Community Blog
01/10/2020 11:28:41 AM
Welcome! Check out Rabbi Lizz's divrei Torah and other community updates here.
Chayei Sarah: Trans Day of Remembrance
11/25/2024 07:55:36 PM
This week's d'var Torah was written by Ner Shalom member Percy Brooks
Parshat Chayei Sarah is well known for its quirks and oddities. First, being titled...Read more...
Community Care is Holy
11/15/2024 02:34:42 PM
Shabbat Shalom! This week’s Torah portion is Parashat Vayera, which includes the tale of the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, Isaac’s birth and near-sacrifice, and an odd sidequest between Abraham and Abimelech about the ownership of land.
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Go to Therapy
11/01/2024 02:39:20 PM
Shabbat Shalom. This week’s Torah portion is Parashat Noach, and of course this service honors the mitzvah of tza’ar ba’alei chayim - the commandment to forbid the suffering of animals. We praise Noah for his faith in God and his saving of the animals, and we say special...Read more...
Choosing Life, Choosing Death
10/11/2024 02:18:10 PM
Shabbat Shalom v’Yom Tov. This morning, we read the words of Deuteronomy 30, “I have put before you life and death, blessing and curse. Choose life – if you and your offspring would live.” Rabbi Eliezer Davidovitz, an early 20th century Slovakian rabbi, asked, “Is there a person who would choose death?” In our new prayer books, Rabbi Josh Zweiback, a...Read more...
Let there be peace on earth
10/11/2024 01:37:14 PM
Groovy Teshuvy, y’all. What a year this week has been. What a decade this year has been. What a millennium the past four and a half years have been. It feels like we have been living through one global or national crisis after another for so long with far fewer rests between them than we used. Maybe it’s the rate of news media now, or maybe civilization...Read more...
Passing the Torch in Song
10/05/2024 08:34:50 AM
Shabbat Shalom! This week’s Torah portion is Parashat Ha’azinu, Moses’s final song as he signs off his last shift as leader of the Israelites. At the end of the parasha, he is called up to Mount Nebo by God and he dies quietly and alone, so that none may find his grave and turn it into an idol...Read more...
Akeidah: Turning Sand into pearls
10/01/2024 05:54:09 PM
Shana Tova! Every year, we spend all of the High Holy Day season talking about repentance and forgiveness, yet for Rosh HaShana we read stories about parents doing unforgivable things to children and not even trying to do teshuvah. In the traditional first day reading, we read that Sarah insists that Hagar and Ishmael be exiled from their home, and Abraham complies. In the past, I’ve thought...Read more...
God is the scaffolding but we’re the lumber that builds the house
09/27/2024 05:11:45 PM
Shabbat Shalom! This week we read the double portion of Parashat Nitzavim-Vayelech, and it is our final Shabbat before the new year. Nitzavim is one of my favorite Parshiyot (here’s a challenge for every week Shabbat attendees - count how many times I say that in a Torah cycle), as...Read more...
Dichotomies and Deliberations
09/20/2024 04:06:27 PM
Shabbat Shalom! This week’s Torah portion is Parashat Ki Tavo, in which we hear about the commandment to bring the first fruits of our harvest as a sacrifice to God, the tithes that must go to the priests and to the needy, and the blessings and curses that will be bestowed upon the Israelites according to their...Read more...
Judgement, Justice, and Judaism
09/06/2024 04:22:07 PM
Shabbat Shalom! This week’s Torah portion is Parashat Shoftim, in which we learn about some of the establishments of legal proceedings in Judaism. Shoftim means “judges” and much of the parasha is dedicated to explaining the strata and hierarchy of leadership in the Jewish community, and how we...Read more...
Think Global, Act Local
08/30/2024 01:15:03 PM
Shabbat Shalom! Tonight we honor those within our own community who have devoted themselves to jobs of service: First Responders, Peace Keepers, members of the military, and committed and honest civil servants. The Torah portion this week is Parashat Re’eh, which reiterates some of the greatest hits of the...Read more...
A New School Year
08/23/2024 12:15:59 PM
Shabbat Shalom! This week’s Torah portion is Parashat Ekev, which continues Moses’s teachings to the people of Israel as they prepare for the next chapter on their journey.
On Sunday, our Religious...Read more...
Board Installation Shabbat
08/23/2024 12:14:21 PM
*This d'var Torah is posted a week late. It was written and delivered for Shabbat 8/16*
Shabbat Shalom! This...Read more...
Ethics, Legacies, and Patriarchy
08/09/2024 03:47:07 PM
As a part of my Masters in Jewish Studies, I took an online class called Ethical Dilemmas, which was about exploring modern social norms through traditional Jewish ethical lenses. There were some annoying debates in the class forums about acceptance of LGBTQIA Jews, egalitarian Judaism, and...Read more...
Amen, v'amen, v'amen
08/02/2024 08:37:36 PM
Shabbat Shalom! This week’s Torah portion is Parashat Matot-Masei, which closes out our Book of Numbers. Without a ton of narrative, we still get a lot of movement in this parasha: Some interesting laws regarding vows that set up our culture of legal realities in rabbinic Judaism, a genocide...Read more...
Jeremiah had a Bullhorn
07/26/2024 05:18:51 PM
Shabbat Shalom! This week’s Torah portion is Parashat Pinchas, which includes the blessing of the priest Pinchas, who is being rewarded for murdering some interfaith couples (Big Yikes), then discusses the Daughters of Tzelophechad (Yay Feminism), moves on to Moses appointing his successor (hooray...Read more...
Complaints, confidence, and conviction
06/21/2024 04:03:03 PM
Shabbat Shalom! This week’s Torah portion is Parashat Beha’alot’cha, which has several vignettes of life in the desert: the mounting of the lamps in the Tabernacle, how the Tabernacle was broken down and built back up along the Israelite’s journeys, how the Levites were consecrated for service...Read more...
Bamidbar and Bat Mitzvah
06/07/2024 02:09:20 PM
Shabbat Shalom! Tonight is the 46th night of the omer - shisha v’arba’im yom, sh’haim shisha shavuot v’arba’ah la’omer. The Kabbalistic realm of this day of the omer is Netzach (persistence, eternity) within Malchut/Shekhina (sovereignty, queendom). This week’s Torah portion is Parashat Bamidbar, my...Read more...
Obedience not obsequiesness
06/01/2024 08:38:33 AM
Shabbat Shalom! Count the Omer - tisha ushloshim yom, shehaim chamisha shavuot v’arbaah laomer - and the kabbalistic realm of this day is Netzach shebeyesod, Ambition in foundation. This week’s Torah portion is Parashat Bechukotai, in which we are promised blessings and curses (mostly...Read more...
Disability Torah
05/17/2024 03:11:29 PM
Shabbat Shalom. Today is Day 25 of the Omer, chamisha v’esrim yom, sh’heim shalosh shavuot v’arba’ah yamim laomer. The Kabbalistic realm for this day of the Omer is Netzah (persistence, eternity) within Netzach. This week’s Torah portion is Parashat Emor, which starts out with more...Read more...
Sisterhood Shabbat
05/10/2024 04:55:12 PM
A D'var Torah by Sisterhood Member Michele Jung
Shabbat Shalom! Good Shabbos! Tonight’s Sisterhood Service has a Barbie theme, so you may be wondering what a plastic doll or the Barbie movie has to do with Sisterhood, Judaism, or this week’s Torah portion. You may be thinking she is meshugana. Don’t worry, I don’t know that much Yiddish.
Barbie was created by a Jewish woman, Ruth Handler. She...Read more...
Priests, Pregnancy, and Precarity
04/12/2024 08:24:13 AM
Shabbat Shalom. This week’s Torah portion is Parashat Tazria, which deals with ritual impurities, especially those which come from childbirth. I don’t know that I’ve ever noticed before this year how much of the Torah really deals with pregnancy and childbirth, both physical...Read more...
Priests, Pigs, and Principles
04/06/2024 09:02:03 AM
Shabbat Shalom! This week’s Torah portion is Parashat Shemini, in which the Mishkan is finally ready to receive its first official sacrifices, but two of Aaron’s sons bring an improper sacrifice and are smote. Then in the controlled chaos that follows, as Moses tries to resume the sacrificial...Read more...
Priests, Queens, and Clothes
03/15/2024 05:07:35 PM
Shabbat Shalom! This week’s Torah portion is Parashat Pekudei, in which the priestly vestments are described once again, as the priests finally done them, and Moses anoints the finished Tabernacle and the dressed-up priests. We don’t often get to learn about Pekudei on it’s own, since it is the second of a double portion most years, and we tend...Read more...
Moons, Menstruation, and the Mishkan
03/08/2024 04:42:41 PM
Shabbat Shalom! This week’s Torah portion is Parashat Vayekhel, more of the counting of items the Israelites bring to the building of the Mishkan. As we know from the Alicia Jo Rabins song I like to sing this time of year, wise-hearted people of all the tribes of Israel brought what they had to build and beautify the dwelling place of HaShem. Early in the...Read more...
Idolatry, Security, and Surety
03/01/2024 01:30:13 PM
Shabbat Shalom! This week’s Torah portion is Parashat Ki Tisa, the story of the infamous Golden Calf. In this week’s (M)Oral Torah from T’ruah opens with a story from Rabbi Andrea Goldstein recalling a Bar Mitzvah student who compared the Golden Calf to a small child’s security blanket. Just like this other Rabbi Goldstein, I also feel struck...Read more...
Every Shabbat is ReproShabbat
02/03/2024 02:09:34 PM
Shabbat Shalom! This week’s Torah portion is Parashat Yitro, in which Moses’s father-in-law tells him he needs to set up a governmental structure to share the work load with, because trying to attend to all of the community’s needs alone will only cause harm to himself and to the community. Later in the Parasha, Moses climbs up Mount Sinai to...Read more...
YEAR OF THE SEDER
01/19/2024 01:42:55 PM
Shabbat Shalom! This week’s Torah portion is Parashat Bo, the last of the plagues and the beginning of the flight from Egypt into the wilderness. It contains some key verses that appear in our Passover Haggadahs, not just because Passover commemorates this story, but because the Torah itself...Read more...
Plagues, Compassion, and Responsibility
01/12/2024 03:33:43 PM
Shabbat Shalom! This week’s Torah portion is Parashat Va’Era, the telling of the first 7 of the plagues. Toward the beginning of the Parasha, 7:19 says: G‑d spoke to Moses: “Say to Aaron, ‘Take your rod, and stretch out your hand upon the waters of Egypt’”. A somewhat esoteric Midrash known as the Mishnat Rabbi Eliezer explains this verse: “The first three...Read more...
Extending our Reach
01/05/2024 01:12:33 PM
Shabbat Shalom! This week’s Torah portion is Parashat Shemot, the beginning of the Book of Exodus. In Hebrew, Shemot actually means Names because it starts out with a listing of the sons of Jacob, the predecessors of the Tribes of Israel. Parashat Shemot is a surprisingly jam-packed Torah portion, with so much happening somehow despite the huge time jumps. The Israelites are enslaved,...Read more...