Greenwashing initiatives pollute the mikvahby Andy Oram Insincere gestures toward saving the climate fill the news these days. Governments classify biomass as a low-carbon energy source when many types of biomass put more carbon in the air. Carbon offsets, vaunted by many companies, also are mostly for show.
Insincerity is a perennial human trait, of course. Someone promises to give up smoking and then takes up vaping. A corporate manager decides to stop micromanaging employees while installing computer software that tracks their clicks and keystrokes. Most of us want to look like better people than we are. And we often fool other people. But we cannot fool God—or Nature. The Jewish tradition addresses the need for sincerity directly when discussing t'shuva, the turn back to ethical paths during the High Holidays. Maimonides talks about confession and repentance in Mishneh Torah, the chapter named Hilchot Teshuva. In verse 2:3 (which draws on the Talmudic verse Taanit 16a.14-15), Maimonides says that promising to improve one's behavior, without an honest resolution in your heart to change, is like holding an unclean creature while immersing in a mikvah. Let's trace this odd metaphor back to its Biblical and Talmudic sources. The focus of the metaphor is a creeping creature (sheretz), a noun that springs from a Hebrew root meaning to swarm, teem, or infest. These creeping creatures appear in the Bible as early Chapter 1 of Genesis, on the fifth day of creation when God creates them along with other animals. So sheratzim (lizards, etc.) are a perfectly fine part of creation. However, Chapter 11 of Leviticus labels creeping creatures as a source of ritual impurity, like corpses and improper genital emissions. Ritual impurity has essentially no meaning following the destruction of the Temple because this impurity governs such things as who can offer a sacrifice and who can eat food that was sanctified for the priests. But the concept is still metaphorically useful. People used to enter the mikvah specifically to purify themselves after touching a creeping creature. So, bringing one into the mikvah with you would be absurd. Similarly, actions that are advertised as beneficial to the climate, but actually are detrimental or useless, invalidate the intentions involved. We adopt eco-friendly products in the hope of making some tiny difference; but often we find that the changes had no impact or were balanced by some other harm. Greenwashing pollutes public discourse as the sheretz pollutes the mikvah. Let's follow Maimonides' words about true repentance. This year, our repentance can lead us to seek out and be honest about the actual impacts on the world of our behavior and consumer choices. Andy Oram is a writer and editor in the computer field. Print publications where his writings have appeared include The Economist, the Journal of Information Technology & Politics, and Vanguardia Dossier. Andy has lived in the Boston, Massachusetts area for 50 years and been a member of Temple Shir Tikvah, Winchester for more than 30 years. He has created numerous essays and poems on Jewish themes.
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Winter, Spring, Summer or Fall...by Rabbi Margaret Frisch-Klein  “Winter, Spring, Summer or Fall...”
Trees are like friends. Torah is a Tree of Life, so says Proverbs. We sing this as part of the Torah service. “It is a tree of life to them that hold fast to it and all its paths are peace.” Rabbi Nachman of Bratzlav said that we should spend an hour every day outside amongst the trees. Each day when I go out for a walk, I say hello to these very trees. Winter, spring, summer and fall. They keep me grounded. Quite literally. But imagine a world without trees. Without seasons. As our continues to heat up, it could happen. Research has shown that this summer, now drawing to an end, was the hottest recorded. But there may be hope. Those trees may actually be trees of life. In Chelsea, MA two years ago I heard news that there was a pilot project, a test site if you will, to plant trees. What they found was that planting trees could dramatically cool an area and was a long-term investment. “So, the white roof and new pavement could help cool the area more quickly, however, the trees are a longer-term investment in shade. Chelsea's Cool Block will be loaded with pretty much every intervention to control heat, while other cities are trying one intervention at a time. Ariane Middel, who studies heat and urban design at Arizona State University in Phoenix, says, "It makes sense to concentrate cooling in rising hot spots.” Listen to NPR’s All Things Considered on how a test site can cool cities in the summer! This summer, I heard a similar story. As reported in the New York Post: “Urban tree canopies and green spaces are our most potent weapons against the collision of the UHIE (Urban Heat Island Effect) and climate change. Unlike air conditioning, which often cuts out when everyone cranks up their units — exactly when it is needed to save lives — vegetation’s cooling effect grows the hotter an area gets. Large plants like trees and shrubs not only shade our homes on the days when the sun is most powerful, but they also cool our environment through evapotranspiration. [Evapotranspiration is when water evaporated from the soil surface into the atmosphere through the leaves of plants. - Ed.] Even a young tree has a net cooling effect equivalent to 10 room-size air conditioners operating for 20 hours a day. Within 15 years, the effect doubles.” Now, like with Jews, where you get two Jews and three opinions, a google search will quickly tell you there is a range of opinions on this. Will trees help reduce climate change? I don’t know for sure. But I figure it can’t hurt. And it will add to the world’s beauty and keep us rooted. Just what I need spiritually before Rosh Hashanah. As the old Talmudic story goes, “Just as my ancestors planted for me, so I will plant for my children and grandchildren.” Join me in planting a tree. Rabbi Margaret Frisch Klein is the rabbi of Congregation Kneseth Israel in Elgin, IL. She blogs as the Energizer Rabbi, www.theenergizerrabbi.org and when not singing “Tree of Life” she is outdoors in nature, running, walking and hiking with her husband. Photo credit, Rabbi Margaret Frisch Klein from trees in Elgin. Part of a juried art show from Fox Valley Hands of Hope. Traceby Sheryl J. Shapiro  In this chilly September twilight tufts of cottontail are flattened on the street the body drenched, glistening The piercing eyes of the crows draw the chalk line on the scene The rabbit belongs to the brambles, the earth The birds are eager for a winter meal I want to lift this creature away from this runway A paper bag from my trunk becomes the gurney to the small tangle of grass by the mailbox As the evening darkens, I bundle up don a headlamp, shoulder my shovel Gleaming eyes meet mine Growls and screeches spiral from the boughs of the cedar tree Please, I whisper to the raccoon family, Be with us The small hollow opens to receive a blanket of breathing soil, small stones, leaves, cones, twigs gently tucks in what remains Stars, Wind, Cedar, Raccoon, Human witness together in the silence Sheryl J. Shapiro seeks to deepen her presence as a companion on healing journeys, explore and share the depths of her Judaic roots, whispers from nature, and the complex beauty of community.
Sheryl loves integrating spiritual, creative and embodied expression. This journey has included facilitator training programs in Sacred Hebrew Chant with Rabbi Shefa Gold, the Educator’s Leadership and Prayer Project Intensives with the Institute for Jewish Spirituality and in experiential environmental education. Sheryl practices 5 Rhythms Dance/Open Floor movement, chanting, meditation, yoga and qigong. Her poetry appears online at Ritualwell (2021, 2022, 2023) and Salish Magazine (2022), in print in Peregrine in the upcoming issue (2024), Like a Tree by Water: Poems, Prayers and Rituals, an Anthology by Advot members (2023), We’Moon Datebook (2020, 2022), Dirt? Exhibit and Catalogue, University of Puget Sound (2015) and Poetry on the Buses, Writing Home Collection, King County Metro (2014). Sheryl lives on Duwamish/Coast Salish land (aka Seattle, WA) and was born and raised on Lenape land (aka Brooklyn, New York). Zazu Dreams - Between the Scarab and the Dung Beetle -- A Cautionary Fable for the Anthropocene Era by Cara Judea Alhadeff, PhD Our collaboration combines four generations: Zazu (the dreamer), Cara/Mommia (the storyteller), Micaela/Nana (the artist), and Grand Papoo (the family photographer). Zazu Dreams focuses on human rights and ecological justice, merging humanities and the sciences, exploring the relationships among cross-cultural Sephardic and Arab-Jewish spiritualities with biodiversity. The trailer opens with Jacques Cousteau’s declaration, “The impossible missions are the only ones which succeed.” We then ripple into a school of parrot fish freeing Zazu and Ari from plastic gyre where the Persian Gulf meets the Arabian Sea. Corporate giants are swiftly engulfed by inter-religious symbols echoing the Golden Rule. Spiritual unity connects with the earth body as we transition into Zazu’s dog Cocomiso who poops fertile “bricks,” reminiscent of the Blessing of Asher Yatzar and the critical function of excrement in the cycle-of-life. “Waste” (death) and fertility (birth) unite through the perseverance of the dung beetle (non-human ecosystems). The diligent dung beetle reminds us of Stephen Hawking’s wisdom, “Everything we need to know is already within us, just waiting to be realized.” Rachel Carson states, “To sin by silence when they should protest, makes cowards out of men.” As Hawking and Carson visually merge, Uum Kulthum’s song, La Ya Habibi, welcomes Zazu, Cocomiso, and Zafira among the singing sand dunes from which emerge the 10 sefirot. Maimonides tops our Kabbalah Tree of Life, followed by RBG, Ibn Sina, Gandhi, Emma Lazarus, Sol Hachuel, MLK Jr., Frederick Douglass, Einstein, and Mandela. Zazu affirms, “I understood more and more that there was so much work to be done; that the only way to heal ethnic and racial divisions and the ecology of our global body is to see how we are all interconnected. We all have to take care of each other.” Ladino proverbs and family archival photographs are montaged with mosaics from the Maghreb, a visual manifestation of community expressed through interlocking perspectives. The camera zooms out from a question mark composed of multiracial ears reminding us of a tenet of Judaism: the individual-collective act of questioning—there are 50,000 arguments in the Talmud and only 50 are resolved. Questions open the possibility for unexpected encounters. As Zazu recounts his dreams, we see Harriet Tubman who declares: “Every great dream begins with a dreamer.” Zazu Dreams explores the equilibrium between biodiversity and cultural diversity, human and wildlife ecosystems in balance, and Jewish and Arab-Jewish ancient wisdom. Dr. Cara Judea Alhadeff, Mother, Artist, Author, Alchemy: Unlearning What We Think We Know, will launch during the World Affairs Conference. Alhadeff’s monographs, Viscous Expectations: Justice, Vulnerability, The Ob-scene and Zazu Dreams: Between the Scarab and the Dung Beetle, A Cautionary Fable for the Anthropocene Era, have been critically acclaimed and endorsed by activists, philosophers, and scientists. Zazu Dreams unravels the complexities of climate crisis as it celebrates our interconnectedness through cross-cultural Jewish indigenous wisdoms, economic, literary, environmental. Learn more:www.carajudeaalhadeff.com Appreciating Nature's Giftsby Rabbi Susan Elkodsi  The tiny island country of Iceland sits atop two tectonic plates, the North American plate, and the Eurasian plate, which accounts for most of its landscape, along with its continual seismic activity. Thanks to a cousin who chose to have her wedding in Iceland this past May, I had the opportunity to visit just a small area of this amazing place. Miles and miles of lava fields, unable to be cultivated, gave way to rivers and waterfalls, majestic mountains, geysers and glaciers. I wish I could say that each time I experienced a new wonder, I recited a bracha (blessing) praising God’s creations. I didn’t. The thought didn’t cross my mind, even as the scenery took my breath away. Perhaps that was the blessing I offered, noticing, watching, taking photos, and sharing thoughts. Walking the streets of downtown Reykjavik at 11pm in what appeared to be broad daylight gave new meaning to an evening stroll and reminded me of the need to appreciate what I have. After all, six months from then we’d be looking at 11 hours of darkness. Icelanders appreciate the gifts of their country and don’t let the weather (or earthquakes, volcanoes) stop them. And speaking of volcanoes, as we were preparing to leave Iceland, the Sundhnúkur volcano, which had begun erupting in December 2023, after centuries of dormancy, graced us with a sight most people never see, and from a safe distance from about 50km away. Beauty and nature are all around us. May we be blessed to stop and notice it, to be mindful of nature’s gifts, and appreciate the work of the Holy Creator. Rabbi Susan Elkodsi (AJR '15) is the spiritual leader of the Malverne Jewish Center since August of 2015. In 2019 Rabbi Elkodsi received a Rabbinic Certificate in Gerontology and Palliative Care from the Wurzweiler School of Social work at Yeshiva University; and hopes to soon have published a Torah Commentary for older adults, written by older adults, through Ben Yehuda Press. Susan is passionate about helping Baby Boomers and older adults to find meaning and purpose in their lives within the context of Jewish tradition and teachings, and as part of a Jewish community, however they see themselves. Her website is www.babyboomerrabbi.com. Love is the Breath of the Soulby Rabbi Dr. Nachshon Siritsky Earth: Adamah
In Hebrew, earth (adamah) is also (adam) which is humanity. Both have the same three-letter root (alef/dalet/mem), but earth/adamah has the extra Hebrew letter "Hey." Hey: the double letter in G!d's Name Hey: the vowel that opens us to Life Hey: (Breath/Ruach) called Avram and Sarai to leave the land where they could not breathe that they could awaken into their destined Blessings... Hey: the sound of Breath/Ruach that opens to Spirit/Oxygen enlivening us into our Purpose/Bashert. Hey: the yearning for Breath that pushes us out of the narrowness where we suffocate... this Beckoning of the gravitational pull of Love/Life. Ani L'Dodi V'Dodi Li: I am my Beloved's and my Beloved is Mine To forsake this call... this gravitational calling... is to silence Spirit/Neshamah which is also Breath/Neshimah and suffocate under the toxicity of this world, forgetting that at the heart of this world's physicality is "Hey" (the holiness of the One Who Breathes through us all). Elul: this is the month of our (re)turning that the seasons may turn and push/pull us into re/turning... enlivening ourselves/our earth... reconnecting us to our essence... for we are all Love at our core... our truest self is Self. But all this has been lost in translation... all the connections between us: Adam and Adamah... the Hey/LifeForce that flows through us all... we have lost this deep knowing because we have lost our language/tongue. English is a noun-based language focused on objectification. We live a life in translation using a tongue that is dismembered from our shared embodiment... we communicate with words taught to us by those who have conquered. Hebrew, like the Mi’kmaq/Indigenous language of the unceded territory upon which I dwell as an uninvited guest, is a verb-based language where words and ideas are fluid and interconnected. Here, where everything begins with a land acknowledgement, I have been learning of the truths that my Hebrew ancestors sought to transmit but have been forgotten. Here too, they count time with the moon, and sometimes add an extra month to align with the sun, that we may remain rooted and guided by the earth's seasons. Elul: this is the season of the return of Love: ReMatriation to heal the patriarchy/pain-triarchy. This is the season of becoming Beloved once again. M'sit Nokmaq: All my relations. This is how Elul is translated by my Mi’kmaq neighbors. Ubuntu: I am because you are. I am because we are. This is how Elul is translated by my African siblings. When we focus, not on how we are different, but how we are the same... we finally reMember... ReMatriate. Every three-letter root (alef/dalet/mem) is rooted in two letters. Dalet and mem. Dam. Blood. Beneath our appearance is the same blood/LifeForce. Every living being requires oxygen and sunlight and water and this beautiful Earth that we share but have forgotten how to sanctify. May 5785 be the year when ReMatriation/Teshuvah begins that we may all become Beloved once again. Rabbi Dr. Nachshon Siritsky, MSSW, RSW, BCC is the spiritual leader of the Reform Jewish Community of Atlantic Canada, serving Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Prince Edward Island, Newfoundland and Labrador. Ordained by Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion, they are also a board-certified chaplain with Neshama: Association of Jewish Chaplains and a social worker with advanced training from the Post-Graduate Center of Mental Health and a doctorate in ministry and pastoral counseling with a focus on burnout in health care workers. Rabbi Siritsky identifies as transgender and nonbinary and is the co-founder of the Queer Interfaith Coalition. A passionate educator and advocate for 2SLGBTQIA+ justice, Rabbi Siritsky works as a psychotherapist and educator, and is also a writer, artist and aspiring vegan chef. Uncovering the Moon: The Compass of Compassion by Rabbi Margie Jacobs What “covers over” your ability to access compassion? What might it mean for compassion to be a compass for you? Growing up, I was taught that our prayers on the High Holidays were an effort to move God, who sits on a throne of judgment on Rosh Hashanah writing our fate in the Book of Life, to a seat of compassion by the end of Yom Kippur.
But the Zohar, the 13th-century book of Kabbalah, offers us a different image. While Psalms 81:4 is often translated as “Blow the shofar on the new moon, on the full moon (b’keseh) of our festival day,” the Zohar instead understands “b’keseh” to mean “on the covering of our festival day.” The Zohar takes this to mean that the moon, which is the symbol of the nurturing, compassionate feminine Divine presence, is covered over, or hidden, on Rosh Hashanah, the day of the new moon of the Hebrew month of Tishrei. What’s covering the moon? All the things that tend to separate us and cover over our own hearts – judgment, fear and anger. According to the Zohar, we blow the shofar “In order to break that covering, by which the moon is covered and can’t shine.” (Zohar 2:184a) In the mystical imagination, the sound of the shofar is the voice of compassion. When that sound reaches the heavens, there is a divine, supernal shofar that emits the sound of compassion in response. “[Our] sound meets [divine] sound. [Our] Compassion [meets] divine Compassion.“ (Zohar 2:184b) In blowing the shofar, we awaken our compassion. We break, or perhaps make more permeable, the covering around our own hearts that separates us from others. In response, the mystics imagine, a divine supernal shofar is sounded. As we move from Rosh Hashanah to Yom Kippur, we look up to the night sky, seeing Divine compassion become more visible, more accessible to us each night as the moon’s covering recedes and she comes into her full presence. In the Zoharic imagination, we are actively inviting the moon to shine by letting our own compassionate heart shine through the judgment and fear that might surround it. In the narrative of my childhood, we move ourselves from the seat of judgment on Yom Hadin, Rosh Hashanah, to the seat of compassion as our hearts break open on Yom Kippur. And God follows our lead. Rabbi Margie Jacobs is a Reconstructionist rabbi who works with individuals as a Spiritual Coach, bringing the perspectives of mindfulness, creativity, and Jewish spirituality to explore what is emerging within each of us. She works with groups as a facilitator of the Jewish Studio Process (JSP), bringing together Jewish text study, mindfulness meditation, a facilitated art experience, and reflective writing. She has brought creative practice and Torah to emerging Jewish professionals as a Reconstructionist Rabbinical College instructor and is on faculty at the Academy of Jewish Religion-CA. Margie leads meditation and teaches Jewish mystical texts virtually across the country. She is also a website designer and is on staff at the Mordecai Kaplan Center for Jewish Peoplehood. *Zohar text: “Once Compassion has been aroused below, so too above; another, supernal shofar is aroused, emitting a sound that is Compassion, and sound meets sound. Compassion meets Compassion.” Learn to Acknowledge Defeatby Rabbi Paul Plotkin  I have been a vegetable and herb gardener for the last 30 years. That means that I have had the pleasure of tasting wonderful tomatoes and carrots, snow peas, peppers and eggplants that had real flavor and something mysterious called freshness. It also means that I have experienced disappointment, failure, heartache and loss at a frequency much greater than success. At times after waiting months for a veggie to mature and reach maximal ripeness, something happens. An animal decides it was invited to the harvest. A pest attacks the plant and stunts its growth. A violent storm arrives and washes out the garden.
How does one psychologically handle so much disappointment? It is really a simple calculation. Nothing in life is guaranteed, but it is absolutely true that 100% of all crops not planted will never be harvested. An important tool in managing life is to acknowledge defeat and move on to try again. Every gardener looks at a crop failure and responds, “next year will be better.” So too we come to shul on Rosh Hashana and quietly affirm, “this year will be better.” Leshana Tova Rabbi Paul Plotkin was ordained by the Jewish Theological Seminary in 1976 and served in pulpits for 40 years. He is the author of “Wisdom Grows in My Garden” 25 life lessons he learned from his garden. He also served for 20 years on the Committee of Jewish Law and Standards of the Rabbinical Assembly and was the founding chairman of the Kashrut Sub-Committee. God's eyes on the Land: Why are ancestors chose a land "of hills and valleys"by Rabbi David Seidenberg In Parshat Eikev, Deut 11:10-12, the Torah compares the land of Egypt to the land of Canaan. There are two distinctions made. The first is that Egypt is sustained by a river-fed agriculture, whereas the land of Canaan is "a land of hills and valleys -- she drinks rain from the heavens". The second is that the eyes of God are upon the land of Canaan continually. Each of these distinctions bears close reading; each is needed to explain the significance of the other.
Egypt is described as the place where you would draw water from the river “with your foot" / hishkita b'raglekha "like a green garden" / k'gan hayarok. There is a great difference of opinion on how to interpret this verse. Does it mean, you worked harder in Egypt because you had to bring water to your field "on foot"? Or does it mean the work was easier, because you could bring water to your field whenever you needed by using a simple foot-pedal technology that raised water from the Nile to send it far across the floodplain? The correct p'shat (plain meaning) is that in Egypt things were easier, because you had control over water. But that is exactly why Canaan is better, because not having control means having a closer relationship with God. This interpretation is made certain by what follows, the second paragraph of the Shma. Deut 11:17 explains exactly what it means for God to be watching over the land: if the Israelites don't follow the commands, within in one season, they will be "lost from off the ground which YHVH swore to your ancestors". We know those commands include most prominently not committing idolatry, seeing oneself as strangers rather than owners of the land (this is the Shmita, whose foundation is Shabbat), and doing justice by protecting the stranger and the vulnerable. That is why verse 12, YHVH's eyes are on the land "continually, from the beginning of the year until the end of the year." So, the literal intent of these verses is that Canaan is better because you can suffer famine more easily. But the New JPS (1962) changed verse 10 to read "the grain you sowed had to be watered by your own labors, like a vegetable garden". Perhaps the translators were uncomfortable with the physicality and obscurity of watering "with one's foot", but the new JPS translation made the plain meaning of the verse—that Egypt was easier because you had control over water—inaccessible to anyone who does not know Hebrew. The new JPS is the translation found in Etz Chayyim (Conservative), in the Women's Torah Commentary, and in the Plaut (Reform) Chumash. (The old JPS does not make this mistake, but the Hertz commentary does make the same mistake in its interpretation.) Of course, it's not really fair to just call out JPS. Rashi himself explains that in Egypt, "you would lose sleep to labor, and have to bring water from the low places to water the higher places" but in Canaan, "you could sleep soundly in bed because the Holy One would water the low and high together". But that is the difference between an ecological view of the Torah, which focuses on the bedrock foundation of the Torah coming to life within an ecosystem, and an ideological view of the Torah that learns beautiful lessons but may not always concern itself with how the text arose. The bottom line is that our ancestors had a beautiful vision of a land where they were so close to God that they would know almost immediately if they were doing well or not. Egypt, and other river-fed agricultures, like Mesopotamia, were the opposite, going along blithely until they had a proverbial seven years of famine or ten plagues, or in the case of Sumer in Mesopotamia, a complete collapse of agriculture, because their way of farming made the soil salty over hundreds of years. Our ancestors dreamed of a civilization where agriculture was an act of service to the soil, rather than slavery to the gods (as Mesopotamia understood it), and an ecosystem in which the soil could always be renewed. They imagined a future that was the very opposite of the Anthropocene we live in now, where agriculture became one giant step on the path to the sixth mass extinction. But as our tradition teaches, it's not too late to change this reality. The present disaster does not define the future. What defines the future will be our capacity to make ecological t'shuvah. May we be strengthened to do so! Rabbi David Seidenberg is the creator of neohasid.org and the author of Kabbalah and Ecology: God's Image in the More-Than-Human World. His teaching most often focuses on human rights, animal rights, and ecology. David is also an avid dancer, and a composer of Jewish liturgical music and classical instrumental music. Climate and the Sh'maby Leah F. Cassorla, Ph.D. One of my amazing 7th graders said to me that the second paragraph of the Sh’ma (the V’hayu) says, in his words, “if we follow the commandments, we will have plenty to eat and be safe, but there are people who don’t have enough food.”
He’s right. There are people who don’t have enough food. I explained it’s because we bow down to other gods. The V’hayu is either completely redacted or read silently in most liberal Jewish communities in North America. It feels a bit icky to us. It describes a system of punishment and reward that we in the West can sometimes feel relies on magical thinking and presents a vengeful and petty God. That is unsettling. And it should be. Because it also describes the world in which we find ourselves today, facing sea-level rise, floods, droughts, wildfires, and worse. And yet, we know the answer: T’shuvah. The paragraph itself makes it clear. T’shuvah, in Judaism, requires more than recognition of our bad choices, it requires action. We must feel remorse, and pray, and act. We must return to living in harmony with Earth. It can’t be that simple, you say. It can. But as any recovering 12-stepper will tell you, “Simple and easy are not the same thing.” It’s as simple as no longer “serv[ing] other Gods and bow[ing] down to them.” We serve the gods of money by actively participating in our over-the-top consumption culture. And that’s a hard habit to break. Still, we can take little steps toward bigger change. The first and second paragraphs teach us this lesson using possessive pronouns. In Hebrew, the second person pronoun (you) has different singular and plural forms. The V’ahavta uses singular pronouns to tell us how to act. The V’hayu, on the other hand, lists the rewards and punishments using plural pronouns. This tells us that the actions of each individual accrue to their community. We can buy less by sharing more. We can benefit all of life by taking responsibility for our individual choices. God knows better than to ask us to turn on a dime. We can be reminded of the small steps we want to take daily if we attend to the second part of the Sh’ma. We can pray and act our way back to a healthy relationship with our Source and our Earth. Leah F. Cassorla, Ph.D., MFA, is a Kol-Bo (dual ordination) student at the Academy for Jewish Religion in Yonkers, NY. She works as a Cantor and Education Director for the Melville Jewish Center in Melville, NY. |
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