us coming together to voice our protests against injustice and inequality. It has been painful and hard not to be able to be with people physically in their suffering, even to express our sympathy face to face. We haven’t even been able to pray aloud for fear of the transmission of Covid-19.
As we reach this New Year of 5782, our role as witnesses requires us to testify against what we see to be wrong with the world, to use our voices to protest against injustice, our financial resources to support those organisations that are fighting for equality and justice, and to reawaken our compassion to support those who are having to create new lives in places that are not home.
‘You are My witnesses,’ declares the Eternal One, ‘and I am God’ (Isaiah 43:12). The midrash, in a daring commentary to this verse, interprets it in this way: ‘If you are My witnesses,’ declares the Eternal One, ‘I am God. But if you are not My witnesses, then it is as if I am not God’ (Pesikta d’Rav Kahana 12:6). The notion of God’s imagined non-existence is a shocking and audacious one; you wonder how it can even be articulated in this way. And yet I think what the rabbis are implying is that by testifying to truth, goodness and righteousness, we banish evil and bring God’s presence into the world to make it a better place for future generations.
On behalf of all of us at the LJS, Rabbi Igor and I wish you a healthy and peaceful Shanah Tovah for 5782.
Alexandra Wright
The Book of Life
10 Sept 2021
Dear Members and Friends,
During the High Holy Days we read many prayers. Many of them raise many questions and challenges to modern readers. Not only are they problematic because we compare God to a King or Father (Avinu Malkeinu), but also because they suggest that God can inscribe us for a good or bad life. One of the High Holy Days additions to the daily prayer Amida, says the following:
Remember us for life, for You, O Sovereign, delight in life; and inscribe us in the Book of Life, for Your sake, O God of life.How can one believe that God can directly intervene in human fate, after all the misfortunes, persecutions and catastrophes that have fallen on Jewish people throughout history?
Zalman Schachter-Shalomi was a Polish born American Rabbi who was a founder of the Jewish Renewal Movement. In his book ‘Davening: A Guide to Meaningful Jewish Prayer’ Rabbi Schachter-Shalomi wrote: ‘[Many Jews see] the Siddur as a book of information… But the prayer book is a guide for offering the heart’s feelings to God. To understand how this is possible, you have to see the Siddur in an entirely different way. The Siddur is like a colouring book with outlines. People have to fill it in with life, background and context.’
In other words, only our experience and willingness can fill prayers with meaning. Like a good poem, Jewish prayer requires the reader’s interpretation.
After a year of danger, anxiety and vulnerability, we can relate to this prayer in a very intimate way. We can be grateful that, despite many losses, we are still here.
Isaac Bashevis Singer once said: ‘I am not ashamed to admit that I belong to those who fantasize that literature is capable of bringing new horizons and new perspectives – philosophical, religious, aesthetical, and even social.’
For me, to be written in the Book of Life is to believe that every action counts, every contribution matters, and that you are an important character in life. Whatever we say to God, we should be able to say to ourselves. Whatever we accuse God of, we should direct to humanity. Whatever we believe about God, we should apply in our lives.
As we approach Shabbat Shuva and Yom Kippur, I would like to wish all of us to be inscribed and sealed in the Book of Life.
Shabbat Shalom,
Igor Zinkov
Yom Kippur
15 Sept 2021
Dear Members and Friends,
In a short time, we shall gather (whether in the Sanctuary or online) to celebrate the beginning of Yom Kippur. Wherever we are, those first moments of lighting the Yom Tov candles and then listening to Gemma Rosefield play Bruch’s Kol Nidre, will take us on our own interior journey for the next 25 hours.
We enter a world of prayer and music, of fasting (for some of us) and self-affliction. We ask ourselves, what does it mean, when we can’t all ‘stand before God’ as the Torah portion for the morning of Yom Kippur tells us? And how do we effect that transformation of which Deutero-Isaiah speaks in the Haftarah: ‘Is not this the fast I look for…. Is it not to share your bread with the hungry and to bring the homeless poor into your house? When you see the naked, to clothe them, and never to hide yourself from your own kin?’
It has been so hard to embody those teachings and values over the past eighteen months when the synagogue has closed its doors to everything but its Nursery School and services. How have we been able to show hospitality at kiddushim, chavurah suppers or Pesach sedarim while sitting at our screens alone with our seder plates on display in front of us? Is it enough to send a voucher to our guests at the Drop-in for people seeking asylum and not welcome them across the threshold of the LJS? Creating an atmosphere of joy and uplift has been a challenge knowing that only a few people could come into the Sanctuary, unable to sing or join in with the prayers. These restrictions have bowed our spirits and bound our hearts for too long.
But now, with caution, we are able to welcome people back into the synagogue; we are beginning to re-open our activities and we must find the strength to retrain our spirits, to open ourselves to joy and celebration and to find meaningful ways of embodying our teachings of hospitality and welcome, supporting the frail and elderly, teaching our children and young people in person and reaching out beyond the walls of the synagogue to those in need. And those of us who have felt fortunate in many ways to have managed through these months, must find the strength to support those who have really suffered and been challenged by repeated lockdowns – children, teenagers, students and adults of all ages. It is precisely at the point of freedom that we often lose our nerve, and fearfulness of what lies ahead can be overwhelming.
As we leave the synagogue on Thursday evening or switch off our devices at the end of the Yom Kippur services, let us pray that the words of contrition and promise on our lips will galvanise us to renew our passion for social justice and change how we are in the world.
We must rediscover what is good in the world – the altruism, kindness and generosity of millions of people, the self-sacrifice, and desire to bring into the world the knowledge that the vast majority of humanity is defined and driven not by selfishness and greed, but by a willingness to care for others, to give more to those who have less, and to preserve and sustain the precious beauty and resources of the environment.
May you and your dear ones be sealed for a fulfilling and peaceful New Year of 5782.
Alexandra Wright
Sukkot
22 Sept 2021
Dear Members and Friends,
Last week, on Yom Kippur we read this passage in the Torah:
“You are standing before God in order to enter into the Covenant of God and take the oath that God makes with you, so that God may fulfill God’s promise to your ancestors, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. It is not with you alone, but with those who are here and those who are not here that God makes this Covenant and oath.” (Deuteronomy 29:9-14)
This passage always puzzled me. It is traditionally understood to be about future generations. I could never understand how you can make an agreement with someone who is not here.
As we begin the Festival of Sukkot, we explore its themes and ideas. Perhaps, the Festival of Sukkot and its theme of nature will help us to solve the puzzle of Deuteronomy 29.
On Sukkot we have four species, build tents and spend time outside of our permanent homes. The very origin of Sukkot is agricultural. Originally it was a thanksgiving for the fruit harvest and the tents we build are the security or storage booths for all that was gathered.
Today, in light of the climate emergency, the original meaning of the festival might be relevant again. Today we know that many of our decisions will dramatically impact future generations. Human activity is changing the climate in unprecedented and sometimes irreversible ways.1 If we choose to ignore or not do enough to change this, we act as if there is no covenant between us and future generations. Today we need Deuteronomy 29 to be valid and establish agreement not only with those who live today, but to take responsibility for those who are ‘not here today,’ generations of people who will be after us.
This year, we don’t just build a Sukkah as a reminder of personal fragility and dependency on nature, but as a powerful metaphor that out planet is much more fragile than we thought it is. On this Festival of Sukkot, let us celebrate our achievements of the past and re-establish the covenant with the future.
Moadim L'Simcha. May this season bring you joy and happiness.
Igor Zinkov
[1] You can read more about the climate emergency and the latest IPCC report HERE
