Rosh Hashanah

hey hmm so so so so foreign is me is miracles miracles do happen they happen every day around us all the time we just don't always realize them elohim was about uh the creation of of of ourselves that we are given a new soul every day and every chance is every day is a chance to start over and now foreign foreign is page 130 foreign foreign foreign foreign foreign 135 foreign we turn to page 142 for the baraku and we rise so 46. me is foreign m we continue on page 160. true and steadfast is this teaching beloved and treasured a source of wonder a fount of goodness a thing of beauty and ours for all time and true it is the eternal god is our sovereign the rock of jacob our protecting shield through all generations god's name lives on god's throne stands firm god's dominion prevails god's grandeur and faithfulness endure through eternity god's words are precious they will live forever from egypt you redeemed us adonai our god and from the slave house you set us free for this the people who felt your love exalted you and the ones whom you found precious saying hymns of praise blessing and thanks to the living god who reigns forever high and exalted inspiring wonder who humbles the proud and raised the lowly who frees the captive redeems the oppressed and sustains the poor god responds to the cry of our people their prayer in time of need sing praise to god most high most blessed source of blessing as moses miriam and all israel sang this joyous song oh i i'm oh oh oh six is everybody foreign i oh is foreign foreign is are about to recite it's one of the distinctive prayers of the high holy days we recited only twice once on rosh hashanah and the other time on yom kippur and like all prayers it speaks in metaphor we are mortal we are frail people are born they live and they pass on some reach the ripeness of old age others do not who by fire who by water who by war and who by beast who shall live in poverty who in prosperity who shall be humbled and who exalted we are on trial that's the metaphor of the high holy days god sits on the throne of justice god is the judge of truth recording and recounting our deeds inscribing judgments as the unetano talk of prayer speaks of judgment i would like to dedicate a few minutes of our time together to the life of ruth bader ginsburg justice was her first name justice ginsburg how fortunate to be able to devote one's entire professional life to the pursuit of justice the torah commands justice justice shall you pursue and the word justice is repeated for emphasis it was a verse that ruth bader ginsburg quoted many times i never met justice ginsburg personally but when she died on the eve of rosh hashanah i felt personally bereft as if a member of my family passed away there are some human beings who fill such huge spaces in our lives that when they die we can scarcely comprehend god pours into these people some mysterious talent some potent heavenly mixture and all the rest of us simply stand in awe basking in their reflected radiance her death should not have come as a surprise she was in poor health for many years and yet she survived challenge after challenge illness after illness she pulled through so many times that we almost forgot that she like all of us was mortal that there would come a time that she would not prevail and thus we were shocked at receiving the news she gave all she could every last drop of life's energy was entirely consumed nothing was left she died on the bench a good life a life well lived leaves a void we feel this void today we are in mourning the talmud tells of the death of rabbi safra when he died the rabbis of the academy did not rip their clothes as his custom for jewish families in mourning they said that they did not rend their garments because they were not rabbi safra's next of kin rend your garments anyway the rabbis instructed because when a great teacher dies all are next of kin every day we consider their teachings and implement their judgments justice ginsburg was such a formidable presence in the life of our country that many millions of americans are in mourning today it's not only that we worry about the direction of the country it is that we felt in some way that ruth bader ginsburg was our next of kin we will consider her teachings and implement her judgments for decades to come she was a daughter of our people who represented the best of us she was a proud jew she often spoke about how judaism's values its sense of justice formed and informed her she wielded enormous influence in a quiet way every american girl every american woman and every american man or woman who cares about equality and dignity owes her eternal gratitude she was ferocious in the pursuit of justice a quiet even introverted woman slight and small with this gigantic spirit the spirit of a warrior her courage was indomitable her determination indefatigable what a magnificent soul she was a giant but a gentle giant her presence was large she filled the voids the empty spaces of life but she did it in an utterly unique way some big personalities filled the room with color and noise ruth bader ginsburg was quieter she was thoughtful she was the type of woman who ennobled our spirit she taught us about fairness dignity and decency she taught us how to pursue justice relentlessly never give up never give up the sages teach them how the righteous ones even in their death are called alive how so ask the sages how can someone who is mortal and has passed away continue to live because their words live on their teaching lives on their example lives on as the jerusalem talmud explains we do not erect monuments to him their words are their memorial justice ginsburg died on the eve of rosh hashanah in jewish tradition the most righteous die on rosh hashanah the final letter of the book of her life was written at the completion of the full additional year she was granted god granted ruth bader ginsburg every last possible moment between last rosh hashanah and this rosh hashanah a full year minus a couple of hours in deference to the setting sun and the preparations to welcome the new year there is a belief that when death occurs on the eve of a jewish holiday it is as if god himself descends from the heavens to kiss us home god has descended from the heavens and kissed ruth bader ginsburg to her heavenly reward welcoming home a good and faithful friend i envisioned god greeting her with these words well done my servant well done now it is time to rest you inspired generations others can now pick up the torch and continue the work we who are still on earth recite the ancient words of gratitude from the book of ruth and all of the people said may god bless ruth who has come into our house and the women especially praised god for the gift of ruth maya angelou wrote when great souls die after a period peace blooms slowly and always irregularly spaces fill with a kind of soothing electric vibration our senses restored never to be the same whisper to us they existed they existed we can be be and be better for they existed ruth bader ginsburg's life was a blessing america is a better place and we are better people because she lived may she rest in eternal peace under the sheltering wing of god's presence 174 oh this earth foreign let us proclaim the power of this day a day whose holiness awakens deepest daw and inspires highest praise for your dominion for your throne is a throne of love your reign is a reign of truth in truth you are judge and plaintiff counselor and witness you inscribe and seal you record and recount you remember all that we have forgotten and when you open the book of memories it speaks for itself for every human hand leaves its mark an imprint like no other and so a great shofar will cry to kia still small voice will be heard angels in a world of fear and trembling will say behold the day of judgment for they too are judged in your eyes even they are not blameless all who come into the world pass before you like sheep before their shepherd as a shepherd considers the flock when it passes beneath the staff you count and consider every life you set bounds you decide destiny you inscribe judgments foreign oh oh foreign me foreign me um how many will pass away from this world how many will be borne into it who will live and who will die who will reach the ripeness of age who will be taken before their time who by fire and who by water who by war and who by beast who by famine and who by drought who by earthquake and who by plague who by strangling and who by stoning who will rest and who will wander who will be tranquil and who will be troubled who will be calm who tormented who will live in poverty and who in prosperity who will be humbled and who exalted through return to the right path through prayer and righteous giving we can transcend the harshness of the decree you are everything that we praise you for slow to anger quit to forgive you do not wish the death of sinners but urge them to return from their ways and live until the day of death you wait for them you accept them at once if they return since you created us you know our impulses we are but flesh and blood we are mortal our origin is dust and dust is our end we wear out our lives to get our bread like broken vessels like withered grass like a flower that must fade a shadow moving on a cloud passing by mere dust on the wind a dream that flies away but for you ever living sovereign time has no limits your presence unbounded by days and years is everywhere a glorious mystery none can decipher your name is worthy of you and you are worthy of your name and our name you have linked with yours we rise for the kedusha on page 184. right oh before hello oh me me please be seated we continue on page two hundred and eight with retsevie mujateno foreign huh let's say i is is uh foreign let's see we continue on page 210. god who is ours god of all generations to you we are grateful for ever rock and protector of our lives your saving power endures from age to age we thank you and tell the tale of your praise your power in our lives your caring for our souls the constant miracle of your kindness morning noon and night we call you goodness for your compassion never ends we call you mercy for your love has no limit we call you hope now and for all time and for all these gifts god of majesty may your name come to be blessed and praised our gratitude a daily offering until the end of time inscribe your covenant partners for a life of goodness and may all life resound with gratitude and faith in praise of your name god you free us and strengthen us o god divine presence whose path our ancestors walked bless us now with the words first bestowed on israel in the time of moses and aaron the threefold blessing given us through torah that joins our hopes with theirs may you know god's blessings of shelter and care may receive the light of god's kindness and grace may you see god's favor and goodness and may you partake of god's peace foreign is is oh at the dawn of his writing career mark twain wrote a short story called petrified man he described the discovery of a mummy in the mountains south of gravely ford upon examination it was determined that the deceased came to his death from protracted exposure approximately a century earlier every limb and feature was perfectly preserved the body was in a sitting position its attitude was pensive the way his hands rested on his face it appeared that he might be thumbing his nose at the world i kind of envisioned it like this the people of the neighborhood volunteered to bury the man but when they attempted to remove him they discovered that the water which had dripped upon him for ages from the crag above had coursed down his back and deposited a limestone sediment under him which had glued him to the bedrock upon which he sat the local judge refused to allow the citizens to blast the petrified man from his position so that they could give him a proper burial such of course would be little less than sacrilege the judge decreed and twain concludes everybody goes to see the stone man as many as 300 having visited the hardened creature during the past five or six weeks when twain published this story america was in the midst of the civil war perhaps he was thinking of the confederacy hardened by its immoral certainty and thumbing its nose at the world the unvarnished truth about america is that we have yet to give the petrified man of the civil war a proper burial he remains cemented to the bedrock of our country he is still thumbing his nose at america petrified man petrified of change we have not fully atoned for our original sin the horrendously evil idea that one group or a particular race is inherently inferior dehumanization is the ultimate logic of racism jews know this the moment they defined us as an inferior people without regard to what we believe they could do with us as they pleased the road to auschwitz was paved with the sediment of supremacy centuries of scorn spread on the highways byways and railways of europe racism subverts every principle of religious thought as rabbi abraham joshua heschel wrote to think of a man in terms of white black or yellow is more than an error it is a cancer of the soul from its first words judaism insisted that every human being created in god's image has equal moral worth and equal moral standing have we not all one father insists did not want god create us why then do we betray one another black human beings all human beings of every color are equally precious to me i am black and beautiful wrote the poet of the song of songs the american tragedy is that white supremacy outlived both the victors and the vanquished of the civil war it outlasted post-war reconstruction in many ways we are still fighting the civil war we are still trying to reconstruct america we've made progress even dramatic progress we do not have slavery we no longer sick german shepherds on freedom riders or diners at lunch counters but we still have racist dog whistles that create havoc and let slip the dogs of culture wars there is still systemic racism in america racial reconstruction is our country's unfinished business take for example the debate over confederate statues a statue is just marble or iron and cement in and of itself it does not depress voting create economic disparity or cause unequal health outcomes it does not jam its knee on the neck of a descendant of slaves slowly snuffing out the candle of life but it is not enough to write laws abolishing slavery custom must also be transformed the custom of venerating leaders of the confederacy is maddening robert e lee stonewall jackson jefferson davis and their cohorts were traitors the confederacy was secessionist seditionist and supremacist there were not two morally acceptable views with both sides containing some very fine people there were task masters and there were emancipators perhaps personally flawed but on the side of the angels they honor god by redeeming the captive as frederick douglass said about ulysses s grant a man he knew had many frailties in him the negro found a protector a vanquished foe a brother and an imperiled nation a savior i'll never forget my feelings of revulsion in kiev and seeing a statue of bogdan malnetsky the cossack leader who massacred tens of thousands of ukrainian jews ripping babies from their mother's wombs burning 300 jewish villages to the ground the destroyer of our people granted a place of honor in kiev central square and i remember thinking to myself hatred of jews will never disappear as long as custom elevates petrified savages to stone seats of reverence for these reasons i state proudly and without reservation that black lives matter it's important to say because the truth of american history is that black lives mattered less when we wrote that americans are entitled to life liberty in the pursuit of happiness we did not mean black americans when we wrote we the people of the united states we did not mean american slaves they were not full people in our eyes they were three-fifths people when we passed the post-war 13th amendment outlawing slavery and the 14th amendment conferring citizenship on former slaves it still took a century to eliminate legal segregation when we enshrined the 15th amendment guaranteeing the right of former slaves to vote still took 100 years to overcome intimidation violence lynching jim crow poll taxes and literacy tests all designed to suppress african-american suffrage highly paid political wizards still practice the dark art of voter suppression the evil that men do lives after them shakespeare wrote the failure to reconstruct america in the 19th century bequeathed unreconstructed racism even to the 3rd 4th 5th 6th and seventh generations we can overcome we have it in us the history of america is the story of liberty becoming ever more conscious of itself but we will never surmount the racial breach without a willingness to step into and repair the bridge this is what most people mean when they say black lives matter this is what most protesters most corporations most public officials most rabbis and ministers of every race mean we mean that we are committed to a full racial reconstruction of america we mean that we want to make america great for all people we mean that we want to push forward not backward we mean that no person's elevation requires another's degradation when we say black lives matter we do not mean the condescending accusation that white lives native american lives jewish lives asian lives don't matter or matter less we do not mean that we support the small minority of activists who perpetrate violence we condemn them unequivocally they distract from the righteous cause some are not even members of the local community their goal is either to sow division or simple looting the rule of law is freedom's central precondition freedom was enshrined not on the far side of the sea but at sinai the mountain of the law we cannot live in this city nor can any american city town or hamlet long endure when lawlessness violence destruction and mayhem prevail the rule of law is the thin veneer that protects us from chaos anarchy and destruction in 21st century america as in 20th century america any movement for social justice must be non-violent if it is to succeed and we should all internalize this it's the central principle of american democracy because many millions of us might soon have to go out onto the streets in peaceful but insistent demand to uphold the results of the november election when we say black lives matter we do not mean that we agree with a few who seek to demolish who yearn to dismantle the economic and political infrastructure of america who have lost faith in america's ability to live up to its highest ideals to the country we mean that we are on the side of those who seek and are prepared to work for a more perfect union we mean that it has not been decreed in the heavens that america should be forever divided by race the fault dear brutus lies not in our stars but in ourselves those of us who are white do not really know what it is like to be black in america it is in the nature of human life we internalize that which is internal to us open your heart so many black americans worry every time they leave their home when their teenage and 20-something children are out on the town when they walk into bodegas or stores when they jog in the neighborhood imagine if you live that way how would you feel the beginning of morality is the ability to put yourself in another person's shoes this is what we mean when we say black lives matter listen to our fellow americans and try to understand their experience with law enforcement is not our experience even something as innocent as bird watching in central park can be fraught with racial tension and potentially life-altering if not life-threatening consequences doesn't mean that we should defund the police i don't even know what that means you shall appoint judges and officers of justice the torah commands there is no rule of law without law enforcement but even the law enforcement community agrees that there is substantial reform that can should and must be implemented in police departments open your eyes to the disproportionate deaths from covet 19 in communities of color give heat to the poverty underemployment and unemployment unequal access to health care housing educational and economic opportunity the black community cannot re resolve these injustices by itself nor should it these are not simply black problems they are american problems a prisoner cannot release himself from prince prison the sages teach others must turn the key and unlock the door who knows this better than the jews we have been abandoned so many times along the way so often we yearn to be heard to be helped to be saved for someone to unlock the door of our prison take sides judaism commands us to take sides stand on the right side of history stand on the side of freedom fairness and dignity stand on the side of liberty and justice for all ukraine freedom on the day of atonement you shall proclaim liberty throughout the land for all its inhabitants jews cannot be silent nor can our synagogue for two reasons first because judaism insists on liberty dignity generosity charity empathy for all of god's creatures wash yourselves make yourselves clean put away your evil doings learn to do well seek justice relieve the oppressed plead for the disadvantaged judaism is an activist involved religion pursue justice relieve oppression plead for the poor there is no such thing in judaism as abstract theology disconnected from the real lives of real people we do not speak exclusively of god in heaven we bring heaven to earth through social repair the second reason we cannot be sound is jews also have an interest a self-interest in the well-being of others jewish history establishes conclusively that wherever and whenever insecurity is widespread when there is economic distress social unrest or political turmoil jews suffer disproportionately we cannot be free unless everyone is free we cannot be content while discontent pervades and thus since politics is how free societies determine policies we cannot avoid the political process we would lose integrity we would be unable to look ourselves in the eye what kind of religion could maintain credibility lamenting the sufferings of the persecuted but not care about the policies that lead to suffering or the measures that can alleviate suffering what kind of religion offers beds to the homeless but is unconcerned about the policies that cause or exacerbate homelessness the jewish people has an historic alliance with the african-american community born of our common experience of suffering and empowered by our shared hopes of deliverance when we say black lives matter we mean that we find in each other common cause common decency common humanity when we say black lives matter we mean that we have each other's backs we do not mean that we supported the noxious anti-israel position of the movement for black lives platform published four years ago characterizing israel as genocidal that actually felt to us like a stab in the back nor do we think that most people most african-americans most of the protesters on the streets were even aware of that document let alone supported its anti-israel provisions and in these very weeks a summary of that document was redrafted excluding the repellent anti-israel claims dialogue works learning about each other works opening your heart works sharing your pain with good and fair-minded people works the elimination of the anti-israel statements was not coincidental we are on the same side the side of justice righteousness humanity still it is important to point out that we liberals are often not vocal enough about anti-semitism and israel bashing within the american left our critics are right when they question our uncharacteristic reserve defending jews from the excesses of the political left while we are so loud and indignant defending everyone else from the excesses of the political right in pursuance of the morally correct and politically important objective to join a broad alliance of social justice reformers we cannot disregard vile contemptible attitudes towards jews the very bigotry we decry when directed towards others we cannot give the impression that liberal american jews are willing to overlook let alone forego our intense commitment to israel and our unwavering loyalty to the jewish people liberal jews can do both our choices are not binary we can join the struggle for racial justice we must join that struggle while distancing from those who peddle hatred of jews as we have seen in these very weeks through the modification of the movement for black lives platform we will persuade most and those who are unpersuaded will eventually be discredited what are we afraid of why the reticence why the reticence to condemn left-wing hatred of jews israel bashing in the american left it's not we who will be cast out outside the tent it is they the intolerant who will be marginalized i'll give you an example from our own community to the best of my knowledge we were the only synagogue in our area to announce publicly that we were discontinuing our participation in the women's march once its leaders began exploiting their platform to bash israel and voice support for louis farrakhan it was controversial at the time we were the only synagogue but subsequent events vindicated us the original women's march organization collapsed on its own it could not sustain the internal contradiction of promoting social justice for all while preaching and tolerating injustice against jews it's gone since we've seen more times of left-wing anti-semitism since we don't have enough voices in the liberal jewish community that condemns full-throatedly anti-semitism from the left it's important for the jewish world and our allies in the civil rights and social justice movements to understand clearly what american liberal jews believe and i think i speak for the majority of us we do not stand with those who seek to cancel israel who skirt with hate it is unbecoming unproductive and unjust injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere you cannot stand for social justice and tolerate injustice in your own reigns during the summer kareem abdul-jabbar wrote a brutally honest op-ed about anti-semitism within some quarters of the social justice movement he lamented what he called the shocking lack of indignation at anti-semitic attitudes of some sports and entertainment celebrities he pointed to the creepy tweets symbols and images of jews that are responsible for the oppression of blacks that jews control the bangs he called out black leaders who not only refused to condemn but actively support louis farrakhan who he termed a notorious homophobe an anti-semite abdul jabbar wrote it's impossible to take you seriously with regards to social justice or anything when you post anti-semitic imagery it's so disheartening he wrote to see people that have been violently marginalized do the same thing to others without realizing that perpetuating this kind of bad logic is what perpetuates racism this is what real courage looks like this is what real leadership looks like the ability to see moral principle clearly and the willingness to contend with those in your own ranks who distort the very principles that propel a righteous cause judaism recognizes that it is a constant struggle to remain morally vital we ossify over time we become glued to our ways and petrified of change judaism teaches that the highest obstacles to justice is not in our stars but in ourselves we refuse to accept personal responsibility for the wrongs of the world for the sins that we have committed against you by casting off responsibility we become arrogant our tendency is to treat the disadvantaged as if their natural vocation was poverty or misery for the sins that we have committed against you by haughtiness we become self-centered and self-absorbed for the sins that we have committed against you by selfishness we stand aside while our neighbor believes tolerating or even contributing to oppression for the sins that we have committed against you by oppressing fellow human beings we develop moral heart disease for the sin that we have committed against you by a confused heart for the sins that we have committed against you by hardening our hearts but judaism insists that we can overcome foreign the day will come that i will give them one heart i will put a new spirit in you i will remove your petrified heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh many of us are alive today because of the kindness and empathy of others people who opened the doors of our prison and offered us warm embrace we may not even have been born were not for the sense of justice the righteous indignation of someone who did the right thing often at great personal risk for no reason other than it was right i learned this year that i would not be alive were it not for the generous heart and immense spirit of a woman i never knew several months before my mother died she instructed my siblings who were traveling to israel to clean out my parents jerusalem apartment not to forget to bring back a certain box she described precisely where it was she was already beginning to fade but she remembered exactly where that box was and she insisted several times don't forget to bring back the box she wanted that box in her possession when her time came after she died we opened the box as she knew we would it overflowed with 700 yellow yellowed pages of her memoirs the hidden details of her past finally documented for her four children to read my mother never elaborated on her childhood because as she wrote she did not want to traumatize her children parts of her life were so painful that she felt that if we were to learn of these when we were young it would damage us permanently when i learned of the contents of the box memories from four decades ago flooded back to me i would return from high school or army service and i would see her in the kitchen table writing on their yellow pads i hadn't given it much thought then and none at all in the 40 years since my mother described her russian upbringing before during and after world war ii she her three siblings and her parents lived in an industrial city that few outside of russia ever heard of in the ural mountains her family was so poor that the six of them lived in a one-room barrack on the outskirts of town she described the poverty the deprivation the numbing cold of russian winters the gnawing hunger that never dissipated she described how during the war people died of starvation on the streets she described the terror of the stalin years how paranoia and brutality crossed the lives of so many of our neighbors we never knew our grandfather we finally learned the details in my mother's memory like so many millions of others stalin's henchmen grabbed him one day and he disappeared decades later after the fall of the soviet union the archives of that period were opened and there our family read in the sterile language of nkvd bureaucracy there was the proof he was executed not far from his home three weeks after he was nabbed leaving my grandmother alone to keep alive her four little children in the middle of a world war during a period of mass starvation in reading of my mother's memoirs i learned of olga gardevskaya olga's husband was also murdered by stalin olga not jewish and not related in any way to my mother's family took pity on my grandmother and her four children she would bring them food from the cafeteria where she worked food was so scarce that sometimes she would steal like a russian jean valjean she broke the law to bring my mother and her siblings a loaf of bread she would cash in our own food rations and give them to our family my mother writes in those days i was too young to think about it i took it for granted but today i often think what a remarkable woman this was she risked her well-being and her livelihood she lost her job because of us when she was caught stealing she risked her freedom her life to make sure we did not perish why now my mother writes as i think about these matters it pains me greatly i would like to cry out to tell olga that we never forgot her i am so sad that we never adequately showed what we felt for her i hope that olga is still alive my mother writes in the 1970s a woman like this deserves to live forever if she is still alive i know that she too thinks of us often oh that our thoughts could meet and could embrace somewhere she and she alone more than any other my mother writes at great and terrible risk is the reason we are here to tell the tale several times when we were literally on the threshold of death she single-handedly pulled us through mother writes every time i think of olga tears come to my eyes a human being so unique that i am frustrated at not being able to put it into words i lament my limitations i would like to write a poem a masterpiece to preserve her memory for all generations to describe her to honor her to express the overwhelming feeling of gratitude that we feel for this human being olga my mother pens her name and explanate exclamation point if i could write if i could write i would write an entire book for her my mother documents i would sing praises i would compose symphonies i would build statues i would do all this and more if i only had the ability instructing us for four children from the world to come while we were still teenagers my mother writes if any of you four kids one day should be blessed in any kind of creative art like music composition painting or writing do your mother a favor give prominence to this most unusual woman i will give you the alphabet you put together what's in my heart not only because she saved us that too but because the world is not yet all that bad as long as there are people like olga i'm granting my mother her posthumous wish but not only that i'm honoring a personal debt that cannot be repaid oga guardian savior of our family i didn't know olga nor had i even heard of her until this year but she saved my mother and thus she saved me she saved all the future generations of our family the world is not yet all that bad as long as there are people like olga in it in this our most sacred season never forget the fundamental truth of judaism humanity is our common lot we are all made of the same clay we were born of the same void inhabit the same flesh and dissolve into the same dust do not harden we are levichat one heart one flesh we owe our lives to those who lived faithfully and now sleep in the dust many of them are unknown to us they rest in unvisited tombs but the growing good of the world depends on these people bit by bit generation by generation they blast the rock of injustice from the cold seat of petrified man and lift the stones of indifference from our calcified hearts tss what is the right path to which a person should cleave rabbi elazar responded levtov a good heart a good heart presupposes and preconditions all other righteous qualities judaism gives us the alphabet it is for each of us to put together the words in our heart amen so so we turn to page 223 for the aveeno malcano followed by the torah service and we rise oh oh here i foreign my oh is oh my oh the torah reading for today is the akedah the story of the binding of isaac and can be found on page 240. our first torah blessing will be recited by randy king phillips and carl phillips foreign foreign foreign foreign my horror blessing will be recited by alyssa and adam shapiro amen foreign foreign the ah um m oh our final torah blessing will be recited by stuart shakir who at adonai my a foreign please rise as we raise and dress the torah and turn to age 242. my my our haftarah this morning is from first samuel chapter 2 verses 1 through 10 and this can be found at the bottom of page 252. our after our blessings will be recited by danny moss and jill rachmael adonai eloheinu melech go is oh foreign this is great you know as i said last night i hope this is the first and last high holy day celebrated like this but you can see we made an effort to try and uh bring in nonetheless members of our uh community and uh jill it's almost like you were here i know she's uh she's online all of you and the singing and for those of you are experiencing our services for the first time it's still terrific but come back next year or at most two years from now when we're all back together again in a conventional way like we've been doing it for thousands of years in judaism speaking of uh you know all kinds of creative efforts so we were agonizing all summer about the shofar because uh you notice we don't have wind uh instruments unfortunately our beautiful flautist can't be with us uh because we're concerned about the aerosols as you know um and so essentially by mid-summer we had uh concluded that the so far blowing is going to be all on film all pre-recorded because that's what people were telling us about wind instruments and so on and we didn't want to risk anything even though the risk was small to blow the shofar for a brief period of time and then towards the end of the summer you won't believe it but of all people israeli epidemiologists started to talk about the shofar i don't know why serbian epidemiologists didn't or you know french epidemiologists or british scientists but the israelis they cared about this so far what happens on the shofar in rosh hashanah because you don't fulfill the command of rosh hashanah you do not fulfill the obligations unless you hear the sounds so far so it's a big deal and israeli epidemiologists recommended put a mask on it so that seemed to us a really elegant uh solution and in any case cantor singer is going to blow his shofar behind the plexiglas screen i am going to blow my so far into the ark so the torah and god will receive any aerosols that happen to come out of this mask not you uh and and we still have our sofa blowing team who i think might be coordinated in some way with us no you can't you can't blow so far i'm talking about the shofar blowing team on the screen yeah you participated on screen yeah you're on the screen yeah but i i hope it uh works well uh if not you'll forgive us it's all for your own safety service which you will find on an insert at the back of your prayer book and we rise foreign tequila tequila mmm to kia tequila oh foreign tequila um tequila tequila is foreign foreign ah tequila tequila so right foreign my we return the torah to the ark on page 276 after which we go straight into ellen is foreign god foreign m me oh our thoughts now turn to those who have departed from this earth as we remember them we meditate on the meaning of love and loss of life and death we extend our sympathies to those who have lost loved ones in recent weeks marilyn beltzer ruth miriam divac diana bauer shikiar tamara engel david a englander melvin kitz's susan custler barbara weisenfeld and remember the following yard sights of the years past susan bayless joseph barrett's elise block sam blum katie davidson lillian deutsch irving dick gertrude eisenstein berta escalante sarah fader hershkowitz irving again saul goldstein elihu goddessman ella p green max may greenspan max h horowitz aviva kelton elsa klein joel lander fred oppenheimer billy joe perlman abraham rappaport sylvia rosenberg claudia schoenfeld marty scalar fern spandorffer cone irving sturm elliot hopkins joel verbit emile weiss louis m weintraub samuel welt helen yellen and if there are people for whom you are saying kaddish and you'd like to share their names out loud or in your hearts please do so now we turn to page 292 for the mourners kaddish and we rise as we are able as one community may the source of peace bestow peace upon all who are mourn and may we be a source of comfort to all who are bereaved and let us say amen is is please be seated just a few announcements before we conclude well this was fun for me i uh really appreciate uh that you came i also appreciate all of those the majority of our congregation that um did not come many many many of whom are online and along with many thousands of other people from all over the world some of whom regularly uh check us out and join us online and some of whom join us this year i say to all of you who are home avoid the synagogue if for any reason you're not comfortable to come to the synagogue uh and for those of you who are here and are scheduled to come here continue to do what you're doing which is to wear masks and social distance and we'll be fine when we finish the service in a couple of minutes if you can walk out of the sanctuary from the back to the front so we can just do this in an orderly way and don't congregate outside either just make sure you're socially distancing uh outside for today tashleth will be virtual uh we went and we pre-recorded that it'll be broadcast at three o'clock if you want to participate in that it's much shorter than what it normally is because because hundreds of people usually take longer to get there and to do the service we'll get back we'll get back to that hopefully next year if not two years from now but for those of you here and online if you want to participate in the tasha service it's at three o'clock this afternoon tomorrow we will be here for the second day rosh hashanah at 10 o'clock in the morning anybody who wants to come in must pre-register and then also sign out that health certification uh that allows us to know that you're uh haven't been anywhere that new york state uh requires you to quarantine and that you have no symptoms of cover 19 and if something arises it'll allow us for a rapid contact tracing so everybody needs to pre-register and fill out that form it's also on paper here but the easiest way to do it is through the little app that we created for yom kippur just pointing out again we'll have we're maxed out on yom kippur for those of you who have pre-registered and are listening to me whether here or online if you pre-register just because you're not sure if i can ask you to make a decision because you are taking the space of somebody else let us know if you pre-registered and you decide not to come for those of you who have not pre-registered we have maxed out but we urge you to register nonetheless put yourself on a mailing list and as seats open up we'll contact you and perhaps will have additional space uh yom kippur morning is 10 o'clock the same routine for that there'll be adult study sessions throughout the day i'll tell you more about that on cole nidre the yisker as i said yesterday the one difference from what we normally do is just starts a little later next week it'll start at three o'clock three o'clock three pm and i mentioned yesterday i want to reiterate again we have many people who come just for yisker and then uh leave we'd like to have you rethink that for this year because once you come and you sit in a seat that seat can't be used for the rest of the afternoon so um we urge you to come if you are prepared to stay for the entire afternoon service which begins at three we'll get to the afternoon service at about 3 30 or so and that'll take us through to naila and i expect that we will do the final shofar blast and the havdalah and be finished about a quarter to seven or seven o'clock but it's a it's a run through it's a straight through so if you don't plan on being here for the entire afternoon call the office and uh ask for uh advice everything is online and everything is online in special high definition camera so and rabbi gluck is online as well helping to create an online community of our worshipers and the big broader world so if for one reason or another being here is not for you then join us online and finally i want to ask you to take care of yourselves don't enter the synagogue if you're not feeling well for yourself but also for everybody else if you are experiencing any of the symptoms of covet 19 stay at home and preserve your own health and the health of everybody else i want to wish you and all those uh who are online with us with us a good good and healthy year with uh many blessings cantor singer we conclude with the andrew lippa special uh hayong tom cenu as sung by peter yawitz uh it's a bit of gospel so you can all stand up and uh clap along with us so please join us in in clapping along with some old school gospel jewish gospel stuff i oh i oh hey hi shabbat shalom in china so you

Channel: Stephen Wise Free Synagogue

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Length: 171min 9sec (10269 seconds)

Published: Sat Sep 19 2020