#mitzvot

[zebratoys]

מוֹעֲדִים לְשִׂמְחָה חַגִּים וּזְמַנִּים לְשָׂשׂוֹן

וּלְקַחְתֶּם לָכֶם בַּיּוֹם הָרִאשׁוֹן, פְּרִי עֵץ הָדָר כַּפֹּת תְּמָרִים, וַעֲנַף עֵץ-עָבֹת, וְעַרְבֵי-נָחַל; וּשְׂמַחְתֶּם, לִפְנֵי יְהוָה אֱלֹהֵיכֶם–שִׁבְעַת יָמִים.

[todaysjewishholiday]

7 Sivan 5784 (12-13 June 2024)

Chag Shavuot Sameach! Today is the second and final day of the festival. In the diaspora a communal reading of Megillat Ruth is often held on the second day of Shavuot. And the seventh of Sivan is somewhat different than other added festival days for the diaspora because there is a makhlokhet in the Talmud over whether the presence of HaShem descended on the mountain in the sight of the Israelite camp on the sixth of Sivan or the seventh, when our progenitors left behind bondage in Egypt and found a covenant in the wilderness. So Shavuot is in some ways Schrödinger’s Chag. The correct observance is either the sixth of Sivan or the seventh so we might as well enjoy both!

It is a common Jewish belief (and even for those for whom it is not an literal belief, a potent communal metaphor) that the souls of all Jews who have ever lived and will ever live were present at Har Sinai when HaShem and the house of Israel swore their great covenant to one another there. We were there and accepted it as well. And it is said that all converts to Judaism have Jewish souls, and were also there. Judaism is ethnic and can be received as an inheritance but it can also be joined by all who are drawn to it, because at its heart Judaism is this great promise to HaShem and one another. We argue about how to understand it and we often fall short of applying even the knowledge we have of how to keep it but being Jewish is to admit that we are bound to each other and to the whole world. And a convert has every bit as much a claim to this covenant as any other Jew.

We read the Book of Ruth at Shavuot partly to carry this truth home. Ruth is from Moab— a people the ancient Israelites had repeated conflicts with and entrenched prejudices against— but she tells her Jewish mother-in-law “where you go I go, where you live I live, your people are my people, and your g-d my g-d” and from that moment forward Ruth is understood as a full member of the community. She is one of the direct lineal ancestors of Dovid HaMelekh. Rather than attempt to create a spotless noble pedigree for our most famous king ancient Jewish writers emphasized multiple women from marginalized backgrounds in his ancestry. We are a people shaped from the start by a mixed multitude and by welcoming fully those who are willing to join in Jewish life. It is worth remembering that always.

The book of Ruth’s emphasis on tzedekah and compassion and not only meeting but eagerly fulfilling mitzvot of care for the poor and for marginalized community members also encapsulates Shavuot’s reminder to recommit ourselves to the Torah and to the pursuit of justice that HaShem enjoins upon us.

[bfpnola]

just a snapshot of the list of Jewish laws, mitzvot, israel is breaking while weaponizing Judaism to kill Palestinians en masse

[reachingrachnius]

how do we feel about my rough translation ?

[torais-life]

Shabbat Shalom ✨

With my cat Salomón who comes every morning to caress me when I want to start birkot hashajar and prayers 😁🇮🇱❤️ ��🇷😽

[thepomegranatewitch]

Today's inspiration yielded this wee bracha. Use it in good health.

Image description. A leafy green background with white lineart of ssuk repeated in the background. There are drawings of a shadowed almond blossom in top left, a gilded white California rose in top right, and a gilded tekhelet blue California rose on far left middle. Text os white serif with a black border. A heavier bordered larger text at top reads "a bracha for asking for and receiving help." Thinner bordered and slightly smaller text reads "blessed are You, Gd our god, Sovereign of Space Time, who invites us to help others fulfill the teachings of connection." Black text and logos at bottom give the handle @ the.pomegranate,witch for instagram, tumblr, and kofi, and Sahar Bareket for redbubble. Bottom right has the author's chop in red.

[sophieakatz]

Thursday Thoughts: Structure, Flexibility, and Torah

(I wrote this d’var for tomorrow’s Shabbat evening services. Turns out I won’t be leading services tomorrow after all - so I’m sharing it here instead!)

I love being a Jew. I see it as an active thing – BEING a Jew. Living a Jewish life, making Jewish choices, taking part in our rich, meaningful traditions and fulfilling the mitzvot of the Torah.

However, if I said that I was living a Jewish life in every possible way – making all Jewish choices, taking part in all our traditions, and fulfilling all mitzvot – that would be a lie.

Those of you who come to Shabbat services regularly on Friday nights know that you will nearly always find me here, now. However, if you also come on Saturday morning, then you know that you will almost never find me there, then. I bake challah, but I do not light Shabbat candles. I take time off from my day job on Jewish holidays when I can, but I’m not always able to. I eat kosher foods, but I do not have kosher dishes, since I share my kitchen with three people who do not keep kosher.

I do what I can. Sometimes, I feel like I’m not doing enough.

It’s easy to imagine that G-d might also think that I’m not doing enough. After all, there are 613 mitzvot in the Torah. If your boss gave you an employee handbook with 613 rules for employee conduct, then you would assume that this is a strict boss with a very structured work environment, someone who wants you to obey their instructions without fail or flexibility.

But this week’s parsha makes it clear that “obey without fail or flexibility” is not an entirely accurate description of G-d’s expectations for Jewish people.

This week we read Parshat Vayikra – the beginning of the book of Leviticus. Incidentally, Leviticus has 243 of the 613 mitzvot – more than any other book in the Torah.

(If you’re curious, second place goes to Deuteronomy at 203 mitzvot, Exodus comes in third at 109, Numbers is fourth at 56, and Genesis has only two.)

So, Leviticus is the Big Book of Rules, right? In Vayikra, the start of this book, there are a lot of rules about making offerings at the temple. These are sin offerings. A person would admit wrongdoing and atone for their sin by making the offering. In Leviticus chapter 5 verse 6, the Torah explains, “he shall bring his guilt offering to the Lord for his sin which he had committed, a female from the flock, either a sheep or a goat, for a sin offering.”

But it doesn’t end there. The next verse, verse 7, reads “But if he cannot afford a sheep, he shall bring as his guilt offering for that [sin] that he had committed, two turtle doves or two young doves before the Lord.”

And then if we jump ahead a couple verses, to verse 11, the Torah reads, “But if he cannot afford two turtle doves or two young doves, then he shall bring as his sacrifice for his sin one tenth of an ephah of fine flour for a sin offering.”

(An ephah is a unit of measurement here, and according to Google, it’s about the size of a bushel. So you would bring a tenth of a bushel of flour. I’m not sure exactly how big that is, but it doesn’t sound like much. Certainly it sounds less than a whole sheep.)

So – the commandment here, the mitzvah, is to make a sin offering. And through the Torah, G-d gives specific instructions about what to bring and what to do with it – you bring a sheep, and this is how you kill it. It’s a structure for atonement. But the Torah also provides exceptions or alternate options for this sin offering. If you can’t bring a sheep, bring two doves, and if you can’t bring two doves, bring some flour. The Torah provides structure, and it also provides different structures depending on your individual means.

In doing so, the Torah takes a behavior that could be very limited – something that only rich people could do, the people who could afford to give up an animal because they had plenty more to eat or breed – and turns it into something that anyone could do, within their means, in the way that works best for them. It’s flexible. It’s also encouraging in a way – having these different options for how to participate in the mitzvah makes the whole idea of making sin offerings feel more accessible for anyone.

And this ties in well with how I see and experience Judaism. It’s accessible for all of us. Yes, there’s structure. Judaism includes instructions for every part of our lives. And like I said before, it’s an active thing. I don’t think that you can really BE a Jew if you aren’t doing ANYTHING that’s Jewish.

But you don’t need to do EVERYTHING.

You don’t need to obey EVERY commandment in exactly the same way as everyone else in order to live a Jewish life, make Jewish choices, and participate in the Jewish community. G-d empowers all of us to show up when we can, and how we can, in the way that works best for us, to create a meaningful life as Jews. For me, tonight, that means standing up here in front of you, delivering this d’var. Last week, it meant sitting in the back row with my friends, and next week, it will mean traveling home to spend Passover with my family. And every week, every day, we get to make those Jewish choices, to create our Jewish life. Shabbat shalom.

[drabmakyo]

So much to remember, so much to process.

Fantastic interior illustration by Iris Jay!

Mitzvot is available for pre-order now as paperback and ebook! https://mitzvot.post-self.ink

[whatlieswithintheorchard]

at some point, performing mitzvot has to be about MORE than just fulfilling them

i’m not saying “find a reason for your observance” but for you to “find how you’ll do it, if at all”

[eyetwitch]

I was painting pomegranates when I found out I was Jewish. Ethnically, I am half Ashkenazi, and my personal people are from Hungary and Austria. But I didn’t know any of that when I started painting pomegranates. I was supposed to be Swedish.

I’m an adoptee from a closed-record private domestic adoption during the baby scoop era. Most of those words won’t mean much to you unless you’re an adoptee too, but for me, those words meant that every aspect of my life was colored by my adoption.

My biological mother put the wrong man down as my biological father when she gave me away. She said he was the Swedish guy she had been dating, so I was marketed by the adoption agency as a half Scandinavian baby. This made me a “perfect match” to my new adoptive family - my adoptive father was also half Scandinavian. Later, when my adoptive parents went back to get a boy from the agency, they said they had a German baby - what a perfect match to my adoptive mother, the agency said, she’s German, he’s German, how wonderful! But: DNA holds truths that were never supposed to come out. My brother is half Mexican, not German. I’m half Hungarian Jew, not Swedish. My adoptive brother and I have a bitter joke is that we were re-branded.

At any rate: I was painting pomegranates when I found out I was Jewish. I’ve always loved pomegranates. I knew they were in a lot of Jewish art, but I didn’t really know why - after all, I was Swedish, I politely looked away during discussions of other peoples’ religions. But now I know. The seeds of the pomegranate are supposed to remind you of the 613 mitzvot (sacred obligations) attributed to the Torah (the first five books of the Hebrew Bible), which form the foundation of traditional Jewish practice.

[eightopals]

[todaysjewishholiday]

13 Menachem Av 5784 (16-17 August 2024)

Shabbat shalom! Gutt shabbes! Sabado bueno!

Shabbat is the most significant and joyful Jewish holiday, and this Shabbat is the most joyful of them all, because it is the consolation after our deepest collective grief. The Hebrew year has a few special shabbatot, associated with specific anniversaries, Torah portions, or haftarah of special significance. This Shabbat, the one which follows Tisha b’Av, our day of mourning for the destruction of both Batei HaMikdash and for all that is broken in the world we inhabit, is called Shabbat Nachamu, the Shabbat of Comfort, and has been celebrated by generations of Jews as the combination of all that is most enjoyable about Shabbat and Yom Tov. Truly, this is a day that we accept in all its splendor as an everlasting reminder of HaShem’s loving promises to us. The contrast with the deep heartwrenching grief of Tisha b’Av can allow us to see in this Shabbat in particular all that Shabbat is meant to be for us each and every week. Contrast can teach us many wonderful things.

The parashat hashavua of Shabbat Nachamu is Vaetchanan, “I Pleaded��, the second portion in Devarim, Moshe’s final address to the Israelite people. This parsha includes three of the most important texts of Judaism: the Shma, our most foundational prayer, the v’Ahavta which we repeat alongside it, and the Asheret haDevarim, or Ten Commandments, the first mitzvot given to the Israelite people at Mount Sinai, which are repeated here by Moshe as a reminder of the vows binding the Israelite people and our God. Taken together these three are a powerful reminder of truths that no catastrophe can alter.

The haftarah is from Sefer Yeshayahu, Chapter 40, and its opening words “Nachamu Nachamu Ammi” (Comfort, o comfort my people) give the Shabbat its special name. It was deliberately chosen to follow Tisha b’Av, and is the first of seven passages of comfort from Yeshayahu read between Tisha b’Av and Rosh HaShana. Please accept the comfort and consolation of this particular Shabbat. We live in a difficult world, and we need the peace and rest and joy and change of perspective that Shabbat offers. As the saying goes “the Jews observe Shabbat and Shabbat preserves the Jews”— this Shabbat is a testament to how true that is, even in the face of all the calamities of our community’s history. We can face the challenges of our times, so long as we willingly accept the comfort HaShem offers us in the way of Torah.

[weaversweek]

More from Lilith Fair

"Foolish games" - Jewel

Lilith Fair was organised by Sarah McLachlan, always featured Suzanne Vega, but Jewel was the star attraction.

America's most charted single of the year was a double A-side - charming song "You were meant for me" was turned for its sad flip "Foolish games". Jewel Kilcher had broken through with debut album Pieces of You, and was the biggest thing in American pop.

Lilith Fair wasn't without its criticism. Sarah Vowell, the acerbic cultural critic, made a very fair point.

Lilith Fair isn't a picture of solidarity so much as a picture of uniformity. McLachlan, the event's organizer, has chosen singer-songwriters in her own image: pretty, polite, folksy moderates with sensible hair and more melody than message.

Future editions were less white, less acoustic; future years would show rock and rap, and Latin and R&B.

"Naked eye" - Luscious Jackson

Jill, Gabby, Kate, and Vivian were on the fringes of fame over here: given quarter-hearted approval by the fashion police because they were American and influenced by hip-hop beats and were women. In the error of Britpop, that's at least four capital offences.

"Naked eye" is about being emotionally vulnerable, honest about what you're feeling. Always reminds me of a sunny day with my favourite person of the time, as banks of snow melt into puddles.

"Sleep to dream" - Fiona Apple

Twenty-seven years before Chappell Roan, Fiona Apple wore a suit of armour onto the New York subway. Photographer Joe McNally explains.

"Fiona had always been shot as a waif – tendrils of hair blowing (dressed in lingerie), out in some sort of lily field. She told me she wanted to chuck that scene and be a warrior woman in a suit of armor. I was like 'Cool, babe, works for me!' We did the whole Camelot thing in a daylight studio. A big deal with hair, makeup, styling, painted backdrop, falling rose petals, fake blood on the sword, catering, crew, managers, hangers-on. Everything. All the while her manager is heating up about how late it’s getting. I was like, 'You brought her late, okay?' Finally he explodes and says 'Gotta go now and the subway is the only way' (it was rush hour in New York and she had a gig in Jersey, 'Get on the subway in the armor?' And she said, 'Yeah, that sounds about right!' I shout for a camera, wide lens, hot shoe flash, green and magenta gels and a bunch of 100 speed 35 chrome. We bolt and slip her through the turnstiles–sword and all–unnoticed, Subway came right away and I started ripping film like crazy for 5 stops. On the train, New Yorkers, true to form avoided eye contact. The studio shot went away and the subway shot (flash on camera, 1/15 of a second at F4, a hand held mess of a photograph) ran as the lead. You never know."

from the book "The Moment it Clicks" by Joe McNally

Performance from Conan O'Brien's show.

Bonus interview

"Your new cuckoo" - The Cardigans

First Band on the Moon had yielded an unexpected hit when Lovefool was included on a film soundtrack. What are these Swedes doing in the top ten, do they think they're Ace of Base?

For their next hit, the group released something more typical of their sound, bouncy and energetic and with a nice minor key lilt. But they didn't really promote it, being on dates in Lilith Fair at the time, so only a minor hit.

Lilith Fair was well-documented at the time, but much of the history was recorded digitally. All those ones and zeroes have become halves, and the memories are in danger of being lost. Television coverage and interviews with the performers were made at the time.

Later, there have been oral histories from the fans and performers points of view.

"Closer to fine (live)" - Indigo Girls

We learn that Emily and Amy, the core of the Indigo Girls, were the glue to bind the tour together. Knock on dressing room doors, open windows, get to know their co-stars.

The energy came out on stage, with lots of the acts joining in for a mass singalong near the end of the night. Here, for instance, are Sarah McLachlan, Jewel, Meredith Brooks, and others.

[torais-life]

Parashat Behar Bejukotay: Las Bendiciones de Dios. Rab. Natan Menashe en YouTube

[sanjerina]

This is actually a pretty big deal in Judaism. There are all of these things that we are meant to do, like prayer or tzedakah (“righteous giving”) and so on, and the idea is that you do it even if you’re not inspired, even if you think it’s stupid, and eventually you’ll feel it. The focus is on the behavior, not the thought or the feeling.

And if you never get to the “right” feeling, that’s fine! You’ve still acted justly!

It’s also called “behavioral activation” in psychology, and it’s been shown to get people out of stuck emotional places and/or overcoming overwhelming tasks.

So yeah. “You fake it until maybe you feel it” is a pretty well-established brain hack. (Which is one thing for me to know and another entirely for me to act upon, but that’s a take for another time.)

There is functionally no difference between doing something nice because you actually care and doing something nice because it makes you feel good or because you think you're obligated to.

A charity does not care if you're only donating because your religion says you should; either way, your money is still going to help people. That little old lady next door does not care if you only help her with gardening because being thanked makes you feel good, it's just nice to have some extra hands.

"Fake it til you make it," is a phrase for a reason but it's also okay if you NEVER make it, if you never feel the "correct" emotions behind your actions. Your thoughts and feelings matter considerably less than the impact your actions have on other people.

[torahapologetics]

Unveiling Jewish Diversity: Beyond the Talmud #talmud #torah #diversity #israel #shortvideo

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