Weekly Bulletin Amalgamated Hebrew Men of England (1975) 100 Elder Street, Toronto ON M3H 5G7 | 416.633.3838 Vayera Hertz Chumash Torah Reading pp. 63-76 Haftarah pp. 76-79 Etz Hayim Chumash Torah Reading pp. 99-122 Haftarah pp. 124-126 November 8, 2014 | 15 Cheshvan 5775 www.beby.org REMEMBRANCE DAY NOVEMBER 11TH. LEST WE FORGET. We extend a warm welcome to our special guest speaker, Judge Thomas Walther. Judge Walther, a retired German judge turned Nazi hunter is looking to enlist help from Canadian Jews to prosecute a former Auschwitz guard. ~ The Congregational Kiddush will be held in the Foyer following services ~ 60th Anniversary Launch! Monday, November 17th @ 7:30 pm The Sefer Haftarah Parasha is dedicated in honour of Jason’s Bar Mitzvah, November 2, 1998 by Al, Jan & Lisa Mervin Check out Rabbi Morrison’s article in Mercaz-Canada Autumn Newsletter Services for Week of November 9th Sunday ................................. 7:30 & 8:30 am Monday - Friday ................... 7:15 & 8:15 am Sunday - Thursday ........................... 4:45 pm Friday evening.................................. 4:45 pm Shabbat Candle Lighting .................. 4:34 pm Hashkama Minyan............................ 7:30 am Shabbat Services ............................... 8:45 am Let’s Party like it’s 1955! Dance to the music of the 50’s & 60’s performed by Of Gentlemen and Cowards led by Simon Edwards Emcee Adam Foxman with Comedian Brandon Sobel and his comedy troupe! Õ«i\ÊfÈäÊvÀÊÈäÊÞi>ÀÃÊUÊ-}i\ÊfÎä Hors d’oeuvres, dessert, cash bar >`ÊV«iÌ>ÀÞÊÃ}>ÌÕÀiÊ`À°ÊÊ ÃVÌiÊ>°ÊÊ >ÊÌiÊvvViÊ>ÌÊ{£È°ÈÎÎ°ÎnÎnÊÌÊ «ÕÀV>ÃiÊÌViÌÃÊÀÊÛ>ÊÛiÌLÀÌi° We extend a Mazel Tov to Devorah, daughter of Mindy & Freddy Jacobs on the occasion of her Havdallah Bat Mitzvah. Mazel Tov to grandparents Ellen & Solly Stern. At this time, we lovingly remember the late Ben & Sally Jacobs l”z ~ We extend our condolences to~ Juan Knapp and family on the loss of his mother, Frida Knapp l”z Shirley Springer, Jeff Springer, Hannah Springer and Rochelle Title and families on the loss of husband and father, Henry Springer l”z BEBY reserves the right to make copy & editorial changes. DEADLINE THURSDAY NOON of each week. Beyond that time we cannot guarantee that your event will appear in the bulletin. We regret any errors and omissions that may occur. Please contact the office to make corrections. The Shabbat Study Group will resume December 13th Shabbat Mincha — 4:35 pm Shabbat Ends — 5:45 pm ALLERGY ALERT!! Many of our members suffer from asthma or other breathing difficulties. Please be considerate of those who are chemically sensitive to fragrances and other scented products - your discretion in applying scented products when attending Shul is appreciated. HALACHA (JEWISH LAW) prohibits the use of audible beepers, cell phones, electronic games and any type of photographic equipment on Shabbat and Yom Tov. We thank you in advance for your cooperation in preserving the sanctity of Shabbat. Yasher Koach and thank you to our Shabbat Ushers! WEEKLY PROGRAMMES RABBINICS STUDY GROUP – Daf Ha’Shavua - The Weekly Page of Talmud. For beginning or intermediate students, study the first Tractate of the Talmud known as Masechet Berachot. “The primary focus of the tractate is the myriad ways in which a Jewish person expresses his faith during his life.” 35 minutes prior to Mincha. Study group resumes December 13th. SUNDAY FREE HEBREW READING CLASSES - LEVELS I AND II WITH MICHAEL KINRYS: Level I begins October 26 for 5 weeks. 9:15 - 11 am. Call to register. Level II begins Feb. 22/2015 for 6 weeks. THE LIBRARY ~10 am - 12 noon. Drop by and peruse our many fabulous new titles! A Treasure of Yiddish Stories by Irving Home; Jewish Museums of the World by Grace Cohen Grossman. The KADIMA CENTRE: 2-3:30 pm. For info on student registration, contact Marcel Cohen at 416.633.3838 or [email protected]. More info available from www.beby.org. We are looking for adults to volunteer who are compassionate, patient and positive. TANACH STUDY GROUP - TBA. MONDAY MAH JONGG AT 12:00 NOON. All welcome. Call the office 416-633-3838 to join. Donation of a Toonie. Refreshments served. No Class November 17th RABBI’S STUDY CLASS: PROBING THE PARSHA: A detailed study of a particular theme emanating from the weekly Torah portion. Each theme is linked to an essay topic found in the new book, The Observant Life - The Wisdom of Conservative Judaism for Contemporary Jews. The book is encouraged but not required for participants. Boardroom. 7:15 - 8:15 pm. FRUMBA & NIA! WOMEN’S CARDIO DANCE FITNESS - Sponsored by Sisterhood. 7:30 pm. For more information on upcoming class schedules and pricing, contact Bette at [email protected]. TUESDAY SISTERHOOD STUDY GROUP - 10 - 11:30 am | Rabbis Morrison and Lipson alternate weekly. Ask The Rabbi with Rabbi Morrison: Brief English responsa to modern halakhic questions from the perspective of Conservative Judaism. Topics will cover Bible, ethics, gender, interfaith, symbols, conversion, kashrut, lifecycle, holy day cycle, women’s issues, theology, and more. Rabbi Lipson’s Weekly Topic: Studying the Book of Shmuel (Samuel) and the Book of Kings — Politics & Power in Biblical Israel. WEDNESDAY TALMUD CLASS WITH DR. AARON NUSSBAUM | 9:15 am. Chapel. MAH JONGG AND RUMMIKUB HOSTED BY SISTERHOOD. Games begin at 12:30 to 3:30 pm. Donation of a Toonie. Refreshments served. Mah Jongg Games and Rummikub games needed. If you have one to donate, contact the office. SISTERHOOD PRESENTS ISRAELI FOLK DANCING WITH SHOSHANA FRANK. "EGINNERSPMs)NTERMEDIATE!DVANCEDPMPERCLASS)NFO Call Shoshana Frank at 905.889.9419. THURSDAY NASH & DRASH 2014 - Nov 27, Tuesday December 16 (Chazzan’s Chanukah Musical Special) January 22, February 19, March 26 (Pre-pesach Nash & Drash WITHTHE#ANTOR!PRILAND-AYPP THE MARTY KESHEN CHESED COMMITTEE NEEDS YOU! If you would like to volunteer with home and hospital visits, Shiva calls, etc. please call the office and leave a message for Rochelle Kerzner Committee Chair or email [email protected] SISTERHOOD KNIT/CROCHET AND CHAT GROUP. We invite you to join our knitting and crochet group. Learn to crochet a kippah, or knit a baby blanket. Knit a hat for the Soldiers! We provide the yarn, pattern and coffee! Join us weekly, Mondays at 10 am. Speak to Miriam if you would like to participate. Please pick up a flyer or check our web site /facebook page for more information on our upcoming events. SHABBAT TISH & TORAH - Rabbi Lipson leads learning sessions for the Parashat Hashavuah at 10:00 am in the Boardroom. COMING NOVEMBER EVENTS BEBY Annual Meeting Sunday November 9th Poland/Israel Planning Trip Monday November 10th @ 8 pm Board Installation Saturday November 15th 60th Anniversary Launch Monday November 17th Speakers Series: Women’s Lives - Part II Wednesday November 19th Brunch/Lecture with Dr. Carol Greenwood Sunday November 23rd Reel & Spiel - Crossing Delancey Wednesday November 26th Girls Night Out Thursday November 27th Grey Cup Party Sunday November 30th SAVE THE DATES! Speakers Series: Women’s Lives - Part III Wednesday December 10th Yehuda Rosenberg Tribute Dinner Friday December 12th Eco-Friendly Chanukah Energy Savings Monday December 15th Pre-Chanukah Nash & Drash Tuesday, December 16th Annual Chanukah Party Tuesday, December 16th Shabbat Shira Concert Thursday, January 29th CHAZZAN’S CORNER Davening Class - Chazzan Edwards offers an informal, hands on practical class - Monday evenings following Mincha services. No Class Nov.17th. Pre-Chanukah Nash & Drash with Chazzan Edwards & Tara Abrams, Cantorial Soloist. Tuesday, December 16th at 12 noon. Shabbat Shira Concert with Chazzans Edwards & Alex Stein of Adath Israel, Thursday January 29th at 7:30 pm FYI: Please be aware that in the event of a medical emergency, our Security Personnel are EVENTS YOUTH & YOUNG FAMILIES (Formerly Na’are Emet) Junior Congregation Shakin’ Up Shabbat! THE BETH EMETH GREENING COMMITTEE s s s s s s The Zero-Waste Lifestyle by Amy Korst: Buy in bulk to save money and reduce waste from packaging Buy flour, pasta, rice, spices, dry baking supplies, olive oil, honey, shampoos and conditioners in bulk Use reusable tote bags or mesh produce bags Arriving home, store bulk foods into re-purposed glass jars Plan numerous, nutritious meals based on these bulk foods to create no waste Buy larger sizes of pet food every Shabbat at 10 am with a fun activity led by Elie Morrison and Samara Gottesman or by our ShinShinim Omer Itzhak & Yotam Meizeles. New program with lots of fun activities and games! See you there! Sam Kotzer Shabbat & Festival Gan Program OPEN YEAR ROUND FOR NURSERY SERVICES. 10 am - 12 noon | BEBY Babies Room (lower level) Structured weekly Shabbat programming for children ages 1 through JK, including Tefillot, songs, games, and healthy snacks. Hilda Swirsky, RN, BScN, MEd, Chair, [email protected] or Fay Rakoff, [email protected] Café Shinshinim: Contact [email protected] or call 416 633.3838 for MORE INFO or to RSVP to any program. Tuesday November 11th at 7 pm Topic Remembrance Day and Yom HaZikaron - thoughts and reflections. Join Omer and Yotam for their lively bi-weekly programs covering a range of current topics. YOUTH EVENTS PJ PLUS is a parent (or grandparent!) and tot program for 1.5 -3 years old. This 9 week program runs Sunday mornings right here at Beth Emeth! Your first class is FREE! 9:30 - 10:45 am in the BEBY Babies Room. PROGRAM INFO: Women’s Lives Series From Church to Cholent with Michèle Sankar: Michèle started her life as a religious Roman Catholic in small-town Ontario, yet went on a journey which led her to become a Torahobservant Jew. She is a teacher in the GTA where she lives with her husband and three children. Admission: $20. Nutrition, Vitality & Your Brain with Dr. Carol Greenwood Sunday November 23rd at 11:30 am Professor, Author and Senior Scientist with the Baycrest Foundation Join us for a delicious brunch and a talk on the merits of good nutrition and brain health. Dr. Greenwood’s work focuses on the relationship between diet and brain function. $10 per person. Reel & Spiel presents Crossing Delancey (1988) Wednesday November 26th at 7:30 pm A Manhattan single meets a man through her Jewish grandmother’s matchmaker. Director: Joan Micklin Silver. Starring Amy Irving, Peter Riegert, Reizl Bozyk and Jeroen Krabbe. Introductory remarks by Bruria Cooperman. Join us for popcorn, refreshments & dessert. Tessler Lounge.$5 per person. Grey Cup Party! Sunday November 30th at 5:30 pm presented by Men’s Club. Tessler Lounge. Watch the game on our 80” screen complete with our new sound system! Tons of delicious game food! All welcome. Members & family guests $30. NM $50. Join the Men’s Club! Only $18. Includes membership in the FJMC and SAVE on all of our events. RSVP by November 17th. Men & Women welcome! To book a Youth Kiddush please send an email to [email protected]. Wednesday November 19th at 7:30 pm MIDDLE SCHOOL — CCCS BE’TE-AVON! CHEF FOR A NIGHT! Saturday November 15th at 8 pm. CCCS Youth partner with Mazon Canada’s “Kosherlicious” for an evening of cooking with Norene Gilletz! $15 per person. Bring a non-perishable food item, to be donated to Mazon Canada! Register at: http://www.canadianccs.ca/BeTeavon.html. Registration deadline has been extended. YOUNG FAMILIES SHABBAT DINNER! Friday, November 21, 2014 at 6pm Members Cost: Adults $12, kids $8 Family (2 adults, 2 kids) $36. Non Members Cost: Adults $15, kids $10, Family (2 adults 2 kids) $45. Event purchase in advance ONLY to the office by Thursday November 20th. GRADES 1-5: GLAZE CRAZE! Sunday, November 23rd, 1pm. Join Beth Emeth Youth as we have a fun afternoon painting ceramics! More details TBA. BBYO PROGRAMS BBYO Connect (Middle School) Saturday November 15th. Cosmic Bowling, Stay tuned for details! BBYO (High School) – Thursday November 20th. The Hunger Games Mockingjay Pre-Screening for Hunger Awareness! Stay tuned for details! CPR trained. If you need assistance, please do not hesitate to seek out their services. VAYERA Taken from the Jewish Theological Seminary JTS - www.jtsa.edu LARGE PRINT SIDDURIM available. Ask an usher. Sight and vision play an important role in the two opening narratives of Paratures some four thousand years ago. Far shat Vayera. At the beginning of this week’s Torah reading, the newly from only nurturing the narrow, parROSEN JUDAICA Marty Keshen circumcised Abraham, resting in his abode of Elonei Mamre, “looks ticular identity toward deepening Chesed Committee up” and sees “three men rooted before him” (Gen. 18:1–2). Their his roots, Abraham knows well GIFT SHOP presents the 10th Annual appearance triggers a flurry of activity in the homestead of our that one must look outward ancestors as Abraham and Sarah scurry to perform the mitzvah and upward simultaneously. Call Sonia Hendler of hakhnasat orhim, hosting guests in one’s home. These mysWe cannot selfishly and dedicated in memory of at 416 633.3838 x 224 terious messengers are pampered as guests, and then deliver narrowly tend to our own Barbara Frances Grimson l”z & the news that Sarah will conceive. The gesture of Abraham Norton Lorne Grimson l”z needs while the world setting his gaze “upward,” proves to be both a physical and cries and burns around Certificates and “Drive For Dreidels”. spiritual act. The spiritual mirrors the physical as he tends us. In this very moment, Please drop off all Gift & Bridal Registry to the needs of total strangers. Juxtaposed to this story of such a tension is deeply NEW, UNWRAPPED TOY DONATIONS Available too. generosity and kindness, we then encounter the narrative of to the Synagogue felt in the Land of Israel (bin located by the Sodom and Gomorrah with their wicked inhabitants. Interestin general, and in JeruWednesday mornings Wilmington Street entrance) ingly, it opens with the same men setting out on their journey, salem in particular, as the Gift Deadline is 10 am - 12:30 pm and in sharp contrast to Abraham’s upwardly gazing posture, Jewish people struggles Friday, December 12th. they “look down toward Sodom.” Once again, the spiritual and or by appointment. with the meaning of power Think of the joy you can bring physical acts intermingle and mirror each other. What more can and sovereignty on the one to a less fortunate child at be learned about the contrast and positioning of these two stories? hand—being a people at home Chanukah! and emboldened to live freely in Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch explains, our homeland—and being attentive and sensitive to the needs of those From the hospitable meal at Abraham’s, they stood up and looked towards with whom we share this blessed and passion-filled land on the other hand. Sodom . . . Sodom offered the most complete contrast to the simple pure atmosphere Deep rootedness should propel our hands to reach out in embracing and bringing from which these men were just emerging. They had just seen the foundation of a others to a sense of kedushah (holiness), as we act in the sacred image of our ancesnation laid on two factors: a) sanctifying the body with all its urges and lures in pure tor Abraham. moral submission to God in brit milah (the covenant of circumcision) and b) practicing universal brotherly love, as in the kindness that they themselves enjoyed in AbraHirsch succeeds in sharpening our exegetical focus as we read through this text. For ham’s home. The hospitable meal at which they had just announced the first foundait is not simply the contrast that is of import; we must also recognize these moments tion stone of the future people of God offered such a contrast to Sodom, formed such as “the foundation of a nation.” Abraham’s descendants must sanctify their bodies a loftiness to the Sodomite debasement to which they now had to wend their way, that and practice kindness to build a sacred future. Indeed, every moment in life presents they “looked down to the plains of Sodom with criticizing gauging consideration.” us with the choice between Elonei Mamre or Sodom; it is a decision between embracFor that is the meaning of va’yashkifu, that “they looked down.” (Commentary on the ing the presence of God and our fellow humans and banishing the Divine from our Torah: Genesis, 318). midst. Abraham is a multi-dimensional Israelite, concerned about particular identity with an eye to the universal world. May we always be blessed with the gumption and Modern Jews wrestle daily between the two poles represented by our ancestor’s gessight of Abraham, choosing the path of Elonei Mamre. Chanukah Toy Drive Hashkama Minyan Sponsorships Brian Goldman in observance of the first Yahrzeit for his father, Samuel Goldman l”z Sheila & Yehuda Sheen & family in observance of Yahrzeit for Harry Radzinsky l”z and Leah Shvily l”z Eleanor & Michael Minuk in observance of the Yahrzeits this coming week for Michael’s father, Norman Minuk l”z and Eleanors’ grandmother, Ida Vexler l”z Freddy, Mindy, Meyer, Mulky and Avi Jacobs in honour of Devorah’s Bat Mitzvah Weekend. Mazel Tov! Terumah @ 60 Wall A big thank you is extended to all those who have contributed to this year’s Terumah @ 60 Appeal. Others can still participate to mark Beth Emeth’s special 60th Anniversary. The Terumah @ 60 Appeal will continue throughout the year with a focus on the Terumah @ 60 Wall located at the Elder Street entrance. A flyer is available on the Synagogue Carousel with more details. Please pick one up before you leave or at your convenience. For information or assistance, contact Claire Horowitz, [email protected] or 416-633-3838 ext. 242. Thank you! We would love to announce your BREAKFAST SPONSORSHIP right here in the weekly Bulletin! Whatever the occasion - birthdays, anniversaries, births, graduations, and in memoriam. l as call th o c or i ormatio a to r s r yo r s cial r ak ast Weekday Morning Simchas & Sponsorships Malcolm Weinstein in observance of 25th Yahrzeit for Ronald Weinstein l”z *The Bulletin deadline is THURSDAY NOON of each week. Beyond that time we can not guarantee placement. WEEKLY BULLETIN E-MAIL We would like to remind our members that our Shabbat Bulletin is available each Friday by e-mail. Please sign up directly from our home page. And don’t forget to visit www.beby.org for up-to-date info on everything Beth Emeth! Now on Twitter too! Do you like us? Read the weekly blog penned by Rav Yitz! http://drinkingwisdom.blogspot.com/ and join our FACEBOOK PAGE... go to www.beby.org for more info.