- Congregation Beth El–Keser Israel
85 Harrison Street, New Haven, CT 06515-1724 | P: 203.389.2108 | office@beki.org
85 Harrison Street, New Haven, CT 06515-1724 | P: 203.389.2108 | office@beki.org
…(or more) puts it in the top 5%. So I realize that I am at least in the top 10% of American households with respect to annual income. (Data: DeNavas-Walt, Carmen and Robert, Cleveland, U.S. Census Bureau, Current Population Reports, P60-218, Money Income in the United States: 2001, U.S. Government Printing Office, Washington, DC, 2002.) Even more: On the global level, I am in the top 1%. So when I say that the rich should pay, I am including mysel…
…ll do it that way, too. But this procedure often created a dilemma: If the number of qaddishes was limited, there might still be some who did not get to say one; if there was no limit to the number of qaddishes added, the service became burdensomely long. So after careful scrutiny the rabbis allowed all mourners to say qaddish simultaneously. This rabbinic solution was adopted only after careful consideration, and after it was determined that mour…
…th lists start with a broad thing to give up and then narrow it down: list number one — go from your land, your birthplace, your father’s house. List number two — take your son, your only son, the one you love, Isaac. This similarity led me to still others. One of the first, and most obvious, comparisons between the two instances of lekh lekha was that in both, God is sending Abraham on a journey. In the first lekh lekha, God is starting Abraham o…
…of all the people. Imagine if the parshah has told us, tribe by tribe, the number of people in each tribe, and separately, the number of males, 20 and up, who were fit for service. Would that kind of census send a different message to us, a message saying, “everyone counts”, including all the women? The second census, what I’ll call the redemption census, I find a strange one. It requires counting of all the male Levites who were at least a month…
…e Ely House, Center for Contemporary Art, New Haven, CT, and has curated a number of independent exhibitions. She studied at the Akademie fuer Angewante Kunst in Vienna, Austria, and received her MFA from San Jose State University. Anna Broell Bresnick has collaborated with dancers and musicians in the creation of installations for performances. These have included large sculptural str uctures, floor drawings and video. Broell Bresnick has taught…
For today’s services, a number of congregants have added touches of beauty to the synagogue and the services. In my Devar Torah, I would like examine the place of beauty and art in the Sanctuary. The sanctuary is a place where we pray together, where we venerate the wisdom of the Torah, where we tell stories that celebrate our shared past. It is also a place where our spirits and our community can be invigorated, nourished, and rested. It is a sa…
…emptying the house of unwanted items on Ebay, which he has been doing since 1998. Our children remarked at their bnai mitzvah that “Dad would sell us on Ebay if it weren’t for Mom!” Allison Jacobs & Joshua Kuhr and Noa and Oren We live in Westville. When we came to BEKI, we were excited to see the large number of children and families that were local to the Westville community. Having a place for the kids and us to learn and socialize is important…
…e will be able to provide current pricing and other details. For additional 10 or fewer invited guests (Standard Kiddush): $320 For every additional 20 invited guests beyond those 10, expect to order prepared salads from an approved local kosher vendor. Additional options available: Hummus OR guacamole OR cream cheese OR bruschetta: $50 each Herring OR stuffed grape leaves: $40 each Whitefish salad: $100 extra Lox with platter of onion/tomato/cucu…
…ing to say the berakha (blessing) on their own, or even with coaching. If a 12- or 13-year old can find the courage to stand in front of their elders, and before the Throne of Glory, and lead prayers, then the aunts and uncles or grandparents must find the courage to stand up and recite three Hebrew sentences. To say that someone who would not even read the blessings in transliteration had an “aliya” detracts from the honor of all other olim (hono…
…evision programs around the world some months ago depicting an Israeli Telephone Company employee stuffing faxes into the Western Wall. It is in fact a custom among many of our brothers and sisters to insert small handwritten personal notes and petitions to God between the stones of the Kotel, the Western Wall of the Temple in Jerusalem. The service provided by the phone company allows people unable to visit the Wall in person to fax their petitio…
