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  1. Eleh Ezakara - Sacrifice and Martyrdom

    Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, is never an easy day. Fasting, however, is not the real problem. Rather, the day's challenge comes from its demand that we confront deep spiritual, theological, and philosophical issues we would often wish to avoid. We are asked to consider, for example: the tension between sin and forgiveness, the relationship between suffering and redemption, and the emergence of hope out of tragedy. The prayers and readings of Yom Kippur demand that we meditate on these themes as personal challenges, but present them to us in grand images on a mythic scale.

    https://archive.reconstructingjudaism.org/dvar-torah/eleh-ezakara-sacrifice-and-martyrdom

    Posted on: 2016/05/06 - 10:10am

  2. Our Akeidah, Our Binding

    There is a thread running through all the Rosh haShanah portions, except one: that thread is fathers and children, mothers and children.

    The Akedah is the sole exception.

    Where are the mothers today? 

    This is an impressionistic reading of the Akedah.

    It does not explain the text.

    This is not the comfortable reading that, in praising our ancestor Abraham, gains credit for ourselves.

    This is not the reading that shows we are a people who have long put aside idolatry and child sacrifice.

    I have no comfort today, only questions.

    https://archive.reconstructingjudaism.org/dvar-torah/our-akeidah-our-binding

    Posted on: 2016/05/06 - 10:13am

  3. Sukkot: Yom Kippur's Counterbalance

  4. The Modern Meaning of Tisha b'Av

    The Jewish Memorial Day, The Fast of the Ninth of the Jewish month of Av, Tisha b'Av, marks the end of a three week period of mourning during which our people remember the series of events that led to the Babylonian conquest of Jerusalem and the destruction of our people's first Temple on that date in the year 586 BCE.

    https://archive.reconstructingjudaism.org/dvar-torah/modern-meaning-tisha-bav

    Posted on: 2016/05/06 - 10:25am

  5. Future Prayer

    Isaiah 57:14-58:14

    Are these the words for the future prayer not yet in our mahzor, the one all the generations after us will recite?

    We heard the prophet say: “Prepare, prepare the road - clear away the stumbling blocks.” But instead, we have built walls across the roads to keep out those we fear.

    https://archive.reconstructingjudaism.org/dvar-torah/future-prayer

    Posted on: 2016/05/06 - 10:36am

  6. Filling the Earth with God's Presence

    Haftarah Yitro from last week includes words so important they were made part of the service: “Holy, holy, holy! All the earth is filled with the presence of the Lord of Hosts.”

    Or it could be, if we made room for that presence.

    Making room for God is a task set for us by all of Jewish teaching, and it is one whose details are included in Parashat Mishpatim.

    https://archive.reconstructingjudaism.org/dvar-torah/filling-earth-gods-presence

    Posted on: 2016/05/06 - 10:45am

  7. Role of Obligation in Jewish Education (Discussion)

    Discussion from November - December, 2001


     

    Sarah Rubin - Monday November 26, 2001:

    EdTalk Chevre,

    https://archive.reconstructingjudaism.org/article/role-obligation-jewish-education-discussion

    Posted on: 2016/05/06 - 10:49am

  8. Reconstructing Halakha

    Many Reconstructionists and other liberal Jews seem afraid of the term halakha, reacting as if it invokes some dark presence coming out of the past to crush them with its oppressive weight. They would be surprised to learn that Mordecai Kaplan wrote that “Jewish life [is] meaningless without Jewish law.” He made this statement not as the young rabbi of an Orthodox congregation, but relatively late in his career, in one of his most thorough and systematic examinations of Jewish life in America, The Future of the American Jew (1948).

    https://archive.reconstructingjudaism.org/article/reconstructing-halakha

    Posted on: 2016/05/06 - 11:01am

  9. Can a Reconstructionist Sin?

    Some years ago, at an informal lunch shared by a number of us who worked for the same Jewish agency, a staffer indicated she had no need to attend Yom Kippur services. Predictably provoked, we asked why. Yom Kippur was all about sin, she replied, and since she never sinned, she had nothing for which to atone.

    https://archive.reconstructingjudaism.org/article/can-reconstructionist-sin

    Posted on: 2016/05/06 - 11:06am

  10. Reconstructionist Judaism: A Crash Course

    If you advertise yourself as a Reconstructionist rabbi, people will inevitably corner you with “the” question: “Can you tell me—in a few words—what Reconstructionist Judaism is all about?”

    https://archive.reconstructingjudaism.org/article/reconstructionist-judaism-crash-course

    Posted on: 2016/05/30 - 2:21pm

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