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July 9, 2020 | 17 Tammuz 5780
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Faith in Isolation
How does one worship alone? How have people of different religions embraced faith during this pandemic? How have sacred texts provided comfort in these times of isolation? Hebrew College’s new Arts Committee will tackle these questions in a photography show planned for Spring 2021: “Isolated Faith Expressed.”
“All religions have beautiful things to share with one another. I want to show how many different religions who were isolated in their communities were strengthened by their focus, revealing the core values of their inherent purpose,” said Beacon Hill photographer Brenda Bancel, who is curating the show. “I want to show how they embraced this time with grace.”
Bancel’s show, which is supported by a grant from CJP, will be the first exhibited in Hebrew College’s Cutler Atrium as part of the new Hebrew College arts initiative, spearheaded by Hebrew College Board of Trustees member Deborah Feinstein. Hebrew College established the initiative last year in an effort to provide another outlet for fostering love of Torah, social justice, pluralism, and creativity through visual art.
(Photo by Brenda Bancel)
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Innovating Successfully in Response to the Pandemic
After months of planning innovative educational, spiritual, social justice, and interfaith projects to address needs of the Greater Boston Jewish community, Hebrew College Innovation Lab students (including Rabbi Lev Friedman Rab`18, pictured above with his wife) found themselves faced with a hands-on innovation challenge: how to innovate their projects in a newly-quarantined COVID-19 world.
Students quickly responded–bringing joy, music, creativity, and connection to virtual communities. A day-of-study about interfaith and mixed-heritage relationships moved online. A weekend-long retreat about spirituality and social justice became a day-long Zoom conference. And a Pluralistic community of musicians and songwriters collaborated virtually.
“Students in the Innovation Lab were implementing their projects just when the world as we knew it was changing profoundly: quarantine, isolation, the inability for the community to meet face to face,” said Rabbi Jeffrey Summit, Director of the Hebrew College Innovation Lab. “They reconceptualized their projects thoughtfully and creatively, engaging people in living Jewish practice in ways that were value-added to people’s lives and experience.”
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Building Connection through Zivug
Before Rabbi Getzel Davis Rab`13 met his wife, he was engaged to another woman. The relationship ended because the two weren’t compatible, he says, but he regrets that they didn’t meet with a counselor or clergy person as they contemplated their life together.
So when Rabbi Davis and his wife got engaged, they decided to work with a rabbi in their transition to marriage. Now the father of two, Rabbi Davis, a rabbi and chaplain at Harvard Hillel, has started his own pre-marital class through Hebrew College Open Circle Jewish Learning. He calls the class “Zivug,” a Jewish mystical word meaning “connection.”
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Deepen your Jewish learning this summer by taking a Hebrew College community learning course. We are grateful for CJP's generous support, which allows us to offer these opportunities. View our course listings and register for a class.
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A Time to Mourn: Grieving Together in the Time of COVID
Today at noon, the Greater Boston Jewish Community paused to mourn those lost during the COVID pandemic thus far. We chose the 17 of Tammuz, Shivah Asar B’Tammuz, because this date is already a day of mourning in our tradition. Watch the event here.
The entire Jewish Community thanks Steven Schneider and Slotnick Monuments for the generous donation of the monument and memorial benches placed at the Baker Street Cemeteries.
Thank you to our partners and sponsors: 2Life Communities, Community Hevra Kadisha of Greater Boston, Combined Jewish Philanthropies of Greater Boston, Hadassah, Hebrew SeniorLife, JCC of Greater Boston, Jewish Cemetery Association of Greater Boston, Jewish Family & Children's Service, Jewish War Veterans, Kerem Shalom, Massachusetts Board of Rabbis, SC Memorial Group, Temple Beth Zion, and Temple Emunah.
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Mi Chamocha/Who is Like You
We are pleased to share this visual narrative of the prayer Mi Chamocha, created by Rabbi Jessica Kate Meyer Rab`14, Rabbi/Chazzan at The Kitchen in San Francisco, and members of their Davening Team.
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Practicing Acceptance Through Interfaith
Before I joined the Center for Spirituality, Dialogue, and Service at Northeastern, I had never heard the term “interfaith.” I was suddenly and violently thrown into an environment of new ideas, friendly people, and schools of thought I had never encountered. I’ll be honest—it was scary at first. But I quickly learned that people in interfaith settings generally have the same goal: to facilitate a friendlier and more accepting world regardless of belief system.
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From Fast to Festivity: A Zoom Mitzvah in the Narrow StraitsParashat Pinchas (Numbers 25:10-30:1)
By Cantor Ken Richmond
Rabbinical Student & Cantor, Temple Israel in Natick, MA
About six weeks ago, finally facing the reality that our son Zalmen’s bar mitzvah—scheduled for Labor Day weekend—would not be able to take place as we had imagined, we decided to move it up to his Hebrew birthday....
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