Shabbat: Why It's So Important

It's Friday and we're all getting ready for Shabbat. In an unusual departure from my posts on holiday customs, I am providing you with a link to a wonderful and insightful article written by Shoshana Michael Zucker, a self-educated Jewish scholar living in Kfar Saba. This article clarifies why Shabbat is a much needed day of rest, and why it is the glue that keeps the Jewish people together.

Shabbat Shalom to all.
Tami


Photo credit

Tisha B'Av Customs From Czechoslovakia & Germany Remind Us How Important This Day Is

Reciting Eicha – Lamentations – while sitting at the foot of the Wailing Wall is the ultimate way to express grief over our Temples' destruction. That is, if you live in Israel or happen to be visiting. Unfortunately, most Jews do not have easy access to the Wall, so it takes a lot of creative thinking to come up with comparable customs.


This is where looking back at our rich Jewish heritage comes into play. Thinking out of the box was definitely part of it, and the amount of customs I have found for Tisha B'Av is amazing.

I'm going to focus on the two I especially appreciate.

Czech Jews did not wait until the reading of Lamentations to sit on the floor. They began showing signs of mourning during the last meal before the fast, which fittingly consisted of only a hard boiled egg and a slice of bread -- eaten while sitting on the floor.

German Jews had an even more original approach. While praying at the synagogue on Tisha B'Av the Torah scroll was placed on the back of an elderly man, bent over and looking at the floor. The symbolic meaning of this act was to show that while it is hard to be a Jew, we stubbornly persist and survive despite the suffering.

Tisha B'Av is a central date in the collective memory that has kept us going. Pass on its meaning and its customs to your children, grandchildren and students, even though it doesn't coincide with the school year.

Photo Credit

Shavuot, Verona Italy & the Origins of the Bat Mitzvah

It's common knowledge that the Bat-Mitzvah ceremony is an American innovation dating back to 1922 when Judith Kaplan, daughter of Rabbi Mordechai Kaplan -- founder of the Reconstructionist Movement -- celebrated her Bat Mitzvah.

What most people don't know is that as far back as the Renaissance, Italian Jewry had a very liberal view of women and their role in Judaism. This information has been brought to light by Dr. Aliza Lavie, author of the bestselling book A Jewish Woman's Prayer Book, through her new study: Women's Customs: A Journey of Jewish Customs, Prayers and Stories. One of the revelations Lavie brings to light is that the first Bat Mitzvah was the brainchild of 19th century Verona Italy's Rabbi, Isaac Pardo. Through her research Lavie discovered that this was an annual communal ceremony held on Shavuot. The 12-year old girls wore white and entered the synagogue's men's section as part of a procession accompanied by a choir singing the Song of Deborah from the Book of Judges.

I'm not sure when this practice unfortunately faded from the scene, but Rabbi Pardo's great grandson -- Yonatan Bassi -- reports that his 100+ year-old mother still remembers every detail of her Bat Mitzvah. True, the above description indicates that the girls were not called up to the Torah. Still, it was a major gender breakthrough, especially considering the minimal role Jewish women around the globe had at that point in time.

For this Shavuot, where does this leave you, your daughters and students? An opportunity to talk about the role girls and women have/should have in the Jewish tradition. We know that Rosh Chodesh has traditionally been considered a female celebration. Now we can add Shavuot.  What next?

Synagogue photo credit

Origins & Customs of Yom Hashoah

It's always fascinating to find out why specific dates are chosen for memorial holidays. Yom Ha'shoah is a good example. Is there an obvious date for remembering this horrific carnage which lasted so many years? While some voted for Tisha B'Av when many other catastrophes occurred in Jewish history, the original plan was to hold Yom Ha'shoah on the 14th of Nisan -- the anniversary of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising (April 19, 1943), which this memorial in Warsaw symbolizes.

Sounds perfectly logical, but it didn't work. Who could stop, mourn and remember when the country was in full swing with Passover preparations? Let's not forget that the 15th of Nisan is the first day of Passover. To paraphrase a famous American quote: "Jerusalem, we have a problem." And boy, was it a problem! First Passover, then a mere 12 days after the last day of Passover, Israel Memorial Day. What to do? Obviously sandwich it in during this season of remembering. And so, in 1953 Israel's Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion and its President Yitzhak ben-Zvi passed a law stating that Yom Ha'shoah is to be celebrated on the 27th of Nisan.

Today, the official ceremony marking the day is held at sundown, at Yad Vashem's Warsaw Ghetto Plaza. The national flag is lowered to half mast and Holocaust survivors light six torches symbolizing the six million who perished.  Promptly at 10 a.m. the next morning a siren is sounded, and the entire country comes to a standstill (more on sirens next week).  All public entertainment places are closed. Ceremonies are held in schools, military bases and public institutions. Entertainment shows on TV and radio are put on "hold"as well, substituted by documentaries on the Holocaust and low-key songs.

"B-O-R-I-N-G?" Not at all. "M-E-A-N-I-N-G-F-U-L!" Especially in this day and age of existential threats to Israel's existence. Yom Ha'shoah is more than a time to remember. It's a day to reflect.


Warsaw Ghetto Memorial Photo Credit

Bring the Custom of "Kimcha d'Pischa" to Your Seder Table

This week I'm going to put fun Passover customs to the side and focus on a more serious tradition --  Kimcha d'Pischa.


This ancient custom is traced to the Jerusalem Talmud. Its literal meaning is "flour for Passover", which is exactly what the Rabbis instructed fellow Jews to give the poor who had no means of baking their own matzot.

Today, Kimcha d'Pischa has evolved into food packages for the needy. Certainly, this is an admirable form of charity and a wonderful way to get children involved in helping the poor. Yet, you don't have to be penniless to be poor. Assistance to the needy does not begin and end with food or money. My late father began a custom in our family, which I continue to this day. At the end of synagogue services on the first and second nights of Passover, he rounded up the lonely and brought them home to sit around our Seder table. My hat goes off to my late mother who never made a fuss. Equal credit goes to my entire family, including aunts, uncles and cousins who warmly welcomed the strangers sitting next to them.

My family was not alone in this generous act. While researching Kimcha d'Pischa I found a family in Poland who did the exact same thing. I'm sure that if I made the effort, I would find others as well. Tying this tradition to the actual Seder night is easy.  You are told to pass down the story about the birth of our nation to your children. The hagaddah reminds us that we were strangers in Egypt. Connect the dots, bring strangers to your table and pass down an expanded Kimcha d'Pischa custom that will give added meaning to your seder nights and the lives of your guests.


Flour photo credit