Painting Poems

We got snowed out of New York. So we did an art project! Below, we paint interpretations of our favorite poems. View the paintings with their full text. (We also painted mugs.)

By Leah and Daniel. <3

The Great Road Trip

This is what happens when you get snowed out of New York.

The Best of 2010

2010 was a good year for allergins. While cat dander fell 3%, dust mites and timothy grass rose 5% and 8% respectively, making for a boom year here at The Great Schnoz. Below, some of our favorite sneezes.


How to Carefully Write a Set of Haikus

Challah, the Dog Who Loved Challah

The Dalai Lama's Summit on Happiness

A Visit to Ioannina

Rivals--A Rosh Hashanah Sermon

The Shabbat Experiment

National Thank Your Counselor Day

Solidarity March for Gilad Shalit

How to Carefully Write a Set of Haikus

A set of haikus
On how to carefully write
A set of haikus.


1) Count on your hand.
2) Double check every line.
3) Be scrupulous.


This balanced budget
Can never be overspent,
Never overdrawn.


Starved for syllables
As if there were a famine.
Please use sparingly.


Gently arranging
Anapests next to iambs
Like playing Jenga.


Writer and reader
Share responsibility
For checking each line,


As if the writer
Would try to sneak some extra
Under the table.


I’m not that greedy.
I like having boundaries,
Some rules to play by.


You know the best way
To give a cow his freedom?
Fence in his pasture.

The Power of Conversation

We've been thinking at Hillel about the power of conversation. So many of the most meaningful experiences in my life have been real conversations with people who matter to me. Talks on long car rides, on swings, over breakfast. These are transformative moments. At Hillel, we're trying to capture these meaningful moments by practicing the art of conversation.

Last summer, I took a student named Adam on Birthright. We were sitting late at night in hotel hallway. He was telling me how he wishes he could stay in college for more than four years, that four years isn't enough to learn everything he wants to learn, to explore everything he wants to explore. "Sometimes I wonder why I'm a business major," he said. "At the end of the day, strategic management will help me run a business, but it doesn't really excite me."

He asked me what I studied in college--English and Jewish studies--and if I enjoyed it. I did. He asked me what my favorite class was. I really loved this class on the poetry of Emily Dickinson. For a whole semester, we poured over her 1700 poems, reading closely, probing deeply. I loved that a single poem could hold at the same time contradictory meanings, that neither meaning was less real or less true.

I asked what his favorite class was. "My freshman seminar--the Arab-Israeli Conflict. I'm a news junkie, so I loved learning about a subject that's still unfolding in the world. Something that isn't just in a text book and isn't just theory, but is actually happening in real people's lives."

He was looking for meaning.

Gilad March Nominated for Fain Award

This summer, URJ Camp Coleman staged a solidarity march for Gilad Shalit, the captured Israeli soldier. Now, the march has been nominated for the 2010 Irving J. Fain Award. The award, given by the Commision on Social Action of Reform Judaism, seeks to recognize outstanding and innovative social action work carried out by Reform congregations and summer camps.

During his four years in captivity, Gilad Shalit has been kept in total isolation and has been denied visits from humanitarian aid groups like the Red Cross. This is in direct violation of the Geneva Convention and is a violation of his human rights. Please sign this petition demanding that Gilad be released now, and that until he is released, that Hamas abide by the rules of the Geneva Convention.

Below, see photos from the Coleman march.

Challah, the Dog Who Loved Challah

A children's story. For Leah.


Challah, the Dog Who Loved Challah by Daniel Reiser is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.

Revisiting Parshat Vayeshev--Family Matters

This week's parshah is Vayeshev. Several months ago, I posted this drash on the parshah. This week, I revisit my thoughts.
Parshat Vayeshev shows that family matters aren’t for the weak of spirit. The episode between Judah and Tamar at once affirms the value of family and highlights the struggles therein.

I imagine that the readers of this essay are familiar with the story, so I’ll only give a brief synopsis here. Judah promises Tamar that one of his sons will give her a child, but he reneges on the offer. Some time later, Judah sleeps with a prostitute, who turns out to be Tamar in disguise. Nine months later, Tamar gives birth to twins.

This story paints a pretty poor picture of Judah. Recall that it was Judah who convinced his brothers to sell Joseph into slavery, and Judah who is ultimately responsible for deceiving their father, Jacob. This story begins “About that time, Judah left his brothers.” Midrash relates that Judah was in fact running away from home to avoid his shame. When he slept with Tamar, Judah’s wife had just died. He doesn’t even finish his period of mourning, he waits only until “he is comforted.” He condemns Tamar for prostitution, when in fact he solicited it. And in the end, he never outwardly admits that he slept with Tamar. He only admits that he shouldn’t have withheld from her his youngest son. Judah is kind of a jerk.

The Tamar episode cleverly interrupts the Joseph narrative, sort of like an interlude. It shows that Judah’s betrayal of Joseph did not go unpunished. As Judah deceived his father Jacob, so does Tamar deceive Judah. This biblical parallelism fits with the ancient Rabbis’ notion of kav l’kav—that a person’s fate is doled out measure for measure according to their deeds (Visotzky 127). Upon realizing he slept with Tamar, Judah is made to “examine/hakerna” his clothes and “recognize/vayaker” them as his own. The same words are used when Judah shows his father Joseph’s bloodied coat (Plaut 253). Both men fall victim to an article of clothing. And whereas Jacob is made to believe something that is false (that Joseph has died), Judah is made to recognize something that is true (that he has impregnated Tamar). For deceiving his father, Judah inherits a fitting destiny.

And isn’t life often like this? A teenager breaks his parents’ curfew, only to find years later that his own son has similar habits. We accuse our lover of being unfaithful when in fact we harbor lustful feelings. We condemn our colleagues for missing a deadline, only to find that we ourselves have dropped the ball. We blame our friends for screwing up their lives, only to find that we introduced them to the bad habit. The traits we most detest in others are often things we allow or don’t recognize in ourselves.

Tamar, in contrast to Judah, is a clever, strong woman, who plays by her own rules at a man’s game. In Who Wrote the Bible, Richard Friedman argues that Tamar’s wit forces us not to rule out the possibility that the biblical author “J” could have been a woman (86). Tamar plays every card right. She disguises herself from Judah, makes him give her collateral, and then disappears. When the time is right, she exposes Judah in the cleverest way. You can imagine the shock on Judah’s face when she presents his clothing. Tamar reminds us that sometimes it takes the persistence of a friend to show us we have made a mistake.

The story ends with Tamar’s twins fighting over who will emerge first from the womb. Clearly, this is a symbol of family struggle. The story reads like a soap opera, but it sounds like real life. The characters are human, scarred, proud. And despite their drama, from Tamar and Judah will descend King David and the eventual messiah. After all, Judah does redeem himself to Joseph—it is Judah who, in the most earnest way, pleads with Joseph to have mercy on Benjamin. Though our friends and family may hurt us, though we may not recognize our own faults, it is incumbent upon us accept one another. If we take an honest look at ourselves, if we help each other grow, maybe we can learn to forgive. This is the flux between hate and love, the pushing away and the holding tight that binds a family together.

Meet the Faces of Israel

Cross-posted on the Hillel at Emory Blog

Last night, Hillel at Emory partnered with Emory Students for Israel (ESI) to present the Atlanta premier of the critically acclaimed documentary Faces of Israel. The film explores what it means to have a Jewish state. Do the two characterizations — democratic state and Jewish state — work well together? What happens when they don’t?

The event, which drew an audience of about 100 students, faculty, and community members, was organized by Charlie Punia (B‘12). During the screening, the film’s director, Amy Beth Oppenheimer, led an interactive discussion on what it means to have a Jewish state. Audience members had the chance to respond to key issues in the film, share their own opinions, and ask questions to make for a provocative discussion.

“Amy's presentation was extremely informative and relatable. There is a continuous back-and-forth between Israel's progressive society and religious traditions that makes the place so dynamic and thought-provoking.” –Gail Axelrod (B‘11), Co-president, Emory Students for Israel

Faces of Israel is Amy’s first documentary film. While Amy’s passion for film is new, her love of Israel dates back to her first trip there as a young child. Growing up, Amy experienced two distinct types of Israel programming: one that focused on political advocacy, dialogue groups and the conflict, and another that offered falafel and Israeli music on Israel Independence Day. Amy felt that both types of programming had their place, but there wasn’t a lot of meaningful content offered in between. One of her motivations in creating Faces of Israel was to create an internal discussion piece for the community to explore the nature of the Jewish state and questions of Jewish identity in a real and thoughtful way.

“I thought this was a unique event. To hear a lecture about Israel is one thing. To show a film is another. But to have the director come, to share her insights, to lead an interactive conversation really deepened my understanding of the film.” –Charlie Punia (B‘12)

Amy screened three chapters of the film. In each chapter, the film shows her interviews with Israelis from across the political, religious, and social spectra — from ultra-orthodox couples to an openly gay student at the University of Haifa, from new olim to Sabra nationalists, and from the rabbi of Progressive congregation Kol HaNeshama to Israel’s Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi. The interviews raise questions like: How, if at all, should Jewish tradition influence Israeli law? Should the Chief Rabbinate represent the views of all denominations for Judaism? Should civil unions and same-sex unions be legalized in Israel?

“These are important questions that often get over-shadowed by the conflict. I think the audience got a more in depth look at Israeli society and learned a lot from the film.” –Sarah Green (C ’11), Co-president, Emory Students for Israel

This event was made possible in part by Masa-Israel Journey, The David Project, and Emory College Council.

What Hillels Can Learn from Hillel

Last night, I went to the MJCCA Book Festival, where Joseph Telushkin was discussing his new book Hillel: If Not Now, When? The book is a fascinating examination of the teachings of the ancient sage Hillel.

Telushkin argues that although Hillel is among the most famous rabbinic personalities, rarely do we actually live-up to his philosophies. There’s a well-known and oft-quoted story where a gentile asks Hillel to convert him, but on condition that Hillel teach him the whole of Torah while the gentile is standing on one foot. Hillel famously replies: “That which is hateful unto you, do not do unto your neighbor. The rest is just commentary. Now go and study.” From this response, we can conclude that for Hillel, the essence of Judaism is ethical behavior. Telushkin points out, however, that when we think of Jewish religiosity, we primarily think of ritual, not ethical, observance. We’re likely to say:

“‘He keeps kosher, he keeps Shabbat; yes, he is religious,’ or ‘She doesn’t keep kosher, she doesn’t keep Shabbat; no, she’s not religious.’ It is virtually inconceivable that you would overhear the following conversation:

‘Is so-and-so religious?’ 

‘Oh, definitely.’

‘How do you know?’

‘Because he’s very careful never to embarrass anyone, particularly in public. And he always judges other people fairly.’”

Clearly, we’ve lost sight of Hillel’s ethical essence of Judaism. Hillel, the foundation for Jewish campus life, can learn from the ancient sage’s wisdom. We should be careful not just to nourish our students’ religious and cultural growth, but also their social and ethical growth. This could take the form of emotional intelligence workshops, values clarification exercises, or sexual assault prevention seminars. I could also imagine conversations on Jewish perspectives on contemporary ethical questions--gay rights, end-of-life issues, abortion, and others.

For more on how the organization Hillel got its name, visit the Hillel at Emory blog.

Wrestling with Israel

The following is in response to a short essay question on the application to HUC's rabbinical program.
As a living, evolving movement, Reform Judaism has the potential—perhaps more so than other movements—to affect how Jews think about Israel. The state of Israel represents a pinnacle moment in Jewish history. The reality of Israel represents a shift in the Jewish national psyche—from scars and victimization to self-determination and national sovereignty. For the first time since antiquity, there is a Jewish country! We sometimes don’t even fully appreciate the gravity of this statement! It’s the displaced family back under their own roof. It’s the shards of vessels reassembled. It represents an opportunity to live-out the Jewish ideal—where we seek justice, where we sanctify time, where we nurture our relationships, where we value intellect, learning, and creativity.

Many Diaspora Jews have lost sight of this ideal. As the largest and most liberal American movement, Reform Judaism is poised to change how Israel and the Diaspora interact. From conversations with students, young Jewish friends, colleagues in Hillel, campers and staff at Reform Jewish camps, and with my own family, I’ve seen the conflicted feelings American Jews have about Israel. My mom, when she thinks about Israel, feels heartache. During the second Lebanon war, she told me how sad she was that so many people—Israeli and Lebanese—had to die so senselessly. My coworker at Hillel thinks of herself as pro-Israel, but then immediately cites the Arab-Israeli she knows who sends his children to Israeli schools because the Arabic-speaking schools are so underfunded.

Jewish leaders need to learn to understand the ambivalence of American Jews not as a threat but as an opportunity. Learning about and wrestling with Israel is a strong Jewish identity-building tool. Israel, by its very existence, offers the opportunity to engage in conversations that are important to Jews no matter where they live. Questions like: Who decides who is and who isn’t a Jew? What does it mean to be patriotic? Am I first a Jew, first an American, or first a citizen of the world? What level of religious practice will I adopt for my family? How do the stories of my parents and my grandparents affect who I am today?

If Jewish leaders want to make Israel relevant, they must find ways to bring precisely these questions to the forefront of Israel education. Rabbis, educators, and communal professionals must not try to rationalize or distract from the issues their constituents feel about Israel. Rather, they must embrace those issues and use them as opportunities for self-exploration. If Arabic-speaking schools are underfunded, let’s use this issue as a launch pad for serious discussion on the Jewish ethic of education. Let’s use our curiosity to explore disparities within our own school districts. Let’s support organizations that promote universal education, like Urban Arts and Books for Africa. Let’s work to make education in Israeli schools more equal across the board, not just between Israelis and Arabs, but across the social classes.

The Reform rabbi—as teacher, as model—must recognize the value of questioning. We must not ignore the challenges Israel presents, but rather embrace them as opportunities to better our world. Like our forefather Jacob, for whom our people are named, we must give ourselves a little room to wrestle.

The Dalai Lama's Summit on Happiness

Today I attended His Holiness the XIV Dalai Lama’s Interfaith Summit on Happiness. The Dalai Lama took the stage with Rabbi Jonathan Sacks, Chief Rabbi of the UK; the Most Reverend Dr. Katharine Jefferts Schori, Bishop of the Episcopal Church; and professor Seyyed Hossein Nasr, international scholar of Islamic studies.  The religious leaders discussed happiness, in a conversation facilitated by Krista Teppett, host and producer of the public radio program “Being.”

While I felt most cognitively stimulated by rabbi Sacks and professor Nasr, I most enjoyed watching the Dalai Lama and experiencing what he was experiencing. The Dalai Lama, it turns out, is a very creative listener.

The Dalai Lama is just too adorable to watch—like a teddy bear. He can charm a whole arena. When he came out on stage, he bowed to the audience. Some bowed back. He stared at us. We stared at him. He stared right back at us. We stared right back at him. Until finally he threw his hands up and said “Okay!” Then we all laughed and sat. He’s a little comedian. He has this Fred Flintstone laugh, this deep, happy chuckle. He often cracks himself up! Late in the conversation, professor Nasr provided the literal meaning of the word jihad—a cleansing of inner negativities. His Holiness then punned that the whole goal of Buddhism is one giant jihad, to much laughter and applause. And when his colleagues told impressive stories or flashed their wit, His Holiness took a good chuckle. As professor Nasr noted, His Holiness exudes happiness.

Chief Rabbi Sacks told a story that I particularly enjoyed: A rabbi was standing in the town square watching all of the people rushing here and there, and to and fro, and back and forth. Until finally he stopped one of them and asked, “Excuse me, what are you chasing after?” The stranger replied, “I’m chasing after life.” The rabbi replied, “Why are you so certain it’s ahead of you, that you must chase it? Maybe it’s behind you. Maybe you need to stop and let it catch up with you.” When we stop, we feel the happiness of Shabbat. “It’s the only day Daddy doesn’t have to run off somewhere else.”

And yet at the same time, biblical Hebrew has two distinct words for happiness—osher, the happiness we experience, and simcha, the happiness we create. Osher is the happiness we experience when hearing music, when witnessing nature, when reading stories. It is a personal happiness, a happiness that happens to us. Simcha, on the other hand, is the happiness we create when celebrating at a wedding, when singing together, when laughing as a family. It is a communal happiness, a happiness we build in the company of others.

So there are many types and flavors of happiness. As much as we need to stop and let happiness catch up with us, feel osher, we need to seek and create happiness among ourselves, make simcha. There’s the sweet, pure, natural happiness of Mozart, and there’s the wrought, tried, weathered happiness of Beethoven.

Rabbi Sacks emphasized the insightful words Jacob utters after wrestling with the angel. He says, “I will not let you go until you bless me.” Life is full of struggle, but our struggles can also give us blessing. We must insist upon it. We must roll with the difficult times, until we have found blessing in them, at which point we have to let them go. Jacob wrestles his angel, insists that the angel bless him, and comes out with the name Israel.

Professor Nasr discussed the relationship between beauty and goodness. A thing may have much outer beauty and no inner goodness, and eventually the outer beauty will fade. Think of a cracked and ancient urn. On the other hand, if a thing has inner goodness, it will retain its beauty over time. Think of a grandmother.  So beauty is related to goodness. In fact, in Arabic, the word used for beauty also has a number of other meanings, including goodness and virtue.

His Holiness described how there are two types of happiness—external happiness, which is often found in the material world, and internal happiness, which he describes as a deep state of profound understanding.

Professor Nasr echoed His Holiness, describing how often times our material possessions, which are supposed to bring us happiness, are sometimes the biggest obstacles to our happiness. A television is supposed to entertain us. But think of the stress we cause ourselves every time we rush home to catch our favorite show. With greater possession comes greater worry. We have these very words in our US Constitution—the pursuit of happiness. Maybe happiness is not something to be pursued, but the act of pursuing. Professor Nasr joked at how even for the audience to see a summit on happiness, they had to endure an hour-long line in the sun!

Reverend Jefferts Schori discussed the physical embodiment of happiness. How a runner can let go of all in his mind and feel only the joy in his body. The even peace in washing dishes.

Watch video from the Summit here:

A Visit to Ioannina

Last week, I traveled with my family to the town where my mom’s grandparents are from, Ioannina, Greece. Ioannina was once a center of Romaniote Jewish life. Today, the Jewish community is only 35 people.

My great-grandfather, Jessoula Cohen, was the
lay rabbi at the Romaniote synagogue Kehilla Kedosha
in New York. He performed Isaak Dostis's bar mitzvah.

Our tour guide in Ioannina was Isaak Dostis. Isaak grew up on the lower east side of Manhattan, near where my mom was born, in the center of Romaniote life in the States. Later in his life, he decided to move to Ioannina to pursue a quieter, more relaxed life-style. Isaak and his wife Diana were incredibly hospitable—when we arrived in Ioannina, they were waiting to greet us at our hotel. After only a few minutes of conversation, we discovered that my great grandfather Jessoula performed Isaak’s Bar Mitzvah.

Ioannina, to my surprise, is a very cute town. Home to University of Ioannina, the town has high-end shopping, lots of pedestrian culture, cute open air cafes lining the narrow streets, lake-front dining, a very nice walking/biking path around the walls of the old city, and is surrounded by impressive mountains. At the center of Lake Ioannina is a small island with little motorboats docked all along the shore. On the island are cute cafes and shops where you can drink beer and buy leather products and glass beads. My brother David reflected on how beautiful the whole scene was—“Our ancestors sure had good taste.”

On the night we arrived—Friday night, erev Shabbat—Isaak took us to the home of Samuel and Stella Koen, who grew up and have lived in Ioannina their whole lives. Stella is a Holocaust survivor, and Samuel fought the Nazis with the Partisans.

Looking through old photos in the home of Stella and Samuel Koen

Immediately upon entering their flat, I felt I was back in my grandpa’s apartment in South Florida. The furniture looked the same, the decorations looked the same, the dishware looked the same, the color on the walls looked the same. Samuel doesn’t speak much English, but his children live in Israel, so he and I were able to communicate in Hebrew. Stella, upon seeing my brother David, nearly burst in to tears—she said he looked exactly like her brother, who died in the Holocaust. At another point in the evening, she got very upset. My great-grandparents left Greece around 1913. Why, Stella asked, didn’t they ever come back? Why didn’t they come to see what had happened to their old friends? She was very happy that we were there today, but why did our families have to wait so long?

Stella and Samuel served us a small oneg—chocolate covered almonds and pound cake—and we made l’chaim over a decanter of homemade cherry liquor.

David with Stella Koen. She felt he looked like her brother,
who perished in the holocaust 

The next day, Isaak told us the story of when the Jews of Ioannina were rounded up by the Nazis. A couple of days before the round-up, the president of the Jewish community was arrested. While in prison, he overheard the Nazi police saying that in a few days, something major would happen to the Jews. Later that evening, his wife was allowed to bring him dinner. He slipped a note into a piece of bread, gave it to his wife, and said, “Get this to the vice president of the community.” His wife brought the vice president the note—but he did nothing.

It’s very hard for us to judge this man, the VP of the Jewish community. Why didn’t he do anything? Maybe he was afraid—afraid that any attempt to organize a resistance would only lead to a more horrible fate for the Jews. Maybe he knew it was too late—that no matter what the Jews did, their fate was sealed. Maybe he was a bad leader, and didn’t have the capacity to organize his people to flee or to resist. Maybe he was scared and struck to inaction from fear.

Singing Romaniote songs in the Second Synagogue, Ioannina

The next morning, Isaak took us to the old synagogue. Samuel met us there, and was so proud to show us around. He is the chazzan there on the holidays, and he pulled out his machzor to show us his favorite songs. The Romaniote melodies are different from any other Jewish melodies in the world, and the according to Samuel, the Jews of Ioannina sang them more beautifully than any other Jews in Greece. Samuel told us that people would come from Thessaloniki and Athens for High Holidays just to sit in the shul and listen the music. He sang us his favorite tunes. His voice was booming and deep. Such simcha!

And here were we, the great-grandchildren of Ioannina Jews, singing Romaniote melodies with this old man—his favorite songs, the songs he is most proud of. Songs my great-grandpa Jessoula would have led on the High Holidays. Songs that aren’t often sung, but when they are, are sung with tremendous joy.

Great Press for the Shabbat Experiment

Check out this great press for the Shabbat Experiment on YLC's Blog Sameach!

YLC is the Young Leadership Council, the outreach arm for the Jewish Federation of Greater Atlanta, and provides a number of opportunities for young professionals to get involved in the community.

We're Actually Sephardic....

In a week and a half, I'm off to Greece with my mom, dad, brother and his fiance to explore the town my mom's family is from, Ioannina (pronounced "YA-nana"). To get started, I read a paper on the history of Greek Jews by one of my Hillel student leaders, Andrea Marcadis. Her family also happens to be from Ioannina. (Many thanks to Andrea. My paraphrasing below does not capture the depth of her research.)

Her paper is on the influx of Sephardi Jews to Greece after the expulsion from Spain in 1492. Upon arrival in Greece, these Jewish communities in some cases merged with and in some cases overtook the existing Jewish communities in Greece, called Romaniote. Romaniote Jewish customs were distinct from other global Judaisms. They spoke and prayed in Yevanic (Judeo-Greek), a Greek dialect written in Hebrew characters. They also built their synagogues in a distinct way, with benches along the walls, facing each other, in order to have a large aisle for elaborate parading with the Torah.

In the northern city of Thessaloniki, the Sephardic customs almost completely overtook the Romaniote customs. Nearly 20,000 Sephardi Jews moved to Thessaloniki and established 30 new synagogues based around their Sephardi traditions, naming each synagogue after the city in Spain from which they fled. The city which had once only had 500 Jews was suddenly home to 15,700 Jews, more than 50% of the population. The Sephardim brought with them Ladino (Judeo-Spanish). They looked down upon their Romaniote brothers who did not share the language, and called them "Gregos," a derogatory word that lumped them with the rest of the Greeks. The two communities formed a Jewish Federation, but due to the heavy volume of Sephardi Jews, it wasn't long before Ladino became the working language of the federation.

By contrast, in the western city of Ioannina, the Romaniote communities much more successfully retained their identity. Ioannina had long been home to a thriving Jewish community, and Jewish involvement in civic life made Ioannina an important commercial center for all of Greece. The Kahal Kadosh Yashan, or Old Synagogue, had housed the Jewish community for centuries, and the community spoke Yevanic (Judeo-Greek). After the expulsion from Spain, Romaniote Jews in Ioannina tried (unsuccessfully) to petition the chief rabbi of Greece to forbid other Jews from doing business in Ioannina. Instead, the head rabbis of Ioannina forbade the formation of new synagogues, so Sephardic immigrants chose to pray at the Old Synagogue and in Yevanic. Eventually, due to population growth, a new synagogue was founded outside the city walls, mainly by immigrants, though the synagogue adopted Romaniote customs.

Reading Ms. Marcadis' paper, I was struck at several of her findings, and sometimes even moved to tears. First, even in Ioannina, the Romaniote community adopted some Spanish words, namely the word libro, meaning "book." Haven't we Jews been called the "People of the Book?" Of all the words to be absorbed, the word "book" demonstrates a continued emphasis on learning, thinking, and engaged living. Second, consider the lives the Sephardic Jews left behind when they fled Spain. For 300 years (from the 700s-1000s), the Jews of Spain had been the world's most successful Jewish community to date, a golden age of thinkers, writers, religious scholars, and civic leaders--not unlike the American Jewish community today. It astounds me that 400 years later they would have to flee, and as Ms. Marcadis notes, sometimes bring with them the keys to their homes, as if hoping to soon return. This image is very moving. Third, the Sephardic immigrants thrived in the textile industry, an industry that followed my family all the way to my grandfather in New York in the 1950s.

Lastly, Ms. Marcadis cites some of the names of Sephardic immigrant families in Ioannina, and names "Koffina." My mom's mom's maiden name was Betty Cofino. She spoke Ladino. This leads me to believe that at least this branch of my family were Sephardic and not Romaniote Jews, and that they came from Spain before Greece. To read their history, to uncover their story--that they easily adapted to the existing Romaniote community in Ioannina, and yet retained their Ladino language--is to me a symbol of Jewish unity.

As I dream of the future of a Jewish Student Union at Emory--a federation of Hillel, Chabad, Meor, Emory Students for Israel, AIPAC, SHOAH, AEPi, AEPhi, ZBT, Kol HaNesher, and other groups--I am inspired by my mother's Spanish-Greek ancestors. I look forward to learning and seeing more while I am there.

Why Do You Let Me Stay Here

Cross-posted at TheShabbatExperiment.
This was my week to devise our group assignment, and I had more difficulty than I'd expected. I haven't looked at other people's responses yet, so I'm not sure whether or not this task resonated, but I thought it was simple and fun enough. I'm interested to see whether it was meaningful (depth vs. breadth and all that crap....)

Here's the video I watched without sound:


I chose this video kind of on a whim. I think it might have been the last song on my iTunes Genius. But I really like the song. From what I can tell, the video doesn't really reflect the lyrics. Zooey Daschenel is adorable as ever, but the video makes me think of a haunted hotel tour in Chattanooga, TN. Though I know he does much of the music for the duo, but I was surprised to see M. Ward in the video, since we rarely hear his voice. I really laughed at the part when all the little Zooey Daschenels were all dancing around the big Zooey Daschenel--it reminded me of Gulliver's Travels.

In the end, I'm glad there is good music to listen to. I think I liked the song more before I saw the video. 

Silent Films

Cross-posted at TheShabbatExperiment.
Here is Group Gimmel's task for find silence:

Find silence. Find a YouTube video you've never seen before and watch it without volume. You might want to find a music video, or a friend's footage from her trip to Asia, or clips from a favorite TV show, or someone's old home videos. As you watch, narrate in your head what you think might be happening. Then watch the video with sound to see what you missed. Feel free to repeat until you discover something surprising, or awesome, or breathtaking, or hilarious. Share your favorites on the blog.

We Hate Yom Kippur

The holiday of Jewish guilt is upon us again. And this year, it falls on a Saturday! While the rest of the world is enjoying the last sunny weekend of fall, Jews across the world will stuff their necks into dress shirts to atone for our sins. And to gripe.

Rivals--A Rosh Hashanah Sermon

I delivered the following sermon (audio and text below) at the Reform service, Rosh Hashanah morning 5771 with Hillels of Georgia.

In the summer, I work at a Jewish camp in Cleveland, GA, Camp Coleman. It’s been my home for 16 dazzling summers. Down the road from Camp Coleman, only about 3 miles away, is Camp Barney. Camp Barney is also a Jewish camp, run by the JCC of Atlanta.  And every year, the staff at the two camps square-off for a basketball game. It’s one of the most anticipated events of the summer. In the unlikeliest of locations, four-hundred Jews pack the bleachers of the White County Recreation Center to watch the game, Barney on one side, Coleman on the other. Barney dresses in all blue; Coleman wears tie-dye. Barney bangs on a drum; Coleman cheers their faces off. Tempers flare. Players get injured. Fans get in each other’s faces. It is easily the biggest rivalry I have ever been a part of—bigger than Florida-Georgia, bigger than Yankees-Red Sox, bigger even than Emory-Wash. U.

And it strikes me as funny. Here we are in the middle of rural Georgia, miles from any organized Jewish community, and the two Jewish camps hate each other. Why? We all come from the same cities. We all go to the same schools. We all listen to the same music. We all get really excited about basketball. We all love camp. So, in the words of the prophet, “Why can’t we be friends?”

We read on Rosh Hashanah two stories about exactly that—rivalry. Maybe the ancient Rabbis, in their wisdom, knew that football season was a good time to consider the topic. Let’s focus on just one of those stories, about Penninah and Hannah. I’ll give you a little background.

Penninah and Hannah are married to the same man. Penninah has been able to conceive with him, but Hannah has not. And though their husband claims to love Hannah best, he gives more of himself to his fertile wife, Penninah. For this, Penninah taunts Hannah to the point of tears, until Hannah prays that God grant her a son. God hears Hannah’s sorrow, and she gives birth to the prophet Samuel.

Feel for a minute the deep-seeded family rivalry—a love-triangle, favoritism, deceit, envy, contempt. You can imagine the emotional scars this story must have left on its characters. It reads kind of like a soap opera.

I guess the ancient Rabbis, when they chose for us to read these stories on Rosh Hashanah, were trying to tell us that rivalry is a part of life. We can’t avoid it. It’s like friction—even on a glass plate, there’s still a trace. And like friction, rivalry is not always a bad thing. The same friction that causes a rolling marble to eventually slow to a stop allows a rolling tire to push against the road and speed away.

Sometimes rivalry can spark genius. Think of Lennon and McCartney. Or 2Pac and Biggie. 2Pac said it himself: “Can u c the pride in the pantha / as he glows in splendor and grace / Toppling OBSTACLES placed in the way / of the progression of his race.”

Sometimes we need a rival to give us the kick in the pants we need to get moving. Think of Charlie Brown and Lucy. Think of Apple and Sony. Do you think the MacBook Pro would be as great as it is if it didn’t sometimes have to look around and wonder what the Sony VAIO was up to?

Our sages taught that in order to learn, we must acquire a study partner. Someone to bounce ideas off of and to challenge our flimsier arguments. Educational psychologists will tell you that having a study partner helps students probe deeply and think critically. A sounding board. A fact checker. Someone to point out the holes in your argument and challenge you to fill them. Of sorts, a rival.

Funny then that the word for these study partners is chevruta—Aramaic for friend. Chevruta is a little more complicated than friendship. In chevruta, your partner needs to push back, give a little resistance, a little friction.

Indeed, our ancient namesake, Rabbi Hillel, is most famous not for his copious legal writings or his role as head of the Rabbinic assembly, but for debating against his rival, Rabbi Shammai. Think the Lincoln-Douglas debates.

There’s a great scene in Fiddler on the Roof where Tevye is listening to an argument. One side claims, “You can’t close your eyes to what’s happening in the world,” and Tevye responds, “You’re right.” The other side asks, “Why should I break my head about the outside world?” and Tevye responds, “You’re right.” Puzzled, and curious, an onlooker asks, “Tevye, he’s right and he’s right? They can’t both be right!” To which Tevye responds, “You know—you are also right.”

Judaism for centuries has obsessed about the right way of doing things. Do we light the Chanukkah menorah starting with one candle or with eight? Can the same cash register be used for selling meat as well as milk? Can gay and lesbian Jews become rabbis? What we forget to notice is neither side is ever right or wrong, that rivaling ideas have coexisted for centuries. While my father’s grandparents in Austria were busy disposing of their grains for Passover, my mother’s grandparents in Greece were cooking rice to prepare for the holiday.

So what does this all mean? Ashkenazi AND Sephardic. Hillel AND Shammai. Apple AND Sony. Lennon AND McCartney. Penninah AND Hannah. Camp Coleman AND Camp Barney.

It means there’s no one right way to be a Jew. I hear it all the time: I’m a bad Jew, I don’t do this, or I’m a bad Jew, I don’t do that. I’m here to tell you: THERE’S NO SUCH THING AS A BAD JEW. Picture a five-legged stool, or a fork with many prongs—this is Judaism. It’s not just a religion, it’s not just a history, it’s not just a set of values. It’s whatever you choose it to be.

So I’m here to be your rival. I’m here to challenge you. If you had unlimited resources and unlimited time to build a new way of expressing your Judaism, what would you do? Would you found a Jewish hiking club that spends weekends in the mountains? Would you organize your friends to read and think critically about editorials from the Israeli press? Would you start an online dating community for gay and lesbian Jews? Would you organize an interfaith group to fight poverty and hunger? Would you start a Jewish yoga studio? A Jewish book club? A klezmer-funk band? A Jewish meditation group? A silkscreen company that prints clever Jewish t-shirts? Would you organize your friends to devise new, creative, interactive ways of celebrating Shabbat? Would you commission new Jewish art? Would you explore the overlap between Jewish thought and quantum physics?

This New Year, acquire for yourself a rival, a friend who’s willing to push you. Together, do something Jewish you’ve never done before, something that speaks to you, something that challenges you. Make for yourself an experience that can’t be compared, that’s rivaled by none.

Camp Coleman might never love Camp Barney, but they sure do make us play good basketball.

Shana tova.

Walking in Lullwater

Cross-posted at TheShabbatExperiment
I just want to point out that two weeks in a row now I've done my Shabbat-observing on Sunday, not Saturday.

Today I took a walk in Lullwater Park near my house. (It also happens to be the Emory president's residence.) I was struck by how many different scenes there were to watch--parents playing with their children, men fishing, people walking their dogs, a student in the grass reading. It reminded me of a set of postcards. While I walked, I tried to turn-up my sense of hearing and and my sense of sight. I enjoyed the sound of the wind hushing the leaves and a small waterfall running from the lake. I also really enjoyed noticing the different shapes and personalities of tree trunks. I thought about my mom, who likes to walk around our neighborhood for exercise. She's a nurse and hospital administrator. She encourages people to walk 10,000 steps per day to stay healthy.

Oh, I also walked over a small and narrow bridge, but most importantly, I wasn't afraid!

Family Matters (based on Parshat Vayeshev)

The following is in response to a short essay question on the application to HUC's rabbinical program.
Parshat Vayeshev shows that family isn’t for the weak. The episode between Judah and Tamar at once affirms the value of family and highlights the struggles therein.

Judah has three sons, and he finds for the eldest a Canaanite wife—Tamar. But God kills the eldest son before he’s able to conceive a child. So Judah brings his second son to Tamar, so that he will sleep with her and thereby carry-on the line. But the second son pulls-out and doesn’t finish the job. So God kills him. With two sons down and one to go, Judah sends Tamar away. He promises her that when his youngest son, Shua, has grown up, Tamar and Shua will have a child. Many years pass and Tamar never hears from Judah or Shua.

Some time later, Judah passes a prostitute on the road. He sleeps with her, and leaves as collateral for payment some of his clothing. When he returns to pay the prostitute, she can’t be found. Meanwhile, the audience knows that the prostitute was actually Tamar in disguise. She has fooled Judah into impregnating her. One trimester later, Judah hears that Tamar has been knocked-up by some skirt-chaser. He orders Tamar burned for prostitution. She presents his clothing, which he had left for collateral, and says, “I am pregnant by the man to whom these belong.” Judah is embarrassed and never sleeps with her again. Several months later, Tamar gives birth to twins.

Recall that it was Judah who convinced his brothers to sell Joseph into slavery, and Judah who is ultimately responsible for deceiving their father, Jacob. This story begins “About that time, Judah left his brothers.” Midrash relates that Judah was in fact running away from home to avoid his shame.

But there is nowhere Judah can hide. The biblical narrator reveals Judah at his worst. First he tries to evade his promise to Tamar. Then he sleeps with a prostitute who turns out to be his daughter in law. When he slept with Tamar, Judah’s wife had just died. He doesn’t even finish his period of mourning, he waits only until “he is comforted.” He condemns Tamar for prostitution, when in fact he solicited it. And in the end, he never outwardly admits that he slept with Tamar. He only admits that he shouldn’t have withheld from her his youngest son, Shua. Judah is kind of a jerk.

As Judah deceived Jacob, so does Tamar deceive Judah. This biblical foreshadowing fits with the ancient Rabbis' notion of kav l’kav, that a person’s fate is doled out measure for measure according to their deeds (Visotzky 127). Judah was made to “examine/hakerna” his clothes and “recognize/vayaker” them as his own. The same words are used when Judah shows his father Joseph’s bloodied coat (Plaut 253). Both men fall victim to an article of clothing. And whereas Jacob is made to believe something that is false, Judah is made to recognize something that is true. For deceiving his father, Judah can’t avoid the mirror of his shame.

Tamar, by contrast, is a clever, strong woman, who plays by her own rules at a man’s game. In Who Wrote the Bible, Richard Friedman argues that Tamar’s wit forces us not to rule out the possibility that the biblical author “J” could have been a woman (86).

The story ends with Tamar’s twins fighting over who will emerge first from the womb. Clearly, this is a story about family struggle—brother betraying brother, a father’s turmoil visited on his son, a woman wronged by her in-laws, a father who sleeps with his son’s wife. This sounds like a soap opera, but it reads like real life. The characters are human, scarred, proud. They are blurred by the image of their siblings and tied-up by the fears of their parents. This is the flux between hate and love, the pushing away and the holding tight that binds a family together. Regardless of how they are defined, these sticky relationships are the glue of a family.

The Shabbat Experiment

Cross posted at The Shabbat Experiment.
See our coverage on eJewishPhilanthropy and Jewlicious.

A Jewish role model recently introduced me to the Sabbath Manifesto, a set of 10 principles developed by the Reboot Network that they define as core to Shabbat observance. The principles are founded in tradition and open for interpretation. They are short and clear. They are accessible and directive. For the first time in several years, I felt I could tap into Shabbat.

As a Hillel professional, I spend my days, nights, and weekends helping students connect to Jewish life. It's a busy job. While I help students celebrate the day of rest, I myself am working. I and many of my colleagues lose touch with the reasons why we went into this work in the first place.

To reignite our passion for Judaism, we created four cohorts of Hillel professionals across North America who over the course of 10 weeks will observe each of the 10 principles outlined in the Manifesto. Each week, at the end of Shabbat, we will post our reflections, creations, experiments, and experiences to this blog. With the creative support of our colleagues, and with the commitment that we're all in this together, we will rediscover what it means to set aside one day a week. We will be not preaching Jews, but doing Jews.

We call it the Shabbat Experiment.

Hillel Professionals Engaged in Shabbat Manifesto

A Jewish role model recently introduced me to the Shabbat Manifesto. For the first time in a few years, I felt that I could tap into Shabbat.

Inspired by this work, I am helping to organize a group of 10 Hillel professionals nationwide who will over the course of 10 weeks observe each of the 10 principles outlined in the Manifesto. Each week, at the end of Shabbat, we will post our reflections, creations, experiments, and experiences to a shared blog. The 10 weeks will culminate on the Shabbat preceding 10/10/2010.

As Jewish professionals, we are excited by the opportunity to engage in a Jewish experience that is not for our students, but for us. And in creating this experience for ourselves, we are also modeling for our students creative Jewish enterprise.

National Thank Your Counselor Day

The first annual National Thank Your Counselor Day was a huge success. With more than 475 members, the Facebook initiative saw a tremendous outpouring of thank yous to past and present counselors. Thanks to Shira-Rose Lebow for posting this link to a This American Life special "Notes on Camp."

Staff and campers at URJ Camp Coleman acknowledged a favorite Coleman role model, Lauren Zeichner. Lauren is the head of specialists, and has been an integral part of the Coleman family since 1995. Loved for her expertise in the Campscape Garden, Lauren has taught countless Colemanites to make soap from scratch, sew lavender dream pillows and weave dreamcatchers, grow and fry okra, make "Coleman Star" wind charms, and how to pick the ripest blackberries off the bush. The whole camp dressed in tye-die shirts and khaki shorts--Lauren's usual attire--to show their love for her. Watch this clip below.

That evening, seven generations of campers demonstrated the impact camp has on lives. Amanda and Sophie thanked their counselor Jordan, who thanked his counselor Jeremy, who thanked his counselor Daniel, who thanked his counselor Diana, who thanked her counselor Jon, who thanked his mentor Bobby.

Please share who YOU thanked and why.

National Thank Your Counselor Initiative

We have learned so much at summer camp. Camp taught us to appreciate "the great outdoors", to build community and to have the confidence in ourselves to try new things. But, most of all camp taught us the power of standing for the growth and success of others. In honor of all the camp counselors that stood for us over the years we are establishing the "Thank Your Counselor Initiative" and announcing the first ever National Thank Your Counselor day to be celebrated on the first Tuesday in August.

This initiative is designed to encourage you to reach out to and thank your camp counselors from your past or present that have made a difference in your lives. You can to acknowledge your counselor(s)--past or present--on Facebook.

We also envision that on August 3, 2010 that camps all over the country will encourage their campers, staff and alumni to acknowledge their current or former camp counselors by saying thanks through calls, cards or some creative camp way. Join this event on Facebook.

Please invite all your camp buddies to join and let's see what can happen.

A few samples of people who have thanked their counselors:

"Special thanks to Rachel for starting me out strong in '99. Rachel and Shanna for dealing with me and being legendary in '04/'05." --Becca

"As a life long camper/counselor at Henry S. Jacobs Camp and now a camp director of a the Birmingham, Al JCC camp, I wish to thank all who influenced my life positively as a camper and guided me as a counselor. You are the people that taught me about the value of camp and influenced me so much that I became a camp director. And now, my goal is to continue that tradition and give every child I see a smile and a positive experience." --Betty

"I don't know who he is, but the Canoe tripper who took my bunk out of a trip in Algonquin when we were in Tziirim, that guy changed my life. It rained the whole time and it was the best canoe trip I've ever been on in my life. We were like Indiana Jones in the jungle looking for some lost treasure. Thank you mystery Canoe Tripper!" -- Toby

"Thank you Whammy for being Whammy when I was 8 and now at 42. Thank you Jordan, for freeing my from that Hanging Wedgy at the Eddie Cantor. (Jordan's son was my son's counselor for the last 4 weeks and my son raves about him!) Thank you Howie, my first counselor in Unit C. Thank you Ira! Thank you Les! Thanks to Kenny, for the amazing round ups!" --Marc

This project is organized by Daniel Reiser and Josh Goldsmith.

Solidarity March for Gilad Shalit

Cross-posted on URJ Camp Coleman's Blog

In honor of Tisha B’Av—the holiday commemorating the many tragedies of the Jewish people—the Machon and Machon Adventure Programs organized a Solidarity March for Gilad Shalit. Shalit is an Israeli soldier who was captured by Hamas in June 2006. Four years have now passed, and Shalit has still not been returned to his family. In that time, he has been kept in total isolation and has been denied visits from humanitarian aid groups. The Machon participants felt a strong connection to him, given that he is close to them in age. Shalit was 19 when he was captured.

“I’m only 17, and I know I haven’t experienced enough of life yet, so I’m sure Gilad hasn’t either.” -Alex

On the day of Tisha B’Av, the whole camp dressed in blue and white and marched from the office to the dining hall. The Machon prepared blue wristbands to give to every camper, and every staff member received a blue armband that said “Free Gilad.” We carried balloons, Israeli flags, picket signs reading “Support Gilad” and “Peace Now,” and a giant banner with a picture of Gilad on it, while somber Hebrew songs played on the P.A. system.

The dining hall was decorated in blue and white, and when the march arrived, the Machon read a letter they are sending to Gilad’s family, describing the day’s activities.

North American and Israeli staff members joined together to offer a prayer for Shalit. The original prayer was written by Coleman’s drama specialist, Craig Thompson.

There are many casualties of war in this world.

Let Gilad not be among them.

There are many unhealthy people in this world.

Let Gilad not be among them.

There are many unhappy people in this world.

Let Gilad not be among them.

There are many lonely people in this world.

Let Gilad not be among them.

There are many people without hope in this world.

Let Gilad not be among them.

There are many captive people in this world.

Let Gilad not be among them.

There are many silent people in this world.

Let us not be among them.

We pray to you, O God, for the safe and speedy return of Gilad Shalit to his family in Israel. And in the meantime, we pray that he is healthy and safe, and that he find peace in the love of his friends and family and comfort in the knowledge that we are not silent, that people around the world are actively working to bring him home. And let us say, Amen.

Additionally, members of the camp community signed the following petition:

“We demand that Hamas abide by international humanitarian law and afford Gilad Shalit his rights to proper medical care. Moreover, we ask that Gilad be afforded the right of communication with his family and the outside world, and we ask for the immediate end to his inhumane treatment. We also ask that Gilad be returned safely and in good health to his home and family in Israel as soon as possible.”

The whole camp is now participating in a run-a-thon to raise money for the Keren Maor Foundation, which supports Gilad solidarity events around the world. Staff members can pledge a dollar amount for every lap they run around the lake. The initiative is called “Exercise Your Freedom.”

View video from the march on Vimeo.
View photos from the march on Flickr.