Rabbi Kleinbaum on Resilience; Exploring Memory in the Amidah
by Rabbi Nathan Kamesar First of all, I want to make sure you mark your calendars for the Shabbat of Friday evening, December 6 and Saturday morning, December 7, when a friend and teacher of mine, Rabbi Sharon Kleinbaum, will be the Scholar-in-Residence at Society Hill Synagogue. Rabbi Kleinbaum was CBST’s first staff […]
The Election and Our Shared Resilience
by Rabbi Nathan Kamesar As I’ve written about before, to be Jewish, to be in relationship to the Jewish people, entails a Jewish identity that is concerned not exclusively with traditionally “religious” considerations, but with the grand sweep of history, too: with the way in which the Jewish people and the loved ones in relationship […]
Shabbat as Our Anchor and Honoring Our Community
by Rabbi Nathan Kamesar We’re in the middle of a trying week, with a highly consequential election nearly upon us, settling down from the rhythms of the Jewish holiday season back into the traditional rhythms of our year where, week in and week out, the primary anchor we have as a spiritual community, to quiet […]
Sukkot, Voting, and the Call to Build a Better World Together
by Rabbi Nathan Kamesar We are amidst the joyous season of Sukkot — Sukkot is Zman Simhatenu (literally: the time of our joy), the season which immediately follows the Yamim Nora’im, the Days of Awe, or, alternatively, the Days of Intensity. Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur are days that are felt intensely: we gather, we […]
God’s Humanity: Strengthening the Relationship
Yom Kippur 5785 by Rabbi Nathan Kamesar I want to share with you one of my favorite, and one of the most personally impactful, rabbinic teachings that I’ve ever encountered. An allusion is made to it in the final blessing of services today, and if you were reading closely just now in the margins […]