- 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
for works in Main Gallery Contact the Sisterhood Gift Shop to purchase Matzo Covers Keyboard Fantasy $800 Floral Deck $1,200 Popups $1,200 Coaster $1,200 Busy Garden $1,000 Outside the Box $700 Cell $700 Balloon Festival $600 Sails $500 Beneath the Surface $500 Introspection $500 Genesis 1-12 $1,200 Valley of the Leaves $700 The View from Above $1,000 The Book of Life $600 Huppa $2,000 Kaleidoscope $400 Round Matzah Cover $150 Click here to downl…
…he same field, and other rules that seem pretty arbitrary and inapplicable today. On the other hand some of the laws in this parasha remain quite relevant. Don’t make an impoverished laborer wait overnight for his pay. Protect the rights of those who have no one to stand up for them: the non-citizen, the widow, the fatherless. Use honest weights and measures in trade. I want to look at a few verses from the parasha that seem at first unconnected t…
…night. We don’t have any such assurance that God is dwelling in our midst today, but we build and maintain synagogues anyway. Is God here in BEKI right now? What is the point of this whole exercise if God isn’t here? I don’t know how you see God — as a watchful Father, the Rock and Redeemer of Israel, the intelligent designer of creation, the force that inspires goodness within us, or some other construct — but however you see God, we build and m…
…ormational experience. * * * * The Jacob we have come to know, as we begin today’s parashah, is not a very attractive fellow. His deceitful behavior in conning his brother Esau out of his birthright, and tricking his father Isaac into bestowing upon him the blessing that belonged to Esau, has portrayed him as a liar, a cheat, a trickster, a crafty, dishonest manipulator. Jacob’s brother threatens to kill him, so Jacob flees from his home in Canaan…
…I was intrigued by this story and its placement, and decided to discuss it today. Perhaps its position in Leviticus is meant to make us question and give it attention. If so, it worked for me, and I enjoyed the variety of opinions and the privilege to decide for myself what I choose to believe. I recently saw the Broadway play Wicked. The author of the book Wicked, Gregory Maguire, writes books based on the point of view of an alternative characte…
…the Torah and perform their aliya properly. If there were no limit on the number of people who may go up for an aliya at once, then what if a Bar- or Bat-Mitzva family were to want to send up a group of five or ten at once? And what if two groups of ten are called up in succession? The result might violate even our minimal demands of decorum. If we were to limit joint aliya to two people per aliya, then on the one hand we would run into some fami…
…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…
…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…
…o BEKI. At the same time, we also admire and love the fact that a sizeable number of congregants can daven and read Torah! The unrestrained excitement of little ones further adds to the pleasure in feeling that Am Yisrael Chai! Tom Goldenberg & Jessica Holzer and Ainsley Tom is a New Haven Mayoral candidate and was previously a public sector consultant. Jess is the chair-elect of the University of New Haven’s public health department. Ainsley is i…
…Abby Fraade, the volunteer who manages sponsorships. Please note that cellphones and photography are permitted on weekdays, but not on Shabbat or Yom Tov. If you choose to have a ceremony at BEKI on some other day, please work out the general plan in advance with Office Manager Peggy Hackett. She will arrange kitchen supervision and custodial services. Please note that we do NOT allow self-catering or a plan that’s “friends will take care of setu…
