Virtual Shabbat Box Archives: October 2022
October 28-29
While appropriate at all times, this prayer by Rabbi David Mevorach Seidenberg is particularly suitable during the week that the Torah portion chapters about Noah are read.
On Shabbat Sukkot, 5783, Rabbi Deborah Waxman, president and CEO of Reconstructing Judaism, spoke at Philadelphia’s Congregation Mishkan Shalom. She focused on how Jewish practices and rituals cultivate resilience within individuals and communities, sustaining the Jewish people through the ages.
Xava De Cordova explores the ethical question: Does Judaism have anything to say about remembering people who have hurt others and speaking honestly while avoiding lashon hara (derogatory speech)?
Poet and director of Ritualwell Hila Ratzabi discusses creativity and the role it plays in her life and its valuable place in Jewish civilization.
Martin Hasan presents a non-theistic ceremony for marking the end of Shabbat and the return to ordinary week.
October 21-22
The Rev. Wil Gafney, biblical scholar and Episcopal priest, paints a more accurate picture of our Afro-Asiatic forebearers, making a case that engaging with the racist history of biblical criticism and Western art is key to forging a more just future.
Shahanna MicKinney-Baldon, a Reconstructing Judaism board member, portrays Madame Goldye Steiner, a Black cantor who performed traditional Jewish music a century ago.
“It is our work in the world with the people in our lives,” teaches Rabbi Steven Nathen, “that enable us to find God. Only then can we truly be rewarded with the experience of the holiness and peace that is represented by Shabbat.”
In this poem, Cathleen Cohen reflects on the creation story of Genesis 2 and wonders: “Don’t we all have seeds of paradise within us?”
Shabbat completed the work of Divine creation. Rabbi James Stone Goodman offers this prayer to complete our own work.
