From Ecology to Theology. Also, A Thread of Blue!

 A very full morning of Torah and Jewish Thought was had this Sunday morning with the Sixth Grade, and one of those topics was from Ecology to Theology. What unites thsoe two topics? 

That's the question our 6th graders tried to use today. Here's one of the first questions they had to tackle: 

Who among the following draws water from the Jordan River:

a)    Israelis? 

b)    Syrians?

c)     Lebanse?

d)    Palestinians?

e)     All of the above?

 

It’s all of the above. As our students learned in a far-ranging set of  questions in a quiz, there is a large number of people dependent on a very small source of water in and around Eretz Yisrael. The drain on the Jordan river is so intense, very little water even makes it to the Dead Sea, which is shrinking at a horrifying rate. The need for rain in the Middle East cannot be understated, and the power of droughts in that arid climate is a serious threat. This is why Israel has actually invested heavily in water reclamation and desalinization efforts. Desalinization is expensive and electricity intensive, but it puts less of a strain on the water sources of the area.  Israel now gets up to 80% of its fresh water from plants on the coast like this one in Hadera.

In comparison to the Midwest, where there is no rainy season, Israel has a clear rainy season that begins around some coat in the fall and ends at Passover time in the spring. Ensuring there's enough moisture just in the general atmosphere to keep crops alive has been a serious concern of any people who farm in this area of the world.

And that's why we were looking at and listening to the prayer for dew, or Tal . The prayer is a very flowery, beautiful poem asking for God to bless us in multiple ways, each blessing to fall like tall dew.  This special prayer is inserted into the musaf service on the 7th day of Passover. The issue of water is so serious that the prayer is still chanted in part or whole in the nusach/melodic mode of the Yamim Nora’im,  the High Holidays!  

Here’s a simple rendition of prayer:

And here is  full text and translation :

:אֱלהֵינוּ וֵאלהֵי אֲבותֵינוּ טַל תֵּן לִִרְצּות אַרְצָךְ שִׁיתֵנוּ בְרָכָה בְּדִיצָךְ רוב דָגָן וְתִירושׁ בְּהַפְרִיצָךְ קומֵם עִיר בָּהּ חֶפְצָךְ :בְּטַל טַל צַוֵּה שָׁנָה טובָה וּמְעֻטֶרֶת פְּרִי הָאָרֶץ לְגָאון וּלְתִפְאֶרֶת עִיר כְּסֻּכָּה נותֶרֶת שימָהּ בְּיָדְךָ עֲטֶרֶת :בְּטַל טַל נופֵף עֲלֵי אֶרֶץ בְּרוּכָה מִמֶּגֶד שָׁמַיִם שבְּעֵנוּ בְרָכָה לְהָאִיר מִתּוךְ חֲשֵׁכָה כַּנָה אַחֲרֶיךָ מְשׁוּכָה :בְּטַל טַל יַעֲסִיס צוּף הָרִים טְעֵם בִּמְאודֶךָ מֻבְחָרִים חֲנוּנֶיךָ חַלֵץ מִמַסְגֵרִים זִמְרָה נַנְעִים וְקול נָרִים בְּטַל: טַל וָשובַע מַלֵּא אֲסָמֵינוּ הֲכָעֵת תְּחַדֵּשׁ יָמֵינוּ דוד כְּעֶרְכְּךָ הַעֲמֵד שְׁמֵנוּ גַּן רָוֶה שימֵנוּ :בְּטַל טַל בּו תְבָרֵךְ מָזון בְּמַשְׁמַנֵּינוּ אַל יְהִי רָזון אֲיֻמָה אֲשֶׁר הִסַּעְתָּ כַצּאן אָנָא תָּפֵק לָהּ רָצון :בְּטַל שָׁאַתָּה הוּא ה’ אֱלהֵינוּ מַשִּׁיב הָרוּחַ וּמורִיד הַטָּל :לִבְרָכָה וְלא לִקְלָלָה. אמן :לְחַיִּים וְלא לַמָּוֶת. אמן :לְשובַע וְלא לְרָזון. אמן

Our God and God of our ancestors: Dew, precious dew, unto Your land forlorn, Pour out our blessing in Your exultation, To strengthen us with ample wine and corn, And give Your chosen city safe foundation In dew. Dew, precious dew, the good year’s crown, we await, That earth in pride and glory may be fruited, And that the city once so desolate Into a gleaming crown may be transmuted By dew. Dew, precious dew, let fall upon the land; From heaven’s treasury be this accorded; So shall the darkness by a beam be spanned, The faithful of Your vineyard be rewarded With dew. Dew, precious dew to make the mountains sweet, The savor of Your excellence recalling. Deliver us from exile, we entreat, So we may sing Your praises, softly falling As dew. Dew, precious dew, our granaries to fill, And all our youthful excesses pardon. Beloved God, uplift us at Your will And make us as a richly watered garden With dew. Dew, precious dew, that we our harvest reap, And guard our fatted flocks and herds from leanness. Behold our people follow You like sheep, And look to You to give the earth her greenness With dew. You are Adonai our God who causes the wind to blow and the dew to fall. For a blessing, not for a curse, Amen. For life, not for death, Amen. For abundance, not for famine, Amen.

 

In addition to exploring Tal,  we spend a bit of time talking about the Four Children in the Haggadah, and how the Talmud Yerushalmi,  the Talmud of the Land of Israel,  explains the wicked son in a very particular way.  That and a bit of fun with the four sons and we took a few minutes to finish up our unit on the Tallit. 

Until the mid 1980’s,  there was commandment in Sefer Bamidbar, the Book of Numbers (ch. 15, vv.37-39), that nobody could perform for over 1500 years. Which one? 

וַיֹּ֥אמֶר יְהוָ֖ה אֶל־מֹשֶׁ֥ה לֵּאמֹֽר׃

Adonai said to Moses as follows:

דַּבֵּ֞ר אֶל־בְּנֵ֤י יִשְׂרָאֵל֙ וְאָמַרְתָּ֣ אֲלֵהֶ֔ם וְעָשׂ֨וּ לָהֶ֥ם צִיצִ֛ת עַל־כַּנְפֵ֥י בִגְדֵיהֶ֖ם לְדֹרֹתָ֑ם וְנָֽתְנ֛וּ עַל־צִיצִ֥ת הַכָּנָ֖ף פְּתִ֥יל תְּכֵֽלֶת׃

Speak to families of Yisrael and instruct them to make for themselves fringes on the corners of their garments throughout the ages; let them attach a string of blue to the fringe at each corner.

וְהָיָ֣ה לָכֶם֮ לְצִיצִת֒ וּרְאִיתֶ֣ם אֹת֗וֹ וּזְכַרְתֶּם֙ אֶת־כָּל־מִצְוֺ֣ת יְהוָ֔ה וַעֲשִׂיתֶ֖ם אֹתָ֑ם וְלֹֽא־תָתֻ֜רוּ אַחֲרֵ֤י לְבַבְכֶם֙ וְאַחֲרֵ֣י עֵֽינֵיכֶ֔ם אֲשֶׁר־אַתֶּ֥ם זֹנִ֖ים אַחֲרֵיהֶֽם׃

That shall be your fringe; look at it and recall all the mitzvot of Adonai and observe them, so that you do not get distracted by your heart or let your eyes lead you astray.

The commandment to place a string of techeylet/sky blue,  was impossible for Jews to fulfill after the Jewish dyeing industry was wiped out in the Byzantine period.  The color, derived from a snail known only as the chilazon,  became an object of legend and myth.

Colorfast blue and purple dyes were extremely expensive in the ancient near east,  saved for royalty and priesthood.  Even once lost, Jews dreamed of restoring the blue threat to their tallitot, as the Talmud taught of its powerful spirutual meaning in Tractate Menachot (43b if you want to check) where we find the words of Rebbe Meir:  "For the techeyelt is as the color of the sea,  and the sea is as the color of the sky, and the sky is as the color of God's glorious throne." 

 It remained a dream until the modern period, where a series of Torah scholars and scientists searched for the creature.  In the 1980’s,  a new group of scholars and activists worked to restore the blue dye successfully.   Any tallit is acceptable with all white fringes,   but now there those who wear the blue threads on the corners of their tallitot in a dazzling array of gorgeous patterns as in centuries past:

 

So why, aside from the extra step to tie these blue threads, do so few people wear this blue?  Our students agreed the answer may lay in that there is a cost to the strings, over $40 a set.  In the times of the Mishnah,  wool dyed with genuine techeylet was worth more than its weight in gold! The other reason we discussed  that this mitzvah has just recently been restored to function, and Jewish tradition can be slow to change, even when that change is going back to the way things used to be!  But our hope is that our students, regardless of gender, now understand something of why so many do embrace the practice of wearing tzitzit with Techeylet.

 

Rabbi Bonna Haberman Browns, zichronah livracha/of blessed memory, in prayer with with techelyet strung tzitzit and tefilin.  

 

 

 

 

Purim Lano, Pesach Ala Mano!

For most of our 6th Gade families, our understanding of what it means to be Jewish is one that is Ashkenormative.   When we think of Jewishness, we often think of  the foods of Eastern Europe, of Chasidim with black coats and hats,   Hebrew tinged with the letter  " ת "  read as an "S",  and Yiddish words and accents. For most of us, this is the default mode by which we exp  But for much of the Jewish world, Jewishness is anchored in the foods of  Spain, Greece,  or Turkey, and the langauge of Ladino.  Ladino, Gabe pointed out to our students,  is a compound language like Yiddish,  but its roots are in medival Spanish and Hebrew.    The great Flory Jagoda sings the perfect Ladino song for this time of year:  Pesach Ala Mano- Passover is at Hand!

Pesah ala Mano

Flory Jagoda

 

Purim, Purim, Purim lano,

Pesah, Pesah ala mano;

Las matsas si stan faziendo,

Los japrakis si stan koziendo.

Aman (4x) Il Diyo Bendicho mos da mazal (repeat)

Purim, Purim, Purim lano,

Pesah, Pesah ala mano;

La Nona sta diziendo a los nyetos,

Alimpiya il puelvo, kantones i loz techos.

Aman…

Purim, Purim, Purim lano,

Pesah, Pesah ala mano;

Il Sinyor Rubi disho a las tiyas

No kumer il pan ocho diyas.

Aman…

 

Purim, Purim, Purim is over,

Passover is at hand;

Matzot are being made,

The stuffed grape leaves are being baked.

Amen (4x)

Almighty God give us good fortune.

Purim, Purim, Purim is over,

Passover is at hand;

The grandmother is telling the grandchildren,

Clean the dust, the corners and ceilings.

Aman…

Purim, Purim, Purim is over,

Passover is at hand;

The Rabbi tells the aunties

Not to eat bread for eight days.

Aman…

Some parents may hear that and think "well, that does encapsulate a moment of what it is like to be between Purim and Pesach, but Gabe and Miron, does it really speak  musically to today's students?"Which is why we shared  this excellent,  dynamic remix of the song to share with them (listen to this one with headphones  or you will miss out on the full effect).  

In addition to our exploring Ladino and reviewing the 10 plauges mentioned in the Seder,  we also did a bit of shopping!  Not actual shopping, but as part of the second part of our unit on the Tallit, we had students search for Tallitot in a host of their favorite colors, and they found them!  The incredible variety of colors and styles of Tallitot aviable today helped us realize that there is  a style of Tallit out there for everyone,  and  in our synagouge,  we encourage people of all genders to wear a tallit during prayer.  Why many Jews, especially women,  still feel it difficult to connect to this essential Jewish prayer practice- even in our welcoming and supporive synagouge-  is one we hope to explore with our clergy in coming weeks. 

 

 

In preparation for Purim this week (Yay!), we started our lesson today by taking a deep dive into the Megillah, a.ka. the Scroll of Esther. We looked at the differences between Megillah and Torah scrolls, noting the beautiful illustrations and ornaments  that can be found on the former. Torah scrolls remain beautiful in terms of their calligraphy, but without embellishment.

Here's a medieval illustrated Megilah as an example.

We listened to different regional chanting of the book of Ester: Ashkenazi, Yemenite (Gabe's personal favorite), 

Moroccan,   Yerushalmi, and Miron's favorite, the Spanish Portuguese, 

courtesy of the amazing alto Cantor Ocanto-Romo of Congregation Ohev Shalom in PA.

Then we looked at the Liturgy of the holiday, listening to  and reviewing the Al Hannism prayer (used on Chanukah, Purim and sometimes on Yom Haatzmaut).  We spent time talking in our chevruta (study pairs) about the meaning of the holiday. Next, we took an anonymous survey about how personally important Purim is to us, and how we view it in contrast with the other costume holiday middle schoolers know about, Halloween. We ended the lesson with another edition of “What's Gabe Lying About?”, which was played this time with Israeli news headlines.  

 

Don't forget to bring a tallis for next week!

 

For this week's  lesson on American Jewish history, we took a deep dive into the events of October 7th, 1965. That moment in history, of course, was when Dodgers ace Sandy Koufax sat out game one of the world series, as October 7th was the first day of Yom Kippur.

The decision to sit out game one of the world series sent seismic shock-waves through the American Jewish community, as a non-Orthodox American Jew to with a famous American identity refused to give up his practice on Judaism on its holiest of days.  We also looked at events in our daily lives where we had to balance our Jewish and American identities, such as missing school to attend high holiday service or arguing at the dinner table. 

Koufax was a trailblazer to those who wanted to hold true to both  their religious and  secular lives;  American Jews could now ask themselves "If he did it, why cant I?"  Koufax also hand thrown out a challenge at American Jews who  had-  or were readying to eject their Jewishness in the name of their American identity; American Jews could now  be asked "If he did it, why won't you?"


This Sunday was our first look at Purim material for the year, and what better way to introduce the topic that with an essay from our good friend Tiffany B. Now of course, Tiffany's essays always leave a lot to be desired, especially within the realm of facts, and that is where our sixth graders come in to help. In groups, they went over Tiffany B's work, and earned points  for finding her mistakes and fixing them. At the end of the activity, the students tally up their corrections, and whoever has the most points gets inducted into the Sixth Grade Hall of Fame. This weeks Hall of Fame Inductee is Maxwell G,  who found 37 things wrong with Tiffany B's paper. Way to go Max!

Shalom 6th Grade Families:  

With Tu BiShvat this week, we studied some Torah about the new year of the Trees. We learned about Orlah, a mitzvah that cultivates mindfulness and states that for three years ater it is planted, the fruit of a tree is not ours to eat.  We also looked at the laws of Ma'aser/tithing, which drive us to think of others who may be food insecure.  These Torah commandments, aimed at creating a just management of the food supply,  are based on yearly growth and harvests.  Determining if  fruit belonged to one calendar year or the next  created the need for a new year for a tree.  And hence,  Tu Bishvat, which has expanded in meaning from a just food supply to Chag Ha'Teva, where nature and the environment take center stage with the Torah teachings that surround them. 

Gabe says :his favorite thing related to trees and Tu Bishvat that we learned came from Rabban Yohannan Ben Zakkai:   “If you are holding a sapling in your hand and someone says that the Messiah has drawn near, first plant the sapling, and then go and greet the Messiah.”  Miron says his favorite iis from The Great Midrash on Koshlet/Ecclesiates: "When the Blessed Holy One created the first human, God took Adam and led him round all the trees of the Garden of Eden and said to him: “Look at My works, how beautiful and praiseworthy they are! And all that I have created, it was for you that I created it. Pay attention that you do not ruin and destroy My world: if you ruin it, there is no one to repair it after you!"

(Reccomended reading for all who love Torah, Trees, the Earth, or hopefully all three.)

For our unit of American Jewish History, we took a look at the year 1883. 1883 was the year of  both the "Treyfa Banquet"  and was also the year that Emma Lazarus wrote The New Colossus.  As famous as the poem that adorns the Statue of Liberty is,  we explored how Lazarus was of great fame long before she wrote those adamant words,"Give me your tired, your poor,  your huddled masses yearning to breathe free." 

The New Colossus, we learned a little about Emma's history as an American Jewish immigrant and her history as a poet, and then we analysed the poem, which may have had little impact in the months following its being written.   In the time of Emma's fame, the Statue of Liberty was seen by many as a guardian against  immigration!  Yet as years passed,  the power of the poem increased, and changed how the statue  was seen, finally being installed on the base of the statue in bronze.  Her poem inspired Americans to see the tall green sentinel as a symbol of welcome and not warding. 

We learned about another event in 1883. Take a look at the menu below,  and ask youself:  What is suprising about the menu below if it is being served to several rabbis? 

  Here are some culinary terms to help you decode the dishes:

Ala` Monglas:  (ala MontGlas) dish finished with a velouté  sauce augmented with Truffles, Mushrooms,  and Demi-Glace.

Relevee:  A second main dish that takes the place (lit. relieves) the entrée,  usually a roasted/stewed meat.

Ala Viennoise: served in a butter and cream sauce,  flavored with nutmeg

Grenouiles: Frogs’ legs

Vol au Vents:  baked dish covered in savory crust

Ala Tyrolienne:  A tomato and mayonnaise based sauce

GH Mumm: a brand of Champagne. Still around at $40 a bottle.

This menu was from a banquet held by Reform movement's Union of American Hebrew Congretations for the first graduating class of  rabbis of the Hebrew Union College. So you would be correct in realizing that the menu, while pork free,  features both combinations of milk and meat as well as plenty of other non-kosher Animals.  That earned this mean  the name "The Treyfe (unkosher) Banquet".  While its non-kosher nature is now guessed by some to have been an oversight,  there is no dobut that the meal was lavish, each course with a wine or liquour, showing that some Jews in the USA had acquired wealth enough for fine dining. And while there is also a debate as to how many observant sages and teachers of Judaism,  with shelfish or shrimp placed before them, got up and left the banquet or refused to eat,  news of the menu spread through the Jewish press,  reported by journalists such as Henrietta Szold, founder of Haddassa.  

The news brought attacks on the  leaders of the Reform Movement for ingnoring Judaism's laws for mindful eating,  which in turn caused the Reform movement to dig in and defend what may have been an accidental choice!  Within two years,  the Reform movement's 1885 Pitsburgh Platform elminiated kashrut as a part of Reform practice.  Instead of retaining kashrut as a value shared by American Jews,  half of  the American Jewish world would soon come to find they could no longer expect to be able to eat with comfort at the tables of the other half. 

In 1887,  members of traditionalist elements of the Reform movment and the American Jewish world as a whole founded the Jewish Theological Seminiary in the efforts to conserve the laws of  keeping kosher and other areas of Judaism rejected by the Reform thinkers.  Which means that this banquet (along with many other factors) led to the creation of... you guessed it,  Conservative Judaism.  

For more on this small dinner with big consequences, read Jonathan Sarna's excellent article at  https://www.jta.org/2018/01/16/opinion/what-really-happened-at-the-original-trefa-banquet .

Thanks for reading,

Gabe and Miron

Let us march on till victory is won!

 Dear Parents,

In honor of MLK Day, we spent our time this Sunday learning about American Jews and the civil rights movement. Much like our lesson on the Jews and the Civil War, we made sure to paint a holistic picture of Jewish activitsts in the civil rights movement, which meant in addition to admirable supporters of civil rights, we also examined a rather disturbing letter written by a southern Jewish congregation to Maurice Eisendrath, at the time a leader of the Reform movement's  Union of American Hebrew Congregations. 

(Dr. King,  Rabbi Eisendrath with Sefer Torah,  and Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel)

 This letter, which argued for a public non-stance on civil rights, was staunchly pro-segregation.  It is difficult for us to understand the people writing such letters, but as Rabbi Chaikin-Gould made clear last week,  Jews have been on both the right and wrong sides of history many times.  Read the letter for yourself: 

https://jwa.org/sites/default/files/mediaobjects/RabbiEisnedrathFromHUC19560501_1of2.jpg and   https://jwa.org/sites/default/files/mediaobjects/RabbiEisnedrathFromHUC19560501_2of2.jpg

We taught about the history of Synagogue bombings and attacks during the time period, including the bombing of he Hebrew Benevolent Congregation Temple in Atlanta in 1958.

. 

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See the details here: https://www.georgiaencyclopedia.org/articles/arts-culture/temple-bombing .

We then contrasted two Jewish figures in the civil rights movement.  The first  Rabbi Joachim Prinz, had the  difficult task of speaking after famed singer Mahalia Jackson (The Queen of Gospel)   and  before Dr. King at the March for Jobs and Freedom on that famous day in 1963!  

A freind of  MLK,  his speech is worth listening as he speaks of being the Rabbi of Berlin under the Hitler regime and the dangers of when people remain silent.  The speech is a short six minutes, and totally worth your time.  Following Mahalia Jackson singing the powerful hymn "How I Got Over",  ( which you can hear and see here at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t9iQUIwAgus)  you can understand why Prinz starts his speech with "I wish I could sing!" 

http://www.joachimprinz.com/images/mow.mp3

In contrast to Rabbi Prinz,  we then learned about the life of  Rita Schwerner Bender. Now a civil rights attourney for many decades,  Bender came to the nation's attention in  1964  in Mississippi following disapearance  of her husband Mickey Schwerner along with fellow civil rights workers James Chaney and Andrew Goodman (who had been murdered by the Ku Klux Klan) . 

Bender's quest for Justice put her in front of the media, and  widowed at the age of 22, she faced the press and did not shy away from presenting the difficult truth to America. “My husband, Michael Schwerner, did not die in vain,” she said at the time. “If he and Andrew Goodman had been Negroes, the world would have taken little notice of their deaths. After all, the slaying of a Negro in Mississippi is not news. It is only because my husband and Andrew Goodman were white that the national alarm has been sounded.”   That quote and an amazing interview can all be found here at https://www.propublica.org/article/a-brutal-loss-but-an-enduring-conviction . 

In contrast to Prinz,  Bender was an atheist and had no connection to Judaism growing up, but still had a strong sense of Jewish identity stemming from her immigrant grandparents.  Bender was not connected to the leadership of the civil rights movement, but the story of her and her husband is every bit as crucial to understanding the civil rights era for students of  America n history and the Jewish people who are her citizens.   

In addition to our lesson on American Jewish history, we had a small lesson on Israeli culture and the draft of many (but not all) Israelis into the IDF. We also concluded our unit on divorce in Judaism, which we will revisit later in the season for some review. 

Rabbi Uri Miller, who gave the opening prayer at the March on Washington, was ordained at HTC in Skokie,  where he certainly could have learned the following passage we shared in concluding our studies on Jews and the civil rights movement. It is this call to action within Judaism that motivated Rabbis Miller, Eisendrath, Prinz,  Heschel and so many others to speak out when others were silent. 

Rav Ya'akov Emden (Germany, 1697-1776) "She'elat Ya'betz"

משא"כ באדם חשוב שמוטל עליו להציל עשוק מיד עשקו בכל אופן שיוכל, אם בגופו או בהשתדלותו, יהי' העשוק מי שהי'. כענין שאמר איוב, ואשברה מתלעות עול, וכתוב במרע"ה ויקם ויושיען, אע"פ שבנות כומר הי

What is not like this is an adam chashuv/person of importance or power, who has the obligation to rescue the oppressed from the hands of the oppressor by all means available to him, whether by direct action or through political effort, regardless of whether the oppressed is Jewish or not. So Job praised himself by saying "I have broken the teeth of evil", and the Torah says of Moses that "He arose and championed them", referring to the daughters of Jethro, even though they were the daughters of a pagan priest. 

Studying Hidden History

In a week where American history was made, our sixth grade students were studying the history of America. Our specific focus this Sunday was the history of Jews in the Civil War. We introduced the topic by examining the topic at large through this amazing video which features some of the best historians of Jewish America :

Three films from Passages through the Fire: Jews and the Civil War from Yeshiva University Museum on Vimeo.

We then examined the role of two prominent Jews during the era, Judah P. Benjamin and Edward Salomon. Judah P. Benjamin was an American Jew from Louisiana who served as the First Attorney General of the Confederate States of America.  He rose to be Secretary of State the Confederacy, the second highest position in their government, even appearing on their currency.

At the end of the war, his marriage broken and his cause defeated, he fled to England, where he remained for the rest of his life. While 8000 Jews fought for the Union,  over 2000 fought for the Confederacy. It is difficult for us to encounter Jews who supported the Confederacy and were proponents of slavery,  but as Rabbi Chainkin-Gould said during his visit to our virtual classroom,  it is only by facing the truth of our past that we can learn from it.  

In a delightful contrast,  Edward Seilig Salomon was a German Jewish immigrant whose family had multiple members serve in the Union army.   Salomon's life and achivements are incredible.  He became Chicago's youngest alderman at age 24,  rose to Lt. Colonel in the Civil war, and fought at Gettysburg alongside Genereal Carl Schurz with incredible daring and bravery: he survived not one but two horses shot out from under him as he rallied troops on the front lines.  One of seven Jews promoted to general during the Civil war  (you can read about all seven here at the Cleveland Jewish News),  he later would be governor of the Territory of Washington, and then many other posts.  An amazing fighter and public servant whose name is worth  knowing. 

You can read more about Benjamin here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judah_P._Benjamin and Salomon here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_S._Salomon. 

After our unit on American history, we continued our unit on Divorce in Judaism, studying the differences and shared properties of a Ketubah (wedding contract), such as these by artist Daniel Howarth:(https://howarthpapercuts.tripod.com/)

and a Get (divorce document). 

As you can see from these examples,  the Ketubah can combine English and Hebrew,  calligrahy and papercutting,   be abstract or  realistic, and is different for each couple.   The  Get is plain and without any ornament,  the text  and format fixed for all. Yet both require wintesses,  name the parties involved, have a date and location,  and  mark crucial moments in life.  Both are part of a life of Mitzvot, the commandments that lie at the heart of Judaism. 

We also took a few moments to explore Israeli cultural and political current events, such as the amazing vaccination of over 12% of Israels population in just the past few weeks!  Let's hope other coutnries can be inspired -- and supplied-- to do as well. 

A Hanukkah Miracle

 Dear parents,

Last week was our last class before winter break. As such, our students were 1000% engaged with the material and had nothing else on their minds. Our song of the day was another great Hanukkah song by Shulem Lemmer , the first Haredi Jew to sign a major record deal with Universal music group. Of course, while not all Jewish music is done by Hasidic men in big hats, sometimes it is! 

Later,  our students help revise an poorly written research paper  on Hanukkah by (the fictional) Tiffany B. The students worked in groups to look over the paper, marking and correcting any errors they found, while of course earning points for their team along the way (the winning group inducted into the sixth grade hall of fame as per usual, see below). 

After the lesson, we took a poll asking what would it take for us NOT to celebrate Hanukkah. The answers to this poll were pleasantly surprising, with many students responding that we could take away the gifts and fired foods and beautiful lights, and they, the students, would still celebrate and love the holiday (a true Hanukkah miracle!). 

After the Hanukkah portion of our lesson, we continued on our Divorce curriculum, learning about what it takes to be a witnesses to a Get, the Jewish divorce document. Finlay, we played "finish the headline," were the students had to fill in the missing word of newspaper headlines of articles relating to Israel and Israeli current events (yes, and in this case, even the galactic federation).

Hanukkah Sameach and have a Wonderful Winter Break.

Hall of Fame Inductees for this week:

Nathan

Maxwell

Jack