Category Archives: Inuyim – Prayer reflections and ruminations

A Celebration of Love

02 Monday Apr 2018

Posted by in Art, Holidays, Inuyim - Prayer reflections and ruminations, Poetry

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“The world is not as worthy as the day on which the Song of Songs was given to Israel, for all the writings are holy, but the Song of Songs is the Holy of Holies.”

So said Rabbi Akiva (2nd century Palestine), who understood that The Song of Songs is an allegory between two lovers, God and Israel.

The Kabbalistic tradition teaches that the love in the Song reflects higher events inside God’s metaphysical structure. It is read each year on the Shabbat during Pesach, and we at Temple Israel of Hollywood will celebrate the Song of Songs and our community’s milestone wedding anniversaries this Friday evening, April 6 at 6:30 PM in our Shabbat services.

Shelly Fox, our Director of Music and Cantorial Soloist, with our quartet and pianist Michael Alfera will present some of the most beautiful musical settings for the Song of Songs. Many of the melodies were composed in pre-statehood Palestine.

Our milestone wedding couples (celebrating 5 to 65 years of marriage will read love poetry.

If you live in Los Angeles, come and celebrate with us.

From the Song of Songs

O for your kiss! For your love / More enticing than wine, / For your scent and sweet name -– / For all this they love you. /

Take me away to your room, / Like a king to his rooms — / We’ll rejoice there with wine. / No wonder they love you! /

 

Like a mare among stallions, / You lure, I am held /

            Your cheeks framed with braids / your neck traced with shells /

I’ll adorn you with gold / And with silver bells“

 

How fine / you are, my love, / your eyes / like doves’. /

How fine / are you, my lover, / what joy / we have together. /

How green / our bed of leaves, / our rafters of cedars, / our juniper eaves./

 

Marcia Falk, The Song of Songs – Love Poems from the Bible (New York & London: Harcourt Brace Javanovich, 1977). Pages 1, 4, 6.

Moadim L’simchah!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Believing in Miracles

27 Tuesday Mar 2018

Posted by in American Jewish Life, Ethics, Holidays, Inuyim - Prayer reflections and ruminations, Jewish Identity, Musings about God/Faith/Religious life, Social Justice

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When I think about God splitting of the sea I’m reminded of the story of Joey who when asked by his father what he learned in Sunday school explained that Israeli engineers laid pontoons across the sea so that the Israelis could cross over safely, attack the Egyptian army and win the 1973 Yom Kippur War. Then Joey told his father that the same Israelis snuck back and laid charges under the bridges so that as the Egyptians crossed the bridges, they exploded and the Egyptians drowned.

Joey’s father said: “You didn’t learn that in Sunday school?”

Joey confessed: “No Dad, but you wouldn’t believe me if I told you what my teacher really told us.”

To children and adults alike, the parting of the Sea of Reeds in the Exodus story is incredulous. What to make of it as it defies reason? Wouldn’t a more relevant liberation story be Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address, Kings “I Have a Dream” speech, Natan Sharansky’s address to the sentencing Soviet court, or Israel’s Declaration of Independence?

The Kotzker Rebbe said: “Whoever believes in miracles is a fool; and whoever does not believe in miracles is an atheist.” Is there no middle ground?

How ought we to read the Exodus text?

Here’s another way.

Nachshon ben Aminadav, a little known figure in the Exodus story, took matters into his own hands and as the Egyptians advanced and Moses prayed Nachshon jumped into the waters and started swimming. The Midrash says that Moses’ faith and Nachshon’s activism persuaded God to split the sea.

I’m reminded of the story of the man caught in a flood. While standing on his roof he prayed that God would save him. In the next hour 3 helicopters and 3 boats arrived but he refused them all claiming that he’d rather wait for God to save him. When the flood waters engulfed him he complained bitterly to the Almighty: “I’ve been a good man my whole life, but when I prayed to You to save me, you ignored my plea!”

“Nebesh!” God screamed, “I sent you 3 helicopters and 3 boats. Next time, help yourself?”

So – what’s a miracle? Philosophers answer the question in the negative; what isn’t a miracle? Judaism teaches that a miracle isn’t the radical transformation of the natural world. Divine wisdom and goodness lie not in rupturing God’s reign of universal law, but in the reliability of the steady order of the world.

Rabbi Harold Schulweis put it this way: “Faith isn’t dependent on miracles….miracles depend on faith. And faith, far from blind, sees life’s deeper truths.”

However defined, no miracle without faith is possible. Rabbi Abraham Heschel noted that a miracle has less to do with great historical peak events as it does in our consciousness of what lies before us at all times: “To pray is to take notice of the wonder, to regain a sense of the mystery that animates all beings, the Divine margin in all attainments.”

Rabbi Akiba was challenged by the pagan Tineus Rufus: “Whose deeds are greater, those of God or humankind?”

Akiba replied: “Greater are human deeds.”

The pagan asked how he could make such a claim.

Akiba brought sheaves of wheat and loaves of cakes and asked, “Which are superior?” The great sage answered his own question: the loaves of cakes excel because they required a human being to take the wheat and make something life-sustaining.

The lesson of the Sea of Reeds isn’t in the splitting of the Sea. It’s in our conscientious capacity to take action and transform the world.

As we prepare Pesach this week, our nation’s teens marching for reasonable gun control this past week is a great example of how we humans can transform ourselves and our world.

THAT is a miracle.

Chag Pesach Sameach!

 

 

Moses and God’s Tears – A Poetic Midrash for Vayikra

16 Friday Mar 2018

Posted by in Divrei Torah, Inuyim - Prayer reflections and ruminations, Musings about God/Faith/Religious life, Poetry

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So often God called Moses. / Three times they met / at the flaming bush / on Sinai and before the Tent of Meeting / that Moses might intuit God’s mind / and soothe God’s heart / as a lover comforts his beloved.

Since creation / God yearned to bridge the chasm / when the Creator pulled away / and opened space / to share the universe.

Yet the Almighty remained alone / exiled within the Divine Self / when the vessels shattered / and matter was flung to the far reaches of the universe.

The upper spheres were divorced from the lower / male from female / the primal Father from the primal Mother / Tiferet from Malchut / Hakadosh Baruch Hu from Shechinah / Adonai from K’nesset Yisrael.

Before time and speech / God appointed the soul of the Shepherd-Prince Moses / to be prophet / and endowed him with hearing-sight / wide-ranging wisdom and intuitive knowledge.

No one but Moses / had ever been so chosen or / to come so near to God.

Moses saw with his ears / heard with his eyes / tasted with his mind / and remained whole in the Light.

The prophet descended the mountain aglow / the primordial Light shielding him behind a veil / bearing on his forehead divine ink-drops / illuminating the earth’s four corners.

Moses descended upon angel’s wings / weightless and cradling the lettered-stone / inside the eye of raging winds.

Though a Prince in Egypt / Moses’ destiny was as a lonely shepherd / gathering sheep / and drawing the children of Israel to God.

God needed much from Moses / to bring the plagues / and show that there is no God but God / and liberate the people / and bring them to Sinai / and inspire with the Word / and create God’s house / that light might abide within every heart / and restore wholeness in the world.

After all of God’s expectations and demands / we might expect Moses’ strength to be depleted / to be exhausted to the bone and ready to say / “Enough! O Redeemer – find a new prophet / I can no longer bear the burden / and be Your voice and create bridges / You are Almighty God / I am but flesh / My strength is gone / My time expired!”

“Nonsense!” proclaimed the Eternal / “I am not yet ready for your retirement! / My world remains shattered / My light obscured / my heart aching / I need you to teach My people / and all people / instill in their hearts / a love that heals My wound / for I cannot do this for Myself.”

Alas, the Creator-Redeemer’s needs were clear / to be close to Moses and the people / that the prophet and Israel together / might wipe away God’s tears / and restore God’s heart to wholeness / and heal God’s Name to Itself / and bring peace.

Poem composed by Rabbi John L. Rosove

Notes about this poetic Midrash:

The first word that appears in this week’s Torah portion Vayikra (vav – yud – kuf – resh – aleph – “And God called Moses…”) ends with an unusually small aleph. This anomaly in what is called the k’tiv (written text) gave rise to much rabbinic interpretation over the centuries.

Rashi explained that the small aleph teaches the humility of Moses. Others said that the aleph is an introduction to the Levitical laws of sacrifice, which requires humility. A Midrash suggests that when Moses descended from Mount Sinai carrying the tablets of the law, he emitted a keren or (“a ray of light”) compelling Moses to shield his face with a veil because the people could not look upon him in such a state. The source of that ray of light was divine ink left over when Moses wrote a small aleph instead of one of normal size. The Midrash explains that Moses had sought to lessen his own stature by using a small aleph, but God restored the extra drops of divine ink by placing them upon Moses’ forehead.

The Midrashic literature comments at length about Moses’ experience meeting panim el panim (lit. “face to face” – metaphorically “soul to soul”) with God. Moses was first among God’s prophets. Though each prophet spoke God’s words, there never was another prophet like Moses nor, as the Torah explains, was there ever again a more humble human being on earth than Moses.

It is my fascination with prophecy that inspired me to write this poetic Midrash.

For those of you wishing more insight into Biblical prophecy, I recommend Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel’s “The Prophets” – publ. Jewish Publication Society, New York, 1962.

Shabbat shalom. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A Pure Soul – Moses’ Selection as Prophet

04 Thursday Jan 2018

Posted by in Art, Divrei Torah, Inuyim - Prayer reflections and ruminations, Musings about God/Faith/Religious life, Poetry

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Moses at the Burning Bush – Marc Chagall

The Book of Exodus is the story about God’s saving love for the oppressed Israelites. It begins with the birth of Moses, follows him as a young prince, as a rebel and outlaw, a shepherd, and THE prophet of God.

Why Moses? What was so unique about him that God chose him to be his most intimate prophet?

Moses was complex, passionate, pure, just, humble, at home nowhere, carrying his people’s burdens while hearing God’s words.

He was unique, the only prophet to speak panim el panim (“face to face”) with God. That is what my drash-poem is about. Moses is the most important Jew in our history and our gold standard of a religious, moral, and political leader.

In our time the world has benefited from Mahatma Gandhi, Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel, Dr. Martin Luther King, Mother Teresa, the Dalai Lama, and Nelson Mandela. Nevertheless, Moses continues to stand alone.

A Pure Soul

I walk in a daze / Eyes sunk in creviced faces / Fettered to worldly tasks / Unable to glimpse rainbows.

I imagine Moses in Midian like that / Brooding in exile / Burdened by his people’s suffering / Knowing that each day / They scream from stopped-up hearts / Shedding silent tears.

A simple shepherd Moses / Staff in hand / Counting sheep / Until one day weaving among rocks / And bramble bushes / The shepherd / Heard thorns popping / Turning his head / His eyes opened / And he would never be the same.

God had from his birth taken note of him / And waited until this moment / To choose him as prophet.

Dodi dofek pitchi li / A-choti ra-yati yo-nati ta-mati. / Open to me, my dove / my twin / my undefiled one. (Song of Songs 5:2)

Moses heard God’s voice / And beheld angels, / His soul flowing in a sacred river / Of Shechinah light.

‘Why me? / Why should I behold such wonder? / Unworthy am I!’

God said / ‘Moses – I choose you / Because you are soft / Because you weep / Because your heart is burdened and worried / Because you know this world’s cruelty / And you have not become cruel / Nor do you stand idly by.

You are a tender of sheep, / And you will lead my people / With the shepherd’s staff from Egypt / And teach them to open their hearts / Without fear.’

Trembling, Moses peered a second time / Into the bush aflame / Free from ash and smoke.

His eyes opened as in a dream / And he heard a soft murmuring sound / Like the sound breath makes / Passing through lips. 

MOSHE MOSHE!—HINEINI!

Two voices—One utterance! / He hid his face / The more Moses heard / The brighter was the light / And he knew he must turn away / Or die.

The prophet’s thoughts were free / Soaring beyond form / No longer of self / To this very day / There has not been a purer soul than his.

God said ‘Come no closer, Moses! / Remove your shoes / Stand barefoot here on this earth / I want your soul.

I am here with you and in you / I am every thing / And no thing / And You are Me / I see that which is and which is not / And I hear it all.

Take heed shepherd-prince / My people‘s blood / Calls to me from the ground / The living suffer still / A thousand deaths.

You must go and take them out / Every crying child / Every lashed man  / Every woman screaming silent tears.

And Moses know this / “With weeping they will come / And with compassion will I guide them.” (Jeremiah 31:8) / The people’s exile began with tears / And it will end with tears.

I have recorded their story in a Book / Black fire on white fire / Letters on parchment / Telling of slaves / Seeing light / Turning to Me / Becoming a nation.

The Book is My spirit / The letters are My heart / They are near to you / That you might do them / And teach them / And redeem My world / That it might not be consumed in flames.

Poem composed by Rabbi John Rosove

 

Jacob’s Dream and His Emergence into a Man of Faith

22 Wednesday Nov 2017

Posted by in Art, Beauty in Nature, Divrei Torah, Inuyim - Prayer reflections and ruminations, Musings about God/Faith/Religious life

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Marc Chagall’s Jacob’s Ladder

Jacob’s destiny was set from birth and would come at a price. As his mother Rebekah’s troubled twin pregnancy came to an end and the babies were born, Jacob holding Esau’s heel suggested a strong pre-natal desire to be born first and become the future leader of the tribe. In a clever commentary, Rashi (11th century, France) says that the scene reflects a primogeniture truth, that Jacob was actually conceived first, though he came out second, much as a pebble dropped into a tube first will come out second when the tube is inverted.

Despite being second-born, Jewish tradition asserts that Jacob’s spiritual potential merited his assuming first-born rights, and it also suggests that Rebecca knew that her other son Esau, a hunter, lacked the requisite sensitivity, gentility, vision, and prophetic capacity to lead the tribe, whereas Jacob possessed all those virtues.

Jacob’s dream event that opens this week’s portion Vayetze (Genesis 28:10-22) signals the beginning of a new stage in Jacob’s life. He had just fled in fear from an enraged Esau, was alone in the mountains, unsure of himself and exhausted. He fell asleep and dreamed of ladders and angels.

This dream sequence is filled with powerful religious imagery, suggestion and mythic archetypes. The stones Jacob placed under his head are symbolic of what Carl Jung called the Ego, the limited “I” of Jacob, a man still unaware of the implicate order in the universe that links the material and metaphysical worlds.

The top of the ladder represents what Jung called the integrated Self which unifies the conscious and unconscious into a non-dualistic cosmos.

When Jacob went to sleep using stones as a pillow, we suspect that something unusual is about to happen, that he’s on the cusp of new self-consciousness. Lo and behold, he sees angels ascending (representing his yearning for something greater than himself) and angels descending (representing God’s outreach towards him), Rabbi Heschel’s idea of prophetic empathy and God’s pathos.

When Jacob awoke from the dream and opened his eyes, he was astonished: “Surely God is in this place, va’anochi lo yadati, and I did not know it! … How awesome is this place! This is none other than the abode of God, and this is the gateway to heaven.” (28:16-17)

The beginning of any religious experience requires us to understand that we know nothing at all. In Hebrew “I” is ani (anochi is a variant form), and when we rearrange the letters – aleph, nun, yod – we spell ain, which means “nothing”). The religious person must transform the “I” of the  ego into a great Self in which we become part of God’s Oneness. Jacob’s sudden awareness results in his newfound humility and is a prerequisite to the development of his faith.

Despite the spiritual potency of this experience, Jacob remains unaware (i.e. he lacks access to his full unconscious) and his faith is conditional. He says, “If God remains with me, if God protects me…, and gives me bread to eat and clothing to wear, and if I return safe … the Eternal shall be my God.” (28:20-21)

One of the consistent themes throughout the Genesis narrative is that in order for the Biblical figures to grow in faith they had to suffer trials. As a protected child of his mother, Jacob had been pampered. However, in being forced to flee for his life from the brother he wronged, Jacob became aware of the shadow (Jung’s term denoting that part of the unconscious consisting of repressed weaknesses, shortcomings and instincts) in which he lived and which would envelop him for the next twenty years. Then he met a being divine and human at the river Jabbok and emerged with a new name, Yisrael – the one who perseveres with God.

From Jacob’s birth to next week’s encounter at the river we witness the patriarch’s evolution from the unconsciousness of his childhood to greater awareness, from a self-centered trickster to the bearer of the covenant. As he progressed he learned to view the world through the eyes of faith as he stood at heaven’s gate.

Shabbat Shalom!

 

 

Filling My Children’s Cups – Toldot

16 Thursday Nov 2017

Posted by in American Jewish Life, Divrei Torah, Inuyim - Prayer reflections and ruminations, Poetry

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Kiddush cup - Shevach shevach Jerusalem

I am Isaac / Tradition doesn’t esteem me / as my father and son.

To our people’s cynics / I’m a passive placeholder / set between two visionaries / one hearing God’s voice / the other communing with angels.

To them I’m the do-nothing / dull-witted middle-man / neither here nor there / coerced into submission by a father / tricked by a son / abandoned by God / who willed me slain / to test my father’s faith / thus becoming history’s most misunderstood near-victim.

My father was driven by voices / left home on a promise / and journeyed to a Place he’d never seen / a low-lying mountain shielded round about / by a cloud / beneath heavenly fire.

My son dreamed of angels / ascended ladder rungs / from land and form / into spirit and spheres.

Tradition diminishes me insinuating / that I merely built a worldly fortune / on my father’s wealth.

Dear ancestors / I’m more than this / the wellsprings I uncovered / are more than you know / greater that waters deep, calm, cool, and tranquil / their streams flow to the Source of souls.

I dug anew my father’s wells / the same the Philistines / with stopped-up hearts / and clogged souls / filled in when he died.

I and my servants dug / our thirst unquenchable / passions unleashing / hearts expecting / souls soaring / on angels’ wings.

After our digging / we found the well / and the spring / flowing in earthly and heavenly wetness.

The inflowing fountain never dries up / The well is replenished continually / and whoever drinks from its waters / merges into Oneness through supernal faith.

The wells I dug / are the same as my father’s / That is our gift to you!

I yearn that you / pour the waters into your cups / dig anew / and pour the same / into your children’s cups.

 

Poem composed by Rabbi John Rosove – The Kiddush Cup was created by Shevach Silversmiths of Jerusalem (Mamilla Mall)

 

 

Temple Israel Rabbis’ High Holiday Sermons – 2017/5778

02 Monday Oct 2017

Posted by in American Jewish Life, American Politics and Life, Divrei Torah, Ethics, Holidays, Inuyim - Prayer reflections and ruminations, Jewish History, Jewish Identity, Musings about God/Faith/Religious life, Social Justice, Women's Rights

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For those interested, the High Holiday sermons for our three rabbis at Temple Israel of Hollywood, Rabbi Michelle Missaghieh, Rabbi Jocee Hudson, and me are available on line at http://www.tioh.org/worship/rabbis/clergystudy.

The Themes of our sermons are as follows:

Rabbi John Rosove’s High Holyday Sermons:

Rabbi Michelle Missaghieh’s High Holyday Sermons:

Rabbi Jocee Hudson’s High Holyday Sermons:

 

 

The Power of Kol Nidre

28 Thursday Sep 2017

Posted by in American Jewish Life, Divrei Torah, Ethics, Health and Well-Being, Holidays, Inuyim - Prayer reflections and ruminations, Jewish Identity, Musings about God/Faith/Religious life

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yom-kippur-prayers-picture-id182923703

Though the chanting of the Kol Nidre text is the iconic moment of the evening service on Yom Kippur, the words of this Aramaic legal formula are less important than the dramatic occasion in which the Kol Nidre is the central element.

The congregation enters the Sanctuary on that holiest of nights and is stunned to see an empty open ark devoid of Torah scrolls. Normally the Aron Hakodesh (The Holy ark) is filled with sifrei Torah – the Torah scrolls are what make the Ark “holy” (Kadosh). Without Torah scrolls the Aron’s meaning changes. In Hebrew, “Aron” is an “ark,” a “closet,” and a “casket.” Looking into an empty Ark is as if we are peering into our own coffins and confronting our limitations and mortality.

The High Holidays, however, offer a reprieve. The liturgy reminds us that prayer (i.e. praising and celebrating God and life), teshuvah (i.e. turning and returning to lives of meaning in relationship with others, with Torah, the Jewish people, nature, and God), and tzedakah (i.e. restoring justice into human affairs) are available to us at any time. Despite whatever has drawn us away from our core Jewish values during the year, we can recommit in this season to living our lives with greater dignity and meaning. We can turn our lives around. Fate need not necessarily determine our destiny. We can change, evolve, and grow. We can be elevated and worthy to stand with dignity before God on this holiest of days.

The Chassidim teach that if one wishes to walk east when one is walking west, all that’s necessary is to turn around.

G’mar chatimah tovah.

 

 

 

 

The Central Personal Challenge of the High Holiday Season

27 Wednesday Sep 2017

Posted by in American Jewish Life, Divrei Torah, Ethics, Health and Well-Being, Holidays, Inuyim - Prayer reflections and ruminations, Musings about God/Faith/Religious life, Quote of the Day

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c034c1627a5d230d6a4cf3e0d9dcc672--yom-teruah-yom-kippur

The primary responsibility of the Jew during the ten days between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur is teshuvah.

I have posted here classic rabbinic text for study and contemplation during these days. I wish for everyone the strength and courage to confront that which prevents us from being close to the people we love, friends, community, the Jewish people, Torah, and God.

“Repentance must be preceded by the recognition of seven things: (1) the penitent must clearly recognize the heinousness of what s/he has done… (2) S/he must be aware that his/her specific act was legally evil and ignominious… (3) S/he must realize that retribution for his/her misdeed is inevitable… (4) S/he must realize that his/her sin is noted and recorded in the book of his iniquities… (5) S/he must be fully convinced that repentance is the remedy for his/her sickness and the road to recovery from his/her evil deed… (6) S/he must conscientiously reflect upon the bounties the Creator had already bestowed upon him/her, and how S/he had rebelled against God instead of being grateful to the Eternal… (7) S/he must strenuously persevere in keeping away from the evil to which s/he had been addicted and firmly resolve in his/her heart and mind to renounce it. – Bachya ibn Pakuda, Duties of the Heart 7:3 

“What is t’shuvah? It is when a sinner abandons his/her sin and removes it from his/her thoughts, and resolves in his/her heart not to do that deed again.  As it says, “Let the wicked person forsake his/her way, and the unrighteous one his/her thoughts.” (Isaiah 55:7)  And so s/he repents for the past.  As it says, “After I turned away, I repented.” (Jeremiah 31:18)  And s/he will call the Knower of secrets to testify against him/her that s/he will never again return to this sin.  As it does not say, “Nor shall we say ever again to the work of our hands, ‘You are our God’ (Hosea 14:4). And s/he must confess in words these things that s/he has resolved in his/her heart. – Maimonides, Mishnah Torah, Laws of Repentance 2:2 

It is very praiseworthy for the penitent to confess publicly and announce his/her sins, and reveal to others the transgressions he committed against his/her fellow.  S/he should say to them, “Truly I have sinned against so-and-so by doing such-and-such.  But now I am turning and repenting.” Everyone who is arrogant and doesn’t reveal but rather conceals his/her sins – his/her t’shuvah isn’t complete.  As it says, “One who conceals his transgressions does not succeed.” (Proverbs 28:13) – Maimonides, Mishnah Torah, Laws of Repentance 2:5 

“What is complete t’shuvah?  When one comes upon a situation in which s/he once transgressed, and it is possible to do so again, but s/he refrains and doesn’t transgress on account of his/her repentance. – Maimonides, Mishnah Torah, Laws of Repentance 2:1 

“Humility is the root and beginning of repentance.” – Bachya ibn Pakuda 

“Rabbi Eliezer said, “Repent one day before your death.” His disciples asked him, “Does then one know on what day s/he will die?”  “All the more reason s/he should repent today, lest s/he die tomorrow.” –  Babylonian Talmud, Shabbat 53a 

“Great is repentance, for it brings healing to the world… When an individual repents, s/he is forgiven, and the entire world with him.” Babylonian Talmud, Yoma 86b 

“How wonderful is the moral perspective that arises from this great responsibility – a responsibility for all of existence, for all worlds. We have the power to bring favor and light, life, joy, and honor in these worlds. This occurs when we follow the straight path, when we strengthen and gird ourselves with a pure fortitude and conquer paths of life that are good and admired, when we advance and go from strength to strength…. YYet it is also in our power to bring pain to every good portion, when we debase our souls and corrupt our ways, when we darken our spiritual light and suspend our moral purity.” – Rabbi Abraham Isaac Cook, Orot HaKodesh vol. III, p. 63

G’mar chatimah tovah. May you be sealed in the book of life.

 

 

 

 

A Prayer for the Jewish New Year 5778

19 Tuesday Sep 2017

Posted by in American Jewish Life, Ethics, Holidays, Inuyim - Prayer reflections and ruminations, Musings about God/Faith/Religious life, Poetry

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RH fruits and symbols
May we hold lovingly in our thoughts / those who suffer from tyranny, subjection, cruelty, and injustice, / and work every day towards the alleviation of their suffering.
 
May we recognize our solidarity / with the stranger, outcast, downtrodden, abused, and deprived, / that no human being be treated as “other,” / that our common humanity weaves us together / in one fabric of mutuality, / one garment of destiny.
 
May we pursue the Biblical prophet’s vision of peace, / that we might live harmoniously with each other / and side by side, / respecting differences, / cherishing diversity, / with no one exploiting the weak, / each living without fear of the other, / each revering Divinity in every human soul.
 
May we struggle against institutional injustice, / free those from oppression and contempt, / act with purity of heart and mind, / despising none, defrauding none, hating none, insulting none / cherishing all, honoring every child of God, every creature of the earth.
 
May the Jewish people, the State of Israel, and all peoples in The Land / know peace in this New Year, / And may we nurture kindness and love everywhere.
 
Prayer composed by Rabbi John Rosove – Temple Israel of Hollywood, Los Angeles