Weekly Messages

On Monday evening, a few moments before our family dedicated a new Torah Scroll to Temple Emanu-El in memory of my mother, Barbara Kirshner z”l, I recited my last Kaddish in her memory.

For a Jewish calendar year, without missing a single day, I prayed in a quorum of ten Jewish adults to remember and honor her. The requirement of Kaddish for the year, shaped my daily routines, schedule and dictated all of my choices. It determined where I would travel and when I would depart and arrive from trips to ensure I could a make the Minyan. I chose only to travel to places where I knew I could find a synagogue that was operational with daily services.

In 12 months, I said Kaddish in Closter, Englewood, Teaneck and Tenafly, Florida, California, Missouri, Texas, Georgia, Michigan, Lisbon & Porto Portugal, Krakow & Warsaw, Poland, Berlin Germany, Cairo Egypt, Abu Dhabi and Dubai in the United Arab Emirates, Manama Bahrain, Madrid, Toledo & Barcelona Spain, and Israel, just to name some of the many places I brought this prayer to.

A few weeks ago, as the formal mourning was winding down, my kids asked if it was hard to say Kaddish every day. I replied that it was not easy but a very small gesture to show my mother how much she meant to me. Compared to the sacrifices she made for me and my siblings, it was a drop in the bucket, so to speak. I said I would do it for five more years if needed, just so my mom would know how loved and missed she indeed is.

The next night, Tuesday, I made sure to go to our Maariv Minyan, even though this would be the first Minyan where I would not say the Kaddish prayer. As we turned to page 282, I sat down and was noticing my silence.

Ironically, a member of our congregation who is a Shabbat regular came to Minyan that night to begin his journey for saying kaddish for an immediate relative who was buried hours before. I felt empowered answering ‘Amen’ to his prayer and being present for his family.

This time reminded me of two timely truths:

First, Minyan is as critical whether we are saying Kaddish or enabling others to. That can only happen by your attendance and support. I lovingly beseech all of you to consider only 1 day a month that you can support our Minyan with your physical presence. Monday through Thursday night at 7 PM. Wednesday morning at 7:30 AM. Friday night at 6:15 PM and Saturday and Sunday at 9 AM.

Second, like the Torah that we finish and restart again this weekend at Simchat Torah, so too are the cycles of remembrance. One person ends their cycle, another begins, and our grief, memory and recollections take new shape and meaning.

I wish you all a Shemini Atzeret and Simchat Torah filled with renewed appreciation for life, memory and our ability to be part of the greater whole.

Hag Sameach!

Rabbi David-Seth Kirshner

What makes a sukkah special? A sukkah must meet certain physical criteria–at least three walls and a roof that provides more shade than sun, while also allowing us to see the stars. A sukkah’s beauty is enhanced by ornate decorations and lights. But there is something beyond the physical structure that lends our sukkot a sense of holiness: time.

If we sit in the sukkah before the holiday has started, or after the holiday has ended, we are not fulfilling any mitzvah at all. But as soon as the sun goes down tonight and the holiday begins, our temporary dwellings transform. For one week, they become holy spaces.

For a holiday that is all about dwelling, eating and congregating in a physical space, the element of time has always been fascinating to me. A structure can be ordinary one minute, but then holy the next. Shabbat functions in that same way as we go from Friday afternoon into Shabbat. But Sukkot has that added component of physical space. In that way, sukkot is unlike anything else in Judaism.

There is no other structure in Judaism that is transformed by time. And there is no other holiday that so demands our physical presence. We are asked to be fully present inside the sukkah in order to fulfill the mitzvah. We recognize the intersection of holy time and holy space by sitting in the sukkah during the holiday.

Every night in the evening Ma’ariv service, we ask God u’fros aleiniu sukkat shlomecha–spread over us a sukkah of peace. When we say those words as part of the Hashkivenu prayer during the rest of the year, it is merely metaphorical. This week, that sukkah is literal. It is a sanctuary in time and space.

Wishing you a chag sameach.

Rabbi Gabe Cohen

Not all grief lands the same. Speaking from my role as pastor and someone who has had ample sorrow in my personal life, I know we all grieve loss differently. Even the same person can grieve people of equal status in different ways. A son who loved his parents devotedly and evenly can mourn a mother and father, respectively, in different and unique manners.

One common denominator of grief is the overwhelming notion of regret. Regardless of the timing or circumstances of death, regret always seeps into the crevices and weighs down memory and compounds the sadness.

Grief is heaviest around death because of the finality and irrevocability it brings.

If you listen closely in any cemetery, one can hear the echoes reverberating of phrases that begin:

I wish I would have

I could have done….

If only I had……

I should have…..

During the days between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, it is customary to visit the cemetery and seek forgiveness even from the dead for the ‘could have’ and ‘should have’, and regret that weighs heavily on our shoulders.

When it comes to the living, we carry regret but address it infrequently. We naively think that tomorrow will allow us those portals for apology, for expressing true emotions and for amends.

The brilliance of this season and Yom Kippur is it reminds us of the fragility of life and asks the equalizing question of us all, “What if there is no tomorrow?” Would we say what needs to be said today? Do what need to be done, today? Act on emotions so we can live with fewer regrets, now?

As this hallowed 25 hours of Yom Kippur begins with the setting of the sun, may we find the courage and feel the fragility that enables us to remove ‘could have’ and ‘should have’ for ‘I did’ and ‘I am.’ That will allow us to live with fewer regrets and remind us of the burden of regrets and more importantly, the gift of life.

Rabbi David-Seth Kirshner

One of the High Holiday season’s most powerful and enduring images is our desire to be sealed in the Book of Life for another year of blessing, sustenance and peace. During the Aseret Yamei Tshuva–the Ten Days of Repentance bridging Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur–we take stock of what we have done to hurt people in the past year and try to right those wrongs, all with the goal of being our best spiritual selves and making our way into the Book of Life for the year to come. We rush to get those last bits of remorse in before it is too late.

And so, I want to present you with the two opportunities that Judaism offers us as we collectively prepare for Yom Kippur:

Apologize to the people you have hurt in the last year.

Admitting we were wrong is never easy, but apologizing to those we have hurt is one of the most important actions we can take during the high holiday season. Nobody is perfect, and everybody makes mistakes. And it is incumbent on us to try to right those wrongs and to ask for forgiveness. Take the time to think to yourself–who are the people you offended? Did you say something you immediately regretted that has been weighing heavily on your soul? Let this week be a time you try to mend the fences that you think may be permanently broken.

Be prepared to accept apologies from those who have hurt you.

In some ways, this challenge is even harder than the first one. Working up the courage to say that you did something wrong is never easy. But opening up our hearts to those who wronged us takes genuine compassion. Sometimes it feels like the wounds that were caused by a fight can be impossible to heal. But the people who hurt us may be twisting in knots and grappling with finding the right words to express their own remorse. If they come to you and genuinely apologize for the pain they may have caused you, will you be ready to receive them with open arms?

Going through this process is often easier said than done. As we enter this Shabbat between Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur, called Shabbat Shuva, the Shabbat of Repentance, I hope you can find the courage and strength to open your hearts to repentance in both directions–that you can humble yourself by saying you are sorry, and that you can be open to those who want to express their remorse to you.

And may we all be sealed in the Book of Life for a happy and healthy 5784.

Rabbi Gabe Cohen