From the Bimah: Jewish Lessons for Life

Do you know somebody, or are you somebody, who walks around carrying a heavy weight?  It could be a secret.  It could be a regret.  It could be a mistake.  It could be a broken relationship.  It could be a rift in the family.  It could be some small thing—the Yiddish term is faribble— that grows into a big thing.  And you don’t know quite how to deal with this he...

Once upon a time there was a woman named Olivia who was married to her husband Lee.  They lived in Los Angeles in a neighborhood known as Pacific Palisades.  They were blessed to have two sons.  The family joined a Conservative synagogue in west L.A. named Adat Shalom.  Both boys went to the religious school, and they both celebrated their Bar Mitzvah there.  There is a pi...

On February 8, 2020, we celebrated a very special moment in the Torah, a very musical moment in Jewish biblical history. On Shabbat Shirah we read the Song of the Sea and our service included extraordinary music to celebrate Moses and Miriam leading the Israelites across the Sea of Reeds (The Red Sea) and out of Egypt. Cantor Rosemberg delivered the Shabbat Sermon.  His topic was Jewish Itali...

What do the late Philip Roth, one of the greatest writers of our time, and Steph Curry, one of the greatest basketball players of our time, have in common? Philip Roth was once asked by Robert Siegel, an NPR host, how he was able to write so many award-winning novels.  Roth answered that there is no secret.  Rather, he works all day, every day, six or seven days a week.  He offered...

On September 26th, an officer from the Los Angeles Police Department was walking through the Wilshire-Normandie subway station in Koreatown, when a beautiful voice caught him off guard. Ahead stood a slight, middle-aged woman. Her shoulder-length blond hair was tied up in pigtails, her clothes swallowed her tiny figure. Her right-hand rested on a pushcart, filled to the brim with personal belongin...

Jon Levenson, a professor of Bible at Harvard, offers a rich hypothetical that I have shared with you before, and which I share again now because it goes to the heart of the meaning of the holiday of Thanksgiving. Imagine you are driving to the airport on the Wednesday afternoon before Thanksgiving.  It is  4:00, bumper to bumper traffic.  You are in the tunnel and, oh no, your car...

I want to play a new game with you this morning, Jewish trivial pursuit.  I am going to ask you two simple questions about the Hebrew Bible, and the winner gets a free bagel at kiddush this morning. First question, what character in the Hebrew Bible is most associated with blessing?  The word blessing, berakhah , is prominently and repeatedly associated with his story? Second question, w...

Years ago, when I was living in Israel, I remember going to visit the Tomb of the Patriarchs (Ma’arat haMachpelah) in Hevron. I remember feeling totally overwhelmed by the sheer number of visitors and by all the sounds. There were tourists snapping their cameras and talking loudly about the history of the place and about plans for lunch.  There were what felt like hundreds of Orthodox Jewish...

Do you remember where you were when you first learned of the massacre at the Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh last year, a year ago tomorrow, October 27, 2018?  I remember exactly where I was.  I was right here.  It was Shabbat morning, in the middle of services, and from the bimah I could see a restless energy, an edge, in the people in the pews that I had never seen before.&nb...

Is it a good thing to go through life always feeling that you have something left to prove?  Or do you ever reach a point where the healthier move is to say: you know what, I have nothing left to prove? You are a tenured professor in your chosen field for 20 years.  You have authored definitive works in your field.  You cannot get fired except for moral turpitude.  When you go...

Next time you are hungry, next time you need a quick pick up, consider eating a protein bar known as an Rx Bar.  It comes in a variety of attractive packages and delicious flavors.  Blueberry, Maple Sea Salt, Mango Pineapple, Chocolate Sea Salt, Chocolate Chip, to name just a few.  I live on them, though I am not getting a commission from the Rx Bar company for this sermon. Follow t...

A rabbi once heard about a preacher who gained notoriety by giving the world’s  longest  sermon.  Not wanting to duplicate that feat, and, perhaps more importantly, not wanting to put everyone in shul to sleep, the rabbi decided to preach the world’s  shortest  sermon instead. In the weeks leading up to the holidays, he shared the big news with the congregation in e-blasts...

Pastor Jeremy D. Battle, from the Western Avenue Baptist Church is a third-generation pastor hailing from Brighton, Alabama. Pastor Battle lives by the personal mantra, “Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways acknowledge Him, and He shall direct your paths.” (Proverbs 3:5-6) Tune in to hear more about Pastor Jeremy Battle in his own wor...

Once, there lived amongst us a man with the stature of a prophet, a man with the moral vision of Isaiah, Jeremiah and Ezekiel.   His name was Elie Wiesel, and he taught for years just a few miles from here at Boston University. In his book Witness , which is about Elie Wiesel’s teaching at BU, Ariel Burger, his student for 25 years, tells a story that Elie Wiesel shared in class.  T...

I want to talk about two words I have never uttered from this bimah. Taylor Swift .  Taylor Swift is dramatically germane to the moment in which we now find ourselves. As you know, Taylor Swift is one of the best-selling, most popular singer songwriters of all time.  She has sold more than 50 million albums.  She has won 10 Grammy Awards.  Her first five albums were all huge, r...

Tune in as Rav-Hazzan Aliza Berger interviews Rabbi Becky Silverstein on his upcoming Parshat Nitzvaim “Entering into a Brit Hashem, Together,” and his journey to becoming a Rabbi. Rabbi Becky will be joining us on Shabbat morning, September 28th. You can learn more here https://www.templeemanuel.com/event/entering-into-a-brit-hashem-together/

Recently I came upon an article in the New York Times which took my breath away titled, “He was shot and paralyzed 37 years ago. That’s not how the story ends.” Thirty-seven years ago, thirteen-year-old Jeff Williams was hanging out with his brother and a friend, Maury, in the Bronx when the unthinkable happened.  Maury got out his uncle’s gun and started showing it off: spinning the chamber...

Tune is as Rabbi Michelle Robinson interviews Robert Mnookin, author of "The Jewish American Paradox: Embracing Choice in a Changing World." Robert Mnookin is an American lawyer, author, and the Samuel Williston Professor of Law at Harvard Law School. He will be kicking off our year of adult learning at Temple Emanuel on Sunday, September 15th. Check out his book and join in on a lecture and Q&amp...

Rabbi Joseph Telushkin authored a book called Jewish Humor: What the Best Jewish Jokes Say About the Jews.   In a section about parents and children, he shares the following: Two Jewish women who haven’t see each other in twenty years run into each other on the street. “How’s your daughter Deborah?” the first woman asks, “the one who marriedthat lawyer.” “They were divorced,” the second...

Whenever there is a mass shooting in our country, including last Saturday in El Paso and Dayton, there is this civic ritual where leaders of both parties say that they are sending thoughts and prayers to the victims and their families.  How are we to understand this?  Is this helpful? There is a cynical read. We send thoughts and prayers in lieu of action .  We send thoughts and pra...

The other day, I was listening to an episode of This American Life titled “Save the Girl,” documenting all sorts of crazy stories of people swooping in to save damsels in distress, when I heard the most unbelievable story. Yong Xiong grew up in Laos, part of the ethnic Hmong minority. A few years ago, she met the man of her dreams at a New Year’s party. They fell in love. They decided to get marri...

When I was still swiping for dates, I had a strict no-fisherman policy. Any time I saw someone posed with a large, freshly caught fish, I swiped no. No matter how cute they were, no matter how smart or Jewishly engaged, I was convinced there was no way I would ever fall in love with someone who liked to torture small, scaly animals for sport. Follow this link to view the sermon and watch the live...

Sergei Rachmaninoff was arguably one of the best pianists ever. He was a virtuoso, with giant hands that could easily grasp complex harmonies and move with lightning speed up and down the keyboard. He was not only a performer but also a compositional genius; he could coax the most nuanced sounds from the piano. Maybe because his own internal landscape was filled with dramatic ups and downs, or may...

Growing up, my Aunt Vanessa was my hero. Whenever we saw her, it seemed like she was just coming back from some herculean triathlon or from an epic marathon through the Colorado mountains. She was fearless. Every year, she would take us to the amusement parks and would gladly ride all the scariest rides with my sister and younger cousin. (I never had the guts to join them.) In the kitchen, she had...

Ugandan Human Rights Activist, Qwin Mbabazi, Celebrates One Year of Political Asylum in Boston. Join Rabbi Wes Gardenswartz and Rav Hazzan Aliza Berger as they sit down with Qwin who shares her story of life as a LGBTQ activist in Uganda and how she found refuge in America. She was persecuted as a child because she was born left-handed in a culture where left-hand dominance is considered the work...