From the Rabbi

Words of the Spirit, by Rabbi Liz Bolton, Or Haneshamah's rabbi and spiritual leader

Apparently, if you focus on a steady spot far off in the distance, it’s possible to mitigate the worst effects of motion sickness. In a flat vista, that could be the distant horizon. With vertigo, the trick is to snap your head quickly in the opposite direction, which, paradoxically, could also worsen the vertiginous symptoms.

Nothing seems to be working for me this week, as I try to look far ahead into the distance, where...Read more...

The Passover seder exerts a strong pull on our people. Many studies and polls show that across the spectrum of observances and beliefs it’s the most widely-observed Jewish ritual outside of the High Holy Days.

At its core, the seder is a Jewish time-traveling psychodrama, a biblio/rabbinic-drama, a fine expression of Judaism as an Evolving Religious Civilization: Our people’s TARDIS (ask a fan of Doctor Who to...Read more...

The first portion in the book of Exodus contains many familiar stories, ones that come with enduring iconic imagery: the Hebrew baby, who would become the great leader, floating in a basket on the river Nile; Moses slaying a cruel taskmaster who is beating a fellow Hebrew; the shepherd Moshe, awed by the bush on fire, called by the Divine voice to free his people back in Mitzrayim.

Woven through these stories are also the stories of...Read more...

Shabbat, paired with the onset of winter, presents an interesting combination of opportunities and challenges for a progressive, living-in-two-civilizations community like ours. The pull to observe communally may weaken, whether your preference is to hunker down to stay in and cozy, or to take off to the hills and rinks at every opportunity.

A few weeks ago, a simple challenge created an awesome opportunity. Once a year, we need to...Read more...

How do we mark Love? What about Creation – birth, plantings that grow, ideas and plan we seed? Where do we put our Regrets, our commitments to change? And how, with all of these, do we share the experience of our observance?

In other times, our ancestors may not have exercised choice in these matters, but they did, oh they surely did innovate. Old ways stuck, but if they did not, they fell away and were replaced by new...Read more...