A German-Trained American Rabbi in Yorkshire

(Picture note: One of my favorite of the Chagall Windows at Hadassah Medical Center in Jerusalem. The inspiration for the windows, other than Chagall's purely amazing creativity, was the section of Torah dealing with Israel/Jacob's blessings to his sons. The blessing that inspires this window starts, "Joseph is a fruitful bough, a fruitful bough by a spring; his branches run over the wall." Why is בן פרת, literally "descendant that bears fruit" repeated? I think because Torah, above else, has power by forcing us to ask questions and always examine and move forward in our lives, rather than leaving status quo alone. There is always work to do. As descendants of Israel we continue to ask the questions prompted by a repeated word here, and extra pronoun there. And in those Kleinigkeiten we find G-d because G-d is in the process of making connections much more than any temporary answer that we would wish to stand on and claim to be the only truth. At le...

(Picture Note: Progressive Rabbinical, Cantorial and Education students from around the world join with HUC alumni to celebrate Havdalah, the celebration at the end of the Sabbath to highlight the transition to the new week.) Something special is happening this year at the Hebrew Union College, Jewish Institute of Religion in Jerusalem . My ego doesn’t exactly demand that I be part of that something special, but the fact that I am does add certain sweetness and should not take away from the fact that the idea about which I shall shortly speak is indeed excellent. This year, for the first time in the institution’s history, HUC-JIR will host all first year students at the three major accredited “Progressive” Jewish rabbinical seminaries. That means that students from Leo Baeck College in London, Abraham Geiger Kolleg in Berlin and Hebrew Union College in LA, New York and Cincinnati have already joined together in Israel and are embarking on a unique experiment—th...

. . .which seems like a bit of a strange thing to say. After all my friends and coworkers threw for me, in total, three going-away parties. I got my last paycheck (gut check on that one) and whittled what little material goods I had left to begin with down to two suitcases and one backpack for Israel and seven boxes to be shipped later to Germany . I even flew half-way around the world. It still didn’t seem real. Then I registered for school and signed student insurance forms, participated in ice-breakers with the other students and got my mailbox. Nope—still felt like I’d be flying out any day to deliver another two-day onsite training for a new client. And then this morning all 52 students representing the (for the first time ever) cohort of 1 st year cantorial, education, and rabbinical students from Hebrew Union College, Leo Baeck (in London) and Abraham Geiger Kolleg gathered together for Shacharit (morning prayers.) The cantor began singing a niggun (...