And Thy word broke their sword, when our own strength failed us.

 

 

BIG BAND WELCOME!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4oAy72TjqI0

 

 

ps 22

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lsY0qJduFN8

Lelsie Odom Jr.-- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leslie_Odom_Jr.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Beb8FsHBh-g

 

            IF THEY CAN DO IT, SO CAN YOU! 

 

See the handout.

 

 

• Maoz Tzur is a song that we sing right after lighting the candles on each night of Hanukkah

•       Most synagogues and families sing the first paragraph, but it is actually part of a larger poem that is five stanzas long

• In this case, the author of this poem’s name is Mordechai • Each stanza begins with a letter of his name - see if you can find it

 מ- ר-ד - כ-י : This is also meant to help the people singing it remember which verse they are on

• Also like many poems, Maoz Tzur is a rhyming poem: leshabeach, nezabeach, etc.

 

• Three themes to identify from this poem:

1.    The opening words:  Maoz tzur - the poem identifies God as the Jewish people’s Maoz - fortress, and tzur – rock--  In times of trouble, these are two of the most protective and comforting images for a person or nation who is scared - being protected by a fortress and supported by their rock

2.   The middle stanzas include other times in our people’s history when we faced persecution - slavery in Egypt, Babylonian exile and captivity, and Haman in the Esther story --We zoom out of the Hanukkah story and talk about other moments of discrimination in our history

3.   In the final stanza, the poet poetically summarizes what happened during Hanukkah; The ancient Greeks surrounded the Jewish people, they broke down Jerusalem’s towers and defiled the Temple o And yet, there was a miracle, and now we celebrate for eight days

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Italian version

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p8Hq_qJDWww&t=14s

Modern Israeli

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=50yjOBTXH0s

 

 

You will learn by the numbers!! I will teach you! By the sea!

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LslsgH3-UFU

 

 

Shoshani Ubanav/ Nikkur

               AL Hanisim-  reading

https://www.sefaria.org/Siddur_Ashkenaz%2C_Shabbat%2C_Minchah%2C_Amidah%2C_Thanksgiving%2C_Al_Hanisim_for_Chanukkah.1?lang=bi

              Al Hanishim- song

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XWZZEIwEur0

  

 הַנִּסִּים

Hanesim

Hanasim

Hanisim

Hanasam

Hana-Maki

 

 

 

 

 הַפֻּרְקָן

Hafurkav

Hapurekan

Hafurkan

Hapurkan

Hapurttylittlekitten

 

 

 הַגְּבוּרוֹת

Hagivurot

Hajevurot

Hag’vudot

Hag’vurot

Hagibanush

 

 

 

הַתְּשׁוּעוֹת

Hateshu’tzot

Ha’tashu’ot

Ha’teshu’ot

Ha’chu’ot

Habainibioboebeh

 

 

 הַנִּפְלָאוֹת

Haniflaois

Hanefila’ot

Hanif’laot

Hanif’laut

Hanif el-Rashid

 

 

 הַנֶּחָמוֹת

Hanechamoot

Hanehamoot

Hanechamot

Hanehamot

Hanachocheese

 

 שֶׁעָשִׂיתָ

Shetza’seeta

Shetza’sheeta

Sheah’sheeta

Sheah’seeta

Sheh lo yodea

 

לַאֲבוֹתֵינוּ

La’avotei’nu

Lavoteh’nu

Lavotei’nu

Le’avotei’nu

Latkahgedolah

 

 

 בַּיָּמִים הָהֵם

Bayamem Haham

Beyemem Heheym

Baiyamin Haheym

Baiyamim Chachem

Binyamin Chochom

 

 בַּזְּמַן הַזֶּה

At that time

At this time

In their time

In our time

There’s no time

 

 

 

 

JS-  Parsha

Hot dogs!

               Hebrew National Commercial - YouTube

               What Makes Us a Cut Above the Rest? l Hebrew National - YouTube

Wrestling

Rahcel’s tomb:  Other Side of the Wall - Biking to Rachel's Tomb - YouTube

 

            Warmup:  Limericks- Wrestling.

                             The moves make the whole ring quake

                            Holds and grips that could make bones break

                             But ask those in the know

                             They will all tell you so

                             Professional wrestling is ____________________.

 

 

                             Sumo wrestlers huge and rarely hyper

                             So sweaty they could use a window wiper

                             at the next basho or tourney

                             make an ettitqute jour

                             they wear mawashi  not a _____________________.

                            

 

 

                             Olympic sports may start or cease

                             Some new sport may get a lease

                             But some sports are classic

                             Like from  the era Jurassic

                             wresting goes back to ancient _____________.

 

 

                             Separated the wrestlers begin

                             And then fight until one gets to win

                             The hard way to go

                             Is to win with a throw

                             Most wrestlers win their match with a _____________________.

                            

 

                            Separated, Sumo wrestlers begin

                             And collide with a terrible din

                             Only foot soles touch floor

                             But there is one rule more

                             Step out of the ring and you don’t _________________________.

 

                             Professional wrestlers adore

                             Drama and costumes and more

                             But it’s not just in the US

                             There’s pro wrestling success,

                             In Mexico they cheer the _______________.

                                                                       

 Vayishlach

PART ONE (Beraysheet 32:4 –33:17)

A- Now Ya’akov sent messengers on ahead of him to Esav his brother in the land of Se’ir, in the territory of Edom, and charged them, saying:

Say to my lord, to Esav:

So says your servant Yaakov:

I have traveled with Lavan and have gone-slowly until now.

Ox and donkey, sheep and servant and maid have become mine.

So I have sent to tell my lord, to find favor in your eyes.

The messengers returned to Yaakov, saying:

“We came to your brother, to Esav—

but he is already coming to meet you, and four hundred men are with him!”

 

B- Yaakov became exceedingly afraid and was distressed.

He divided the people that were with him and the sheep and the oxen and the camels into two camps;

he said [to himself]:

Should Esav come against the one camp and strike it, the camp that is left will be a remnant-that-escapes.   Then Yaakov said:

“God of my father Avraham,  God of my father Yitzhak, O Adonai,

who said to me: Return to your land, to your kindred, and I will deal well with you!—

too small am I for all the loyalty and faithfulness that you have shown your servant.

For with [only] my staff did I cross this Jordan, and now I have become two camps.

Pray save me from the hand of my brother, from the hand of Esav!

For I am in fear of him,

lest he come and strike me down, mothers and children alike!

Yet you, you have said:

I will deal well, well with you,

I will make your seed like the sand of the sea, which is too much to count!”

 

 

 

C- He spent the night there that night,

and took a gift from what was at hand, for Esav his brother:

she-goats, two hundred, and kids, twenty,

ewes, two hundred, and rams, twenty,

nursing camels and their young, thirty,

cows, forty, and bulls, ten,

she-donkeys, twenty, and colts, ten;

he handed them over to his servants, herd by herd separately,

and said to his servants:

“Cross on ahead of me, and leave room between herd and herd.”

He charged the first group, saying:

“When Esav my brother meets you and asks you, saying: To whom do you belong, where are you going, and to whom do these ahead of you belong?

Then say:

—to your servant, to Yaakov, it is a gift sent to my lord, to Esav,

and here, he himself is also behind us.”

 

 

 

 

 

D- Thus he charged the second, and thus the third, and thus all that were walking behind the herds, saying:  According to this word shall you speak to Esav when you come upon him:

you shall say: Also—here, your servant Yaakov is behind us. For he said [to himself]:

I will wipe [the anger from] his face

with the gift that goes “ahead of my face;”

afterward, when I see his face,

perhaps he will lift up my face!

The gift crossed over “ahead of his face,”  but he spent the night on that night in the camp. He arose during that night    and took his two wives, his two maids, and his eleven children

to cross the Yabbok crossing. He took them and brought them across the river; he brought across what belonged to him.

And Yaakov was left alone—

 

DON’T BE IGNORANT OF YOUR RUMP,

OR, KASHRUT AND HINDQUARTERS

Often enough,  we  here in the USA see that this is what is kosher on a kosher, four legged animal.  The hind quarters are not listed as kosher.

However, when you go to Israel, the situation is  totally different.

Meet the Shoshani Brothers.  They run Jerusalem’s best known butcher shop,  Shoshani and Sons, Inc., which is under top-level Kosher supervision.  The shop was started by their father before the state of Israel was established! Jerusalem’s top restaurants buy their meat here, and lovers of good food order from them.  And their store has a meat map like this: 

Kosher butchers like the Shoshani’s, as well meat stands at the supermarkets throughout Israel  show the whole cow!  All those cuts that are normally not available as Kosher in the USA are sold there:  Sirloin, Tenderloin, Flank, Top Round.

Here is the display case at Shoshani and Sons. The cut in the middle is #13, “Sheytel”, which is prized for Szechuan Beef and other stir-fried dishes. It’s a cut from the back of the cow,  and you normally can’t get this cut of beef from a Kosher butcher in the US.

 Almost every part of the cow is kosher according to the Torah.   In Israel, kosher hind cuts are common and affordable.   In the USA,  we rarely see them, if at all. What is going on here?     Part of it has to do with our ancestor,  Ya’akov.

BERESEET (GENESIS) 32: 22-32

24And Ya’akov was all alone--  then a man wrestled with him on and on until dawn. 25When the man saw that he could not win against Ya’akov, the man struck at the socket of Ya’akov's hip so that it was dislocated as they wrestled. 26Then the man said, "Let me go; it's almost dawn!" But Ya’akov answered, "I won't let you go until you bless me!" 27So the man asked him, "What's your name?" "Ya’akov [Heel-Twister]," he answered. 

 28The man said, "Your name will no longer be Ya’akov but Yisra’el [god-fighter] because you have struggled with God and with men--  and you have won." 29Ya’akov said, "Please tell me your name." The man answered, “You need to ask my for my name?” Then he fled from Ya’akov. 30So Ya’akov named that place Peni-el [Face of God], because he said, "I have seen God face to face, but my life was saved." 31The sun rose as he passed Peni-el. He was limping because of his hip. 32 Therefore, even today the people of Yisrael  do not eat the  Gid Ha’nashe [Sciatic tissue attached to the hip socket] because Ya’akov's hip was dislocated at the thigh muscle.

Look at the reactions of sages to this last verse:

The Bechor Shor (Oleans, France, 12^th cen.):  It is to be a commemoration for them that their forefather fought with the angel, and [the latter] could not subdue him. And so [the angel] wounded him in the rear-facing section of his thigh, in the place where there is the sciatic nerve. And it is a commemoration of glory and greatness.

 

Chizkuni (France, 13^th cen.):  it would be right and proper to punish the Israelites not to eat that particular sinew as they should not have allowed their founding father to be exposed to hostile forces at night. Yaakov’s sons were physically strong, and they should have been at hand to assist their father if the need arose to do so. Seeing that they failed to do this, the blame for the injury sustained by their father was theirs. From now on they would have learned their lesson and would practice the commandment to accompany their father, or for that matter, any older and wiser person, especially at night.  

 

Ibn Ezra (Spain, 12^th cen.) :The meaning of the term gid ha-nasheh (the sinew of the thigh-vein) is known from the tradition received and transmitted to us by the Talmudic sages. The rabbis interpret gid ha-nasheh to mean the sinew that slipped from its place. No one but those lacking in understanding and knowledge of nature have any doubt as to its definition.

 

Tur HaArokh (Toledo, Spain, 14^th cen.) :    The Jews not eating this sinew are comparable to sons who make a point of fasting on the anniversary of their father’s death. Another way of looking at this law: In the future, the Jewish people would be commanded not to eat this sinew in order that they should remain aware of the miracle which had occurred when a mortal man, their ancestor Yaakov, had been able to prevail against a celestial force trying to wrestle him to the ground.

 

So Jews who observe Kashrut won’t eat this part of an animal. So what do they do for meat headed to Israel that we don’t do here? 

A trained kosher butcher will  cut out the forbidden tissue from the meat,  a process called Nikur.  There used to be many people in the United States who were Menakerim,  experts in Nikur,  but due to a number of reasons, there are only three left in the entire US!  So aside from three stores here,  you have to go to Israel to find a kosher sirloin, as in Israel there are still many Menakerim.  However,  as we try and eat less meat-  and waste less of the meat we do eat, there may be a return of these cuts to the kosher market in America. 

To top it all off,  Rambam  (that’s Rabbi Dr. Moses Maimonides to you)  codifies what you have to do with this section of an animal and some other related laws:

 

 

Mishneh Torah, Forbidden Foods 8:7

One who removes the gid hanashe must dig out all traces of it until nothing remains. A butcher's word is accepted with regards to the gid hanashe, just as it is accepted with regards to chailev (fats forbidden to eat by the Torah). We don't purchase meat from any old butcher, only from an upright guy who has an established reputation for being observant of the Torah. If he slaughters the meat himself and sells it, his word is accepted.

Mishneh Torah, Forbidden Foods 8:14

It is permitted to derive benefit from the gid hanashe. Therefore, it is permitted for a Jew to send a thigh with the gid in it to a non-Jew. The Jew may give the non-Jew the entire intact thigh in the presence of a Jew. We don't suspect that this other Jew will partake in the meat before the sinew is removed, because the location of the gid is conspicuous (so they won’t eat it).

(See-  it really stands out!--> ) So when we look at this week’s Torah Portion and ask “what does this have to do with being Jewish today,”  the answer is clear!  What we eat, when we follow the discipline of kashrut, anchors us to the lives of our ancestors and their struggles.

 VAYISHLACH 

PART THREE CH. 35 vv 16-21

They moved on from Bet-El/House of God.
But when there was still a stretch of land to come to Efrat,
Rahel began to give birth,
and she had a very hard birthing.

It was, when her birthing was at its hardest,
that the midwife said to her:
Do not be afraid,
for this one too is a son for you!

It was, as her life was slipping away
—for she was dying—
that she called his name: Ben-Oni/Son-of-My-Suffering.
But his father called him: Binyamin/Son-of-my-Right-Hand.

So Rahel died;
she was buried along the way to Efrat—that is Bet-Lehem.

Yaakov set up a standing-pillar over her burial-place;
that is Rahel’s burial pillar of today.

 

 

PART FOUR CH. 35 vv.27-29

Yaakov came home to Yitzhak his father at Mamre, in the city of Arba—

that is Hevron, where Avraham and Yitzhak had sojourned.

And the days of Yitzhak were a hundred years and eighty years,

Then Yitzhak expired.
He died and was gathered to his kinspeople, old and satisfied in days.
Esav and Yaakov his sons buried him.