May 2, 2015 13 Iyar, 5775
Omer Count: Day 28
Friday Night Mincha: 6:30 PM
Shabbat Candle Lighting 7:36PM
Morning Services: 9:00 AM
Shabbat Mincha & Mussar – 7:25 PM
Shabbat ends: 8:37PM
Shul Announcements
Acharei Mot Kedoshim
Page 636 (Torah)
Page 1173 (Haftarah)
Mazel Tov Schmelkin Family!
Thank you to Steven and Rachel Schmelkin for sponsoring
today’s Kiddush in honor of their daughter’s Baby Naming!
Tzeitchem L’Shalom to the London Family!
We wish the London Family farewell and
best of luck as they move away from
Randolph to start a new chapter in life.
May Birthdays & Anniversaries
 May Birthdays: Aaron Chevinsky (2nd), Marisa
Kwoczka (2nd), Hank London (2nd), Sharon Smith
(2nd), Javid Hakakian (5th), Ariel Scheer (5th),
th
Jonathan Bravman (6th), Debra Turitz (6 ), Paul
th
th
Manis (7 ), Carl Rosen (8th), Pamela Gelbert (9 ),
th
Samantha Messer (9 ), Steve Levy (10th), Beena
Levy (11th), Rich Rosenberg (11th), Bryce Zwickel
th
th
th
(11 ), Heather Cohen (12 ), Judith Heistein (12 ),
th
th
Deborah Goldwasser (15 ), Tamar Winters (15 ),
th
th
Etti Zeldis (16 ), Paula Antin (17 ), Elana Winters
th
th
(17 ), Jason Cohen (12 ), Henry Goldwasser
th
th
th
(18 ), Sherry Pollack (18 ), Debby Brafman (20 ),
th
th
Emily Hanrahan (20 ), Jeremy Weiss (20 ),
th
th
Allyssa Gresser (26 ), Justin Shulman (26 ), Ryan
th
th
Winter (26 ), Oritte Bendory (28 ), Rachel Brandtth
th
Greenfeld (28 ), Sarah Dabah (28 ), Louise
th
th
Levine (28 ), Yonaton Tammam (28 ), Shayna
th
th
Chevinsky (29 ), Daniel Spielman (29 ), Daniel
th
th
Geary (30 ), Andrew Hanrahan ( 30 ), Aaron
st
st
Nessel (31 ), Zachary Nessel (31 ), Ron
st
Rubenstein (31 ).
 May Anniversaries: Richard & Fawn Zwickel
th
th
(17 ), Jeff & Mimi Czeisler (20 ), Joel & Marla
th
th
Katz (25 ), Alan & Jennifer Gellerstein (26 ),
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Barry Ginsberg & Lauren Cooper (28 ), Stuart &
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Carol Kerievsky (28 ), Rav Menashe & Donna
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East (29 ).
MFJC INFO ~ www.mtfjc.org
Address: 1209 Sussex Tpk., Randolph 07869
Phone Numbers: Office: 973 895 2100
Rabbi: 973 895 2103; Rabbi’s Cell: 201 923 1107
Rabbi’s Office Hours: Mornings: Tues - Fri, 9-1PM;
afternoons/evenings: 3-6PM; or anytime by appt
Menashe East [email protected]
Office Hours: M-Th, 10- 5PM; F, 10-4PM
David Paris [email protected]
This Week:
May
May
May
May
May
May
2:
3:
3:
5:
7:
7:
Schmelkin Baby Naming
Pesach Sheni; Passover Makeup day
Talmud Study, 9AM
Hebrew School Open House – tell your friends
Thursday Torah, 10AM
Lag Ba’omer Bonfire, Magician and BBQ,
6PM, shul Parking lot…$5/person
Upcoming Events:
May 9: We-Drash – Geoff Lampel and Janet Tammam give a
duo-Drash for Parshat Emor
May 9: April/May Combined Shared Kiddush, contact the
office to be a sponsor.
May 10: Mother’s Day
May 10: Talmud Study, 9AM
May 12: Hebrew School Open House – tell your friends
May 13: Meeting of the Board of Directors, 8PM
May 16: Shabbat Chazzak & Shabbat Mevarchim for Sivan
May 16: Yom Yerushalayim Melavah Malka, details tbd…
May 17: Yom Yerushalayim cont…
May 19: Rosh Chodesh Sivan; Traditional Minyan @
GRTWA, 820AM
May 19: Last Day of Hebrew School; sign up for next year
May 23: Shavuot – sign up to teach a class for our late-night
learning; RSVP for a shul-made dinner;$20/person
May 25: Yizkor & Megillat Ruth – readers sign up…
May 26: NY Mets Israel Appreciation night, 710PM
May 31: Israel Day Parade, join the MFJC Banner, Details
tba
June 2: Interfaith Holocaust Memorial, MFJC, 730PM
June 8: Annual General Meeting, 8PM
MFJC SERVICE TIMES:
Weekday – 6:45AM
Weeknight – Upon Request (Yahrzeit)
Sunday & National Holidays – 8:00AM
Shabbat Services – 9:00AM
Fri Eve: Summer – 6:30PM; Winter – Sunset
MFJC Youth Program Invites You to Celebrate
Lag B’Omer Bon Fire BBQ and Festivities
Thursday, May 7th @6:00PM
BBQ @ 6:30PM
@ Mount Freedom Jewish Center – 1209 Sussex Trpk, Randolph
Special Guest Entertainer:
Steve the Magician
$5/person
RSVP to [email protected]
Celebrate Shavuot with Mt. Freedom Jewish Center
Festive Holiday Meal, All Night Study, Games for kids, Ice Cream
and more!
May 23rd, 24th & 25th
@ 1209 Sussex Turnpike
Randolph, NJ
Come for a Shul cooked Shavuot dinner, May 23rd
$20pp and $15 for kids under 13. BYOB!
Saturday, May 23rd
8:30 PM Evening Services
8:58 Candle Lighting
9:00 PM Shul Cooked Dairy Dinner -- BYOB
10:00 PM Let the Studying Begin!
1st Session: Rabbi East leads the opening discussion
Followed by a variety of classes led by Congregants – sign up today!!!
Treats all night long to feed your body while you nourish your soul!
Sunday, May 24th
4:00 AM Early Morning Services
9:00 AM Regular Morning Services
11:00 AM Jewpardy & Ice Cream Party
7:00 PM Afternoon/Evening Services
8:59 PM Candle Lighting
Monday, May 25th
9:00 AM Morning Services
10:30 AM Youth Aliyah @ Sinai/Bima
11:00 AM YIZKOR
11:30 AM Reading of Ruth
5:00 PM Women’s Discussion of Ruth
hosted by Donna East, 1 Nuko Terr
8:00 PM Afternoon Services
9:00 PM Yom Tov ends
Caregiver Support Group
Are you caring for a loved with Alzheimer’s or
Related Dementia Disease?
This group will offer:
 Emotional and educational support
 An opportunity to network with other caregivers
DATES:
Last Thursday of the month - May 28, June 25, July 30,
August 27, September 24
TIME:
1:00 – 2:00 pm
LOCATION:
Mt. Freedom Jewish Center
1209 Sussex Turnpike, Randolph, NJ
For more information about the Caregiver Support Group,
please call 973-765-9050
There is no charge for this program.
This group will be co-facilitated by:
Alyson Kaplan, LSW & Alexandra Nagy, LSW, Jewish Family Service of MetroWest
WEEKLY PARSHA
By Rabbi Dov Linzer, Rosh HaYeshiva and Dean
of Yeshivat Chovevei Torah Rabbinical School
_________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Parshat Acharei Mot - Kedoshim
|
May 1, 2015 / 13 Iyar 5775
Two Types of Kedusha
Parashat Acharei Mot-Kedoshim represents the transition from the first half of Vayikra to the second. The
first half is focused solely on the Temple, its holiness and the sacrifices conducted therein. TazriaMetzorah, last week's double parasha, continued this theme, detailing the various ritual impurities,
the tumot, that would require a person to be sent out of the camp and prevent his or her access to the
Temple. This week, in Acharei Mot, the Torah limits access not to the Temple itself, but to the Holy of
Holies.
"Speak to Aharon your brother, that he may not enter at all times into the Holy... Only with
this may Aharon enter into the Holy" (Vayikra, 16:2-3). Aharon is singled out because he is
the Kohen Gadol; normalkohanim are never allowed to enter. Even Aharon is only allowed
to enter on Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the year, and only after completing exacting
sacrificial rites.
Clearly, gaining access to the Temple, the place of God's presence, is not a trivial matter. With the
Temple so inaccessible - at times both geographically and ritually - it would stand to reason that a person
may want to reach out to God by bringing a sacrifice without the Temple. This option is denied as well, as
the bringing of such sacrifices is prohibited in the middle of Acharei Mot. That the first half of Vayikra
ends with this prohibition underscores just how difficult it is to connect to God through the Temple.
Beginning the second half of Vayikra, Kedoshim presents a radically different approach to holiness and
to connecting with God. "Speak to the entire congregation of Israel and say to them: Be holy, for I the
Lord your God am holy" (Vayikra, 19:2). To access the holy is not to enter the Temple, it is to strive to
become holy. To connect to God is not to enter into the Holy of Holies, but to strive to be like God. It is
through such striving that we actualize the holiness, the divine, the tzelem elohim, that is in each and
every one of us.
There are, then, two types of holiness, two types of kedusha. There is the kedusha of Acharei Mot and
the kedusha of kedoshim ti'hiyu, "you shall be holy." In other words, there is a kedusha that conceives of
God as residing in a place, and there is a kedusha that perceives of God as residing in each and every
person.
The first represents the attempt to draw close to God, to enter into God's abode. It is thus a kedusha that
is restrictive, one of limited access. For what human being can leave this world and enter into the place
where God dwells? The second is holiness whose goal is not to leave this world to be close to God. Its
goal is to actualize the divine within us, to bring God and Godliness into this world. It is a kedusha that is
accessible by all.
Kedoshim opens not with "daber el Aharon achikha," "Speak to Aharon your brother," but "daber el kol
adat benei Yisrael," "speak to the entire congregation of Israel." All of you - man, woman, child, ritually
pure, and ritually impure - each one of you can become holy, can become like God. This is a holiness
that includes rituals and rites to be sure, but it is also a holiness of morality, a holiness that touches on
every act, religious or interpersonal. It touches every detail of how we live our lives.
How does one live such a life of holiness? One strives for Godliness in all actions. One does not only
connect to God during ritual or "religious" activity; one also brings an awareness of God into his or her
interpersonal exchanges.Kedoshim ti'hiyu is a holiness that demands ethical behavior in all spheres.
Thus we find that Kedoshim opens with two mitzvot: the mitzvah to have awe and respect for one's
parents and the mitzvah to keep Shabbat, an ethical commandment and a religious one. The foundation
of our interpersonal behavior in life is laid in the home; it starts with and is shaped by how children
interact with their parents. And the foundation of holiness is not the Temple with its difficult and limited
access; it is Shabbat, a staple of our week, a holiness that all can experience, a welcoming of the Divine
Presence into our homes.
The rest of Kedoshim presents a dense and varied listing of mitzvot, with almost every other verse
ending with the refrain, "ani Hashem eloheikhem," "I am the Lord your God." This echoes the opening
verse, "Be holy, for holy am I the Lord your God." The Torah is telling us: This is what it means to be
holy, to be like God. If we are to live a life of this type of holiness, then we must bring God into our
harvesting of grain, our buying and selling, our hiring and paying of workers, our dealing with the
disadvantaged, our speaking of others, and our feelings towards others. To have access to God
everywhere means that we cannot compartmentalize our religious life away from our "normal" life. God
can be found in every activity, thus we must strive to find God in all parts of our lives.
In his introduction to Vayikra, Ramban notes that the purpose of constructing the Mishkan was to
recreate Har Sinai in the Israelite camp. Just as God's presence came down onto Har Sinai, God's
presence filled the Mishkan. Just as boundaries were set around the mountain to prevent the people from
"bursting through," impure people were kept outside the Temple. And, one might add, just as Moshe and
Aharon alone were allowed to go to the top of the mountain, only Aharon is allowed to enter into the Holy
of Holies.
So ends Ramban's parallel, but one thing is missing. For after God descends on Har Sinai, something
important happens: the Torah is given. The purpose of the descent was not so that we might go up the
mountain to draw close to God's presence; the purpose of the descent was so that God may command
us in the mitzvot of the Torah.
The parallel to the Giving of the Torah is not the Mishkan; it is Parashat Kedoshim. Many commentators
have already noted that the mitzvot at the beginning of Kedoshim parallel the Ten. More than that,
parashat Kedoshim serves as the culmination and translation of all that came before. The purpose of the
Mishkan was not for the sake of "with this Aharon may enter the sanctum". Its purpose was so that God
may dwell in our midst, so that we can live a life of holiness. The kedushaof Acharei Mot serves to bring
about the kedusha of Kedoshim.
Even in our religious strivings, as we try to come close to God, the ultimate kedusha is a life of mitzvot, a
life of actualizing the divine within us; a life in which God is accessible to every person, a life in which
God is present in all of our actions.
Shabbat Shalom!
Shabbat Shalom
Parshat Acharei Mot - Kedoshim (Leviticus 16:1 – 20:27)
Efrat, Israel – “You must surely instruct your colleague, so that you not bear the brunt of his sin” (Leviticus 19:17)
Judaism teaches us that “every Israelite is responsible for the other.” Except for the State of Israel, where the Jewish
population continues to grow, Jews in the rest of the world suffer from internal “hemorrhaging.” How do we “inspire” our
Jewish siblings so that they remain within —or return to—our Jewish peoplehood? We have recently celebrated the festival of
Passover, and we are “counting” each day towards the festival of Shavuot. The Hebrew term for the counting issefira, a word
pregnant with meaning. Its root noun is the Hebrew sappir, which is the dazzling blue—as the Bible records immediately
following the Revelation at Sinai: “Moses and Aaron, Nadab and Abihu and the seventy elders of Israel then went up. And
they saw the God of Israel, beneath whose ‘feet’ was something akin to the creation of a sapphire stone, like the essence of the
heavens as to its purity” (Exodus 24: 9-10).
From this perspective, the days of our counting are a period of spiritual growth and development, of a connection between
Passover and Shavuot. But when and how does this spiritual journey begin? It begins with Passover, God’s encounter with His
nation Israel at its conception. And the Hebrew sefira (counting/ sapphire) is also based on the Hebrew noun sippur, a tale, a
story, a re-counting – the very essence of the Passover Seder evening experience: “And you shall tell (haggada, telling a story)
your child on that day saying…” (Exodus 13:8) The Israelites came into Egypt as a family, the seventy descendants of Jacob.
Hence the recounting of the story of our enslavement and eventual redemption is the recounting of family history. A nation is a
family writ large: in a family, there are familial memories of origins; in a family there is a sense of commonality and
community togetherness; in a family there are special foods and customs, special holidays and celebrations; in a family there
are mandated values and ideals, that which is acceptable and that which is unacceptable “in our family”; and in a family there
is a heightened sense of a shared fate and shared destiny.
Eda is the biblical word for community (literally “witness”), and every community attempts to recreate a familial collegiality.
The relationship within the family is largely horizontal (towards each other ) rather than vertical (connected to a transcendent
God). And familial rites of togetherness are largely governed by family customs rather than by a Divinely ordained legal code.
Most importantly in families – as well as communities – every individual counts (once again, sefira). Passover is our familycentered, communal festival, at the beginning of our calendar, at the very outset of our history, at the early steps towards
our sefira march. On that first Passover we had not yet received our Torah from God, and we had not yet entered our Promised
Land.
The Passover Sacrifice (Ex. 12) emphasizes our willingness to sacrifice for our freedom from slavery—our sacrifice of the
lamb which was a defiant act of rebellion against the idolatrous Egyptian slave-society—and it attests to our uncompromising
belief in human freedom and redemption even before we became a faith ordained at Mount Sinai. In order for every
person/community to really count, large communities must be subdivided into smaller—and more manageable—familial and
extra-familial units, “a lamb for each household” or several households together. Special foods, special stories and special
songs define and punctuate the close-knit nature of the event. The ticket of admission is that you consider yourself a member
of the family and wish to be counted as such; this entitles you to an unconditional embrace of love and acceptance, to inclusion
in the family of Israel.
The rasha (wicked child) of the Haggadah is the one who seems to exclude himself from the family – and even s/he is to be
invited and included! How do we engage our unaffiliated Jews so that they do not defect and fall away from us? We must
embrace them as part of our family, love them because we are part of them and they are part of us, regale them with the stories,
songs and special foods which are expressed in our biblical and national literature that emerged from our challenging fate and
our unique destiny, share with them our vision and dreams of human freedom and peace, and accept them wholeheartedly no
matter what.
A personal family postscript: My paternal grandfather was an idealistic and intellectual communist. He ate on Yom Kippur and
truly believed that religion “was the opiate of the masses.” Nevertheless, he conducted a Passover Seder each year—which I
attended as a young child—with matza, maror, haroset, and the first part of the Haggada. He would add passages from the
Prophets, the Talmud and Shalom Aleichem which dealt with consideration for the poor and underprivileged, and checked that
I could space my fingers properly for the Priestly Benediction, cautioning me to understand that the blessing was for world
peace.
Despite my tender years, I noticed that there were still bread and rolls in the house which, if a grandchild wished, he received. I
couldn’t understand the contradiction. And then I was riding on a train with my grandfather, and there were two elderly ultraOrthodox Jews sitting opposite us, speaking Yiddish. Two young toughs walked into our compartment and began taunting the
hassidim.
At the next stop my grandfather – who was fairly tall and strong – lunged forward, grabbed the toughs, and literally threw
them out the open door. When he returned to his seat, I asked, “But grandpa, you’re not at all religious!” He looked at me in
dismay. “What difference does that make? They are part of our family—and I am part of their family!” Then I understood…
Shabbat Shalom
A Sanctified Life
In the middle of this week’s double portion, Achrei Mot-Kedoshim, the Torah lists a
Mitzvah that will be restated two more times after this in the Torah; once, in the
second portion of this Shabbat and again in Deuteronomy. Jews are enjoined to
retain our identity: ‘Like the actions of Egypt do not do, and the actions of the
Canaan do not do – in their practices do not follow. [Rather] My judgements you
shall do and My statutes you shall observe to follow them.’
Maimonides book of Mitzvoth lists this as one of his negative commandments (#30).
The warning here is in order to prevent people from following heretical practices.
This would extend even to the way we dress. The Midrash extends the meaning of
statutes – Chukkim – to manners that have been ingrained for generations. The
Midrash, elsewhere, extends the prohibition of mimicking the other to cultural
practices as well – the theater, going to circuses etc…
On the converse, following God’s word means following God’s judgements and
statutes. The Talmud defines the meaning of judgements as matters that are
intuitively known to be correct – the prohibition against idolatry, murder, adultery,
theft – if God hadn’t written these instructions in the Torah, we would have known
that these should have been included.
Statutes, by contrast, are commandments that we would not know as obvious
extensions of God’s will. In the Talmud’s language, these are practices that the
Satanic voice inside of us says: ‘Eating pork, wearing wool and linen, purifying the
leper – those are senseless commandments.’ But God instructs us to follow these
statutes, even if we don’t understand them. (TB Yoma 67b)
These two poles of religious life are fairly representative of the Jewish religious
experience. The book of Psalms phrases it thus: ‘Avoid evil, and perform good.’
That neatly encapsulates the commands of our portion. Avoid the influence of the
other; follow the words of God.
However, the concluding section upends this tidy message: ‘You shall live in them.’
The ironic rabbinic exposition of this idea – living in God’s word – is that if a
person’s life is in danger, we must break Shabbat to help him live. (TB Yoma 85b)
Here, living the word of God means, sometimes, breaking the word of God. This
sentiment is echoed, centuries later, by the Hasidic movement which could find true
devotion to God even in the violation of Torah and would critique rigorous
adherence to Torah and Jewish law as self-centeredness.
In his code of law, Maimondies read this verse with slightly different emphasis. If a
person favors life at the expense of Torah, the exceptions to this rule
notwithstanding, he has not broken the laws of the Torah; he has, rather, upheld a
deeper truth of Torah. (Laws of Foundation of Torah, 5:1) Namely, the Torah is
synonymous with life. The sanctity of life is our most Godly expression.
Shabbat Shalom Umevorach,
Rabbi Menashe East