Earlier this year I had signed up with one of my classmates to lead services for Shabbat morning. We spent a lot of time putting together what we thought would be a meaningful and enjoyable experience. I know that I had a lot of fun working with a cantor (cantorial student) for the first time. It is quite incredible working with someone else who can help lead, especially someone with such an amazing voice.
A few weeks ago two of my classmates had used an arrangement of Dan Nichols's Or Zarua. We decided to use Dave's arrangement for our opening song before services started. Working with Ari, Ben, Brian, Jay and Mike I had a lot of fun preparing and I think we did a really good job with it.
Or Zarua video on Youtube
The service itself, I think, went really well. As always, there are things that I need to work on, but that's the point of school. Right? We've spent all year studying and working hard at improving our skills for leading a community in prayer. I had the chance to share the melody Rabbi Dr. Levine shared with my class a few weeks ago, which I also think went well.
I cannot wait until next fall when I have the opportunity to continue leading services for a community. I received my pulpit assignment for next year and I am very excited to get to work!
Showing posts with label Shabbat. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Shabbat. Show all posts
Tuesday, May 10, 2011
Saturday, March 5, 2011
THIS... IS... SHABBIS!
For the first time in a long time here I finally feel like I'm having a Shabbat I really enjoy.
Thursday night, after another great conference call with the Cincinnati campus, I joined a bunch of people out for dinner to celebrate their birthdays. The 2nd dinner of the night was for all of us that are doing the Ride for Reform (starts tomorrow morning, and I'm still raising funds, if you can donate check out this link) and followed that with hanging out with some more friends before heading home.
Friday I cleaned and got ready for Shabbat which I got to spend in the city of Tzur Hadassah. Two of the Year in Israel Cantorial students help lead services with one of the Israeli students in this community. They worked with her to organize home hosting for a Shabbat Dinner. It was amazing.
We had a very Sephardi (Spainish, North African heritage) dinner with our family. Complete with fish, soup, chicken, beef, salad couscous, tea, wine and dessert. It was incredible. I'd love to share with you the "blessing of couscous" with you, but I want to keep that in my back pocket as a story to use as a Rabbi. Maybe I'll put it up on here later, or maybe I can prepare couscous for you sometime and I can tell you then.
Not only was the dinner amazing, but I also got to help lead services for the community and bang of my drum all day. It's so much fun adding that to services, especially Kabbalat Shabbat (Friday Night Services).
This morning I had a hard time dragging myself out of bed to get to HUC on time to rehearse a little more. Running a few minutes later than I wanted to be, I got to school in time and joined in the closing song, "Say" by John Mayer, that Mike really wanted to use. It was a lot of fun, although non-traditional, I really liked it as a closing song. He might put it up online and if that happens I will find a way to link to it.
Services were great, and I really like the Sermon that Beni delivered. I know I'm going to miss all of my friends that are going to be at other campuses, but I am excited to keep learning with the people who will join me at Cincinnati.
Lunch was also really, really good, and I just got back to my apartment. I need to clean and pack up my place so I'm ready to go on the Ride 4 Reform, which starts tomorrow, but the day is just perfect. I don't really trust the weather reports that I get here, so I'm going to venture a guess that it's mid to high 70's right now, and a perfectly sunny afternoon. If I wasn't about to spend 5 days on the back of a bike, I'd be out riding right now.
It might be that I don't have homework to do for tomorrow, since I won't be in class. Or it could be that this is really just an amazing day. But in my world, and in my Judaism, this is Shabbat and what it is supposed to be like.
I know that according to Orthodoxy, Shabbat and the afterlife is a time that there will be no work and complete rest. To me, that misses the mark by a little bit. Shabbat is a time to be with friends, to enjoy the world. It is a time to enjoy the company of other people and to recharge for the next week.
This has been a perfect Shabbat!
Thursday night, after another great conference call with the Cincinnati campus, I joined a bunch of people out for dinner to celebrate their birthdays. The 2nd dinner of the night was for all of us that are doing the Ride for Reform (starts tomorrow morning, and I'm still raising funds, if you can donate check out this link) and followed that with hanging out with some more friends before heading home.
Friday I cleaned and got ready for Shabbat which I got to spend in the city of Tzur Hadassah. Two of the Year in Israel Cantorial students help lead services with one of the Israeli students in this community. They worked with her to organize home hosting for a Shabbat Dinner. It was amazing.
We had a very Sephardi (Spainish, North African heritage) dinner with our family. Complete with fish, soup, chicken, beef, salad couscous, tea, wine and dessert. It was incredible. I'd love to share with you the "blessing of couscous" with you, but I want to keep that in my back pocket as a story to use as a Rabbi. Maybe I'll put it up on here later, or maybe I can prepare couscous for you sometime and I can tell you then.
Not only was the dinner amazing, but I also got to help lead services for the community and bang of my drum all day. It's so much fun adding that to services, especially Kabbalat Shabbat (Friday Night Services).
This morning I had a hard time dragging myself out of bed to get to HUC on time to rehearse a little more. Running a few minutes later than I wanted to be, I got to school in time and joined in the closing song, "Say" by John Mayer, that Mike really wanted to use. It was a lot of fun, although non-traditional, I really liked it as a closing song. He might put it up online and if that happens I will find a way to link to it.
Services were great, and I really like the Sermon that Beni delivered. I know I'm going to miss all of my friends that are going to be at other campuses, but I am excited to keep learning with the people who will join me at Cincinnati.
Lunch was also really, really good, and I just got back to my apartment. I need to clean and pack up my place so I'm ready to go on the Ride 4 Reform, which starts tomorrow, but the day is just perfect. I don't really trust the weather reports that I get here, so I'm going to venture a guess that it's mid to high 70's right now, and a perfectly sunny afternoon. If I wasn't about to spend 5 days on the back of a bike, I'd be out riding right now.
It might be that I don't have homework to do for tomorrow, since I won't be in class. Or it could be that this is really just an amazing day. But in my world, and in my Judaism, this is Shabbat and what it is supposed to be like.
I know that according to Orthodoxy, Shabbat and the afterlife is a time that there will be no work and complete rest. To me, that misses the mark by a little bit. Shabbat is a time to be with friends, to enjoy the world. It is a time to enjoy the company of other people and to recharge for the next week.
This has been a perfect Shabbat!
Saturday, December 11, 2010
Unwanted But Much Needed
Friday morning, our day off, I needed to be at school by 7:20 in the morning (meaning that I need to leave my apartment before 7:00) to go on a retreat to Kibbutz Hannaton. I have to say that heading into the retreat, I didn't want to head out of town so close to the end of our semester. I was honestly feeling a little stressed looking at everything that is on our schedule as we come to the end of the year.
It was so much better than I could have anticipated. I went on a hike for about 3 hours of hiking. I wish I could remember the hills we climbed, but it was a lot of fun. At the start is seemed pretty easy. Then we took on the actual hilly part of the climb. It was great! There was nothing that we needed to scale, but some of the hiking was pretty tough at times. When we got to the top, the view was incredible.
The way down was actually harder than the way up. I'm a lot more nervous about dropping down, but it was great.
Exhausted, we got to the Kibbutz, showered and had a really nice Shabbat together as a program. Some z'mirot (songs) after dinner and even a tish (table, song session and study session) with one of the community's rabbis. A bunch of melodies, a few discussions and constant interruption of two dogs chasing each other around the tent. After relaxing for a while, I got a decent night's sleep and woke up to go get some meditation in.
I had never do that before and it was a great experience. I'm not sure what it exactly was about focusing on nothing but the pace of my breath. The session was guided and she asked us to concentrate on the the four letter word of God's Name. Each letter represents a part of the cycle of breathing. I felt so much better after that.
Sitting around the kibbutz the rain hit. Yep, that's right. The rain hit hard!
We actually got a nice downpour off and on all day. Complete with thunder and lightning, it was a fantastic show. I had forgotten how much I missed storms. There was really only one more thing that could have made it better was to have a certain special someone sitting on the couch next to me. I love storms and I haven't had a chance to see anything like this since getting to Israel.
It was great to have a little time off somewhere away from Jerusalem. Although I have to see that I am still a little worried about all of the stuff I have coming up and the days that I don't really have to get it all done in. But with that said, I need to get a little sleep. It's going to be a long three weeks until Kaitlin gets here.
It was so much better than I could have anticipated. I went on a hike for about 3 hours of hiking. I wish I could remember the hills we climbed, but it was a lot of fun. At the start is seemed pretty easy. Then we took on the actual hilly part of the climb. It was great! There was nothing that we needed to scale, but some of the hiking was pretty tough at times. When we got to the top, the view was incredible.
The way down was actually harder than the way up. I'm a lot more nervous about dropping down, but it was great.
Exhausted, we got to the Kibbutz, showered and had a really nice Shabbat together as a program. Some z'mirot (songs) after dinner and even a tish (table, song session and study session) with one of the community's rabbis. A bunch of melodies, a few discussions and constant interruption of two dogs chasing each other around the tent. After relaxing for a while, I got a decent night's sleep and woke up to go get some meditation in.
I had never do that before and it was a great experience. I'm not sure what it exactly was about focusing on nothing but the pace of my breath. The session was guided and she asked us to concentrate on the the four letter word of God's Name. Each letter represents a part of the cycle of breathing. I felt so much better after that.
Sitting around the kibbutz the rain hit. Yep, that's right. The rain hit hard!
We actually got a nice downpour off and on all day. Complete with thunder and lightning, it was a fantastic show. I had forgotten how much I missed storms. There was really only one more thing that could have made it better was to have a certain special someone sitting on the couch next to me. I love storms and I haven't had a chance to see anything like this since getting to Israel.
It was great to have a little time off somewhere away from Jerusalem. Although I have to see that I am still a little worried about all of the stuff I have coming up and the days that I don't really have to get it all done in. But with that said, I need to get a little sleep. It's going to be a long three weeks until Kaitlin gets here.
Friday, July 9, 2010
Shabbos In Israel
Tonight is Shabbat, the end of my first week in Jerusalem. Since Marina knows a bunch of people in the area from camp, she wanted to have an OSRUI shabbat dinner. A bunch of her friends in the program and Israelis that she knows from camp came over and we made dinner in our apartment. A great excuse for us to clean out the kitchen and rearrange the apartment (I know I've been promising them, pictures will be up soon).
For t'fillah we went to Kol HaNishamah. I liked parts of their service and other parts were a bit too much for me. I really liked the different melodies that they used. There were ones that I didn't know and I was a bit lost, there were some standard melodies, some NFTY/camp melodies and even some conservative melodies that I haven't sung in a long time. I did like the service overall because it touched a lot of what I remember from my childhood at Adath, but also feels very Reform at the same time. I have some mixed feelings about it. I want to keep looking around Jerusalem for a place that I want to continue to go for services.
Tomorrow morning is a service at HUC. They're early and I want to go, but I'm not sure if I will be up in time. I've still been struggling with getting up in the morning when I need to. I will try the whole idea closing the window and not the shade. It will reduce the airflow, but I think it could help in the morning. We shall see.
We got back to the apartment and got dinner ready. I made my standard salad again. I have to say that it is a lot better with fresh vegetables from the Shuk in place of the ones from Trader Joe's that I used last time. I mean, Trader Joe's has great produce, but there is nothing better than the produce you can get fresh from a market.
Dinner was great. I like this whole pot luck thing. We all had little things ready and it turned out really well. It was a great way to break in the apartment as a small shabbat get together. Even though I didn't understand all of the inside jokes about OSRUI, I liked the community feel. Maybe I should find a way to work there next summer. It could be fun.
It's late and I want to get to services. We shall see how that works out.
Shabbat Shalom M'Yerushalayim!
For t'fillah we went to Kol HaNishamah. I liked parts of their service and other parts were a bit too much for me. I really liked the different melodies that they used. There were ones that I didn't know and I was a bit lost, there were some standard melodies, some NFTY/camp melodies and even some conservative melodies that I haven't sung in a long time. I did like the service overall because it touched a lot of what I remember from my childhood at Adath, but also feels very Reform at the same time. I have some mixed feelings about it. I want to keep looking around Jerusalem for a place that I want to continue to go for services.
Tomorrow morning is a service at HUC. They're early and I want to go, but I'm not sure if I will be up in time. I've still been struggling with getting up in the morning when I need to. I will try the whole idea closing the window and not the shade. It will reduce the airflow, but I think it could help in the morning. We shall see.
We got back to the apartment and got dinner ready. I made my standard salad again. I have to say that it is a lot better with fresh vegetables from the Shuk in place of the ones from Trader Joe's that I used last time. I mean, Trader Joe's has great produce, but there is nothing better than the produce you can get fresh from a market.
Dinner was great. I like this whole pot luck thing. We all had little things ready and it turned out really well. It was a great way to break in the apartment as a small shabbat get together. Even though I didn't understand all of the inside jokes about OSRUI, I liked the community feel. Maybe I should find a way to work there next summer. It could be fun.
It's late and I want to get to services. We shall see how that works out.
Shabbat Shalom M'Yerushalayim!
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