91快活林

Don鈥檛 Be the Terumah

Feb 21, 2025 By Stephanie Ruskay | Commentary | Mishpatim

Last week 91快活林, The Rabbinical Assembly, United Synagogue Youth, United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism, Camp Ramah, the Jewish Youth Climate Movement Powered by Adamah, and Congregation Adas Israel in Washington, DC, launched Ruchot, the first ever advocacy and lobbying training for Conservative Movement teens. We gathered as an erev rav (mixed multitude) of 36 teens from 11 states (and one Canadian), 7 rabbinical students, 6 rabbis, three youth director staff, and an Israeli shaliah.鈥�

The Confusion of Revelation

Feb 14, 2025 By Barry Holtz | Commentary | Yitro

We have now come to Parashat Yitro in our annual Torah reading cycle, arguably the most significant sedra in the Humash. While Parashat Bereishit has the mythic power of the creation stories and Parashat Beshallah includes the narrative of the Exodus from Egypt and the miraculous crossing of the Sea, it is in Yitro that […]

Ariel Dunat – Senior Sermon (’25)

Feb 12, 2025 By 91快活林 Senior Sermon | Commentary | Senior Sermon | Yitro

Yitro

Aggressor and Aggrieved

Feb 7, 2025 By Dr. Phil Keisman | Commentary | Beshallah | Pesah

The Israelites find themselves in a new position in Parashat Beshallah. After generations of suffering as slaves to the pharaohs, and after decades of uncertainty about how and when their suffering might end, the Israelites are now staring backwards as their oppressors die violently.

What’s Next? New Ways of Engaging with Jewish Sources

Feb 3, 2025

91快活林 is well-known as a hub of innovative scholarship and a center of academic Jewish Studies. Recently 91快活林 has launched programs in Biblical Hebrew, Pastoral Care, and Teen Learning to name a few that offer accessible entryways into the Jewish textual tradition. Explore how 91快活林 is bringing together new modes of learning with classical sources to meet the needs of today鈥檚 world. Sessions will give participants a taste of the ideas and teaching that are central to these programs.

Digital Revelations: Jewish Text in the 21st Century

Feb 3, 2025 By David C. Kraemer | Public Event video | Video Lecture

At key moments in our history, revolutions in information technologies have affected the way we study Torah and even the way we define it. Today we are going through such a revolution with very profound consequences. What are the effects of the current revolution and how is affecting our Torah鈥攊n the classroom, in The 91快活林 Library, and beyond?

The Worst Possible Plague

Jan 31, 2025 By Rebecca Galin | Commentary | Bo | Pesah

Terror. Annoyance. Foreboding. Among the Egyptians, each plague feels so much worse than anticipated. A shared sense of eeriness seeps in as the world becomes apocalyptic. Yet, each time a plague ends, the depth of the horror dissipates, forgotten until the next one arrives鈥攎ore all-consuming and destructive than before. Locusts, darkness, death, grief. The world is overturned by a foreign God. Egyptian safety depends on the emotional whims of their leadership, plagues ending only when God softens Pharaoh鈥檚 heart.

Alicia Rothamel – Senior Sermon (’25)

Jan 29, 2025 By 91快活林 Senior Sermon | Commentary | Senior Sermon | Bo

Bo All Class of 2025 Senior Sermons

The John Leopold and Martha Dellheim Senior Recital 2025

Jan 27, 2025

Graduating Cantorial School seniorsRoseanne Benjamin,Rachel Black, andJustin Zvi Pellis, performed at an exciting evening of music and spirit, sharing their talents and their vision for the 21st-century cantorate. The recital featured a wide range of Jewish music in Hebrew and Yiddish, as well as hazzanut, musical theatre, and Israeli folk and art songs. Choral works and compositions written and composed by our graduates were also be performed. The soloists, along with guest artists, were be accompanied by pianist Joyce Rosenzweig, 91快活林 adjunct instructor, and the combined choir of the H. L. Miller Cantorial School and Debbie Friedman School of Sacred Music, conducted by Hazzan Natasha Hirschhorn.

Moses鈥檚 Lessons in Interfaith Dialogue

Jan 24, 2025 By Claire Davidson Bruder & Sherouk Ahmed | Commentary | Va'era

In the first week of 2025, the Washington Theological Consortium hosted a weeklong interfaith dialogue program at the United Lutheran Seminary in Philadelphia. Third-year 91快活林 rabbinical student and Milstein Center for Interreligious Dialogue program manager Claire Davidson Bruder participated in this program, alongside other Jewish, Christian, and Muslim seminary students. The following d鈥檝ar Torah is […]

A Turn for the Better

Jan 17, 2025 By Ariella Rosen | Commentary | Shemot

In Parashat Shemot, it appears that Moses took conscious steps to operate as a lone bystander, taking action that seems unlikely had a larger crowd been present. Raised in Pharaoh鈥檚 household, now an adult, Moses went out to walk among the Hebrew slaves as they labored. After witnessing an Egyptian beating a Hebrew slave, 鈥淗e turned this way and that and, seeing no one about, he struck down the Egyptian and hid him in the sand鈥�(Exod. 2:12).

Angel or Avatar?

Jan 10, 2025 By Benjamin D. Sommer | Commentary | Vayehi

The second of these verses is often sung aloud in a beautiful melody by Abie Rotenberg when children have their aliyah on Simhat Torah and by some parents at bedtime each night. That melody has made these words familiar to many, but their meaning is not clear. Who, exactly, does Jacob call upon to bless the lads?

A Tale of Two Dreamers

Jan 3, 2025 By Eliezer B. Diamond z”l | Commentary | Vayiggash

Yet while the incongruity of Jacob鈥檚 response to Pharaoh鈥檚 question is in some sense humorous, Jacob鈥檚 words are heart-rending. They grow out of the existential and ideological divide that separates Jacob from his son. One can speak of three differences between their perspectives.

The World that Isn鈥檛 There

Dec 27, 2024 By Joel Seltzer | Commentary | Miketz

Years ago, I read a book by the author Chuck Klosterman titled But What if We鈥檙e Wrong? The premise of the book is to attempt to 鈥渢hink about the present as if it were the past,鈥� or in other words, to consider whether despite our current devotion to rationality and the scientific method, there are aspects of our modern world about which we might be profoundly wrong?

What Makes Groups Reject Their Own?

Dec 20, 2024 By Rabbi Yael Shmilovitz | Public Event video | Video Lecture | Vayeshev

The best way to bring folks together is to give them a real good enemy. The Wizard of Oz in Wicked (2024) Joseph’s brothers resent him so much they can’t even stand the sight of him: 讜址讬执旨砖职讉谞职讗讜旨 讗止转讜止 讜职诇止讗 讬指讻职诇讜旨 讚址旨讘职旨专讜止 诇职砖指讈诇止诐 (Gen 37:4)鈥攖hey hated him so much they could not dabro leshalom. The commentators […]

Hanukkah, Jewish Power, and the Future of Israel Education

Dec 16, 2024 By Arnold M. Eisen | Public Event video | Video Lecture | Hanukkah

Every year at Hanukkah, Jews everywhere celebrate the Maccabees鈥� military uprising against oppression. But in our day, many younger American Jews are experiencing discomfort with some of the ways that鈥疘srael uses power to fight its enemies and defend its interests, which has led to decreased support and weakened connection to the State. 鈥�鈥�

How should education about Israel鈥� and advocacy on behalf of Israel鈥攃hange in coming years? What lessons should Jews take away from events on and off campus in the wake of October 7, 2023?

When Jacob Met Esau: Facing Our Fears

Dec 13, 2024 By Gordon Tucker | Commentary | Vayishlah

The story told in Parashat Vayishlahof the meeting between Jacob and Esau is well known.But a closer consideration of the details of the tale speaks to very contemporary concerns.The overall backdrop to the scene is the pervasive feeling of fear. Esau, Jacob learns, is approaching, and there are 400 men with him. Is it a lavish welcoming party? (This is not unheard of in the Middle East鈥擨 myself experienced just such a welcoming party in Egypt when I was traveling there with some American Cabinet officials in 1980.) Or is it a prelude to belligerency?Are the loud sounds they are making just the sounds of 400 excited people from a demonstrative culture, or are those cries of war?Jacob assumed the worst. He didn’t bother asking the messengers who reported Esau’s approach whether the 400 men were armed or not.Jacob reflexively got ready for battle

Communicating Across Divides

Dec 9, 2024 By Jan Uhrbach | Public Event video | Video Lecture

Argument is essential to Jewish life鈥攊t forms the basis of the Talmud and the classic Jewish joke about two Jews, three opinions. Yet today the challenge of talking across differences often seems insurmountable.

Rabbi Jan Uhrbach, director of the Block Kolker Center for Spiritual Life, shares insight into how to communicate with those whose opinion differs from yours. She will include tactics for creating structures that enable civility and explore the traps to avoid in your community.

Going Out to Meet God and History

Dec 6, 2024 By Arnold M. Eisen | Commentary | Vayetzei

In what ways do the Jewish people, the descendants of Jacob, still reside in his 鈥渉ouse鈥�? How can we, who bear the name by which Jacob will be called in next week鈥檚 Torah portion, become the Israel whom Jacob henceforth struggles to become? I鈥檇 like to suggest, using the indispensable categories for Jewish self-understanding contributed by Rabbi Joseph Soloveitchik, that Jacob is party to the 鈥渃ovenant of fate,鈥� while Israel signifies the 鈥渃ovenant of destiny.鈥� The 鈥渃ovenant of fate鈥� is imposed on Jews by history and circumstance, while the 鈥渃ovenant of destiny鈥� is one that Jews are called on to embrace in partnership with God.

Gleanings from 鈥淶ionism: Today, Tomorrow, and Beyond鈥�

Dec 2, 2024 By Gordon Tucker | Public Event video | Video Lecture

How is Zionism finding expression in our communities? What are the challenges and opportunities in educating younger generations around these ideas? Rabbi Gordon Tucker, Vice Chancellor of Religious Life and Engagement, shares his thoughts from the convening and the new models of engagement with Israel that emerged from our conversations.