With the High Holidays and even most of Sukkot behind us, we are left with two major tasks. The first one is to be happy. In some ways it is one of the stranger commandments that we come across. Why should we have to be commanded by the Torah to rejoice?

Ideas for High Holy Day sermons begin to circulate in my mind as soon as Yom Kippur ends. And yet I find it very difficult to get those ideas onto paper and into finished form until the High Holy Day season truly approaches. Even though I know rabbis who are able to write their sermons in June, it never feels right to me. I need the sense of an impending fall season. I need to be more aware of the symbols that connote the High Holy Days.

No Rabbi's Message this month.

Some years ago, there was a British TV show my mother just adored. It aired in the U.S. under the title, “Are You Being Served?” It centered around the employees at an English department store. It had quite the cast of characters. If a customer came in, they would greet them with the title words of the show, “Are you being served?”

Tikkun Leil Shavuot - Studying for the Giving of the Torah

Why is the festival of Shavuot called "the time of the giving of our Torah" and not the time of the receiving of our Torah? Because the giving of the Torah happened at one specified time, but the receiving of the Torah happens at every time and in every generation.
—Rabbi Meir Alter of Ger

Each generation must make its own way back to Sinai, must stand under the mountain and re-appropriate and

Some years ago, there was a British comedy which aired in the U.S. called, “Are You Being Served?” It centered on the employees at an English department store. They were quite a cast of characters. Customers were greeted with the title words, “Are you being served?”

The festival of Sukkot, the Feast of Tabernacles (Booths), begins on Monday night, October 17th. This last of the three pilgrimage festivals was so important in ancient days that it was simply called, “The Holiday.” When Yom Kippur ends, the tradition says that one should start the building of the Sukkah by driving at least one nail into the wood to begin the construction. Imagine, as soon as we are done afflicting our souls, we turn our attention to a holiday known as the “Time of Our Rejoicing.”

It has often struck me as odd that the Jewish New Year comes in the fall. While it is true that as a demarcation of one point on the circular orbit of the sun, any choice might be arbitrary, knowing that Nisan, the month of spring (Aviv), is the first month on the calendar has not made it seem any less strange that we celebrate the New Year in the fall. Spring is the season of rebirth, of flowers and planting. It is the season which seems to hold the most potential, the most hope. It bursts with energy after the survival of a barren winter.

Peace. Sometimes it can feel like peace is a bit like the weather. Everyone talks about it, but no one does anything about it.

At the end of the Passover Seder, when we are theoretically feeling happy (four cups of wine), satisfied (so much matza and food), and proud (because we made it through to the end), there is a somewhat self congratulatory statement: We have completed the ritual in full, and its purposes have been revealed. The Seder is over. Once again we have relived the saga of our journey from slavery to freedom, from ignorance to enlightenment. We allow ourselves a sigh of relief.