- 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
…He has set the Church on an epochal change of course. As a result, the new Millennium holds promise of far better relationships between Catholics and Jews than the one just past. We should accept the Church’s invitation and seek out constructive dialogue with our Catholic brethren starting now. Less familiar but also quite significant is an international movement that has arisen under the banner of Jubilee 2000 to cancel the debt of the poorest co…
…s an enormous ziggurat, a temple tower dedicated to the god Marduk. In the midst of this overwhelming display of architectural and cultural splendor, the people of Judah wandered about the city, virtually powerless, gazing at its grandeur, and sometime staring disconsolately at the broad Euphrates River, far from their physical and spiritual home. They had been stunned by the destruction of the Temple and of Jerusalem by the Babylonians and were s…
…akes the text much more literally. It is seen as a sanguinary call to exterminate anti-semites wherever they are. Indeed it takes less interpretive gymnastics to see it this way. A midrash says that when Esau was getting old, he called in his grandson Amaleq and said, “I tried to kill Jacob but was unable. Now I am entrusting you and your descendants with the important mission of annihilating Jacob’s descendants. Be relentless and do not show merc…
…abbinate to require documents proving the Jewishness of a person’s mother, grandmother, great-grandmother and great-great grandmother when applying to get married in Israel. The RA comments that “Needless to say, this is a near impossibility for most people,” and goes on to argue, “Where one is part of a Jewish community and has been living as a Jew, there is no need to instigate an investigation into that person’s Jewishness. We affirm that trust…
…ccessful — we feel that we were also given those tools — blessed with good minds, very supportive families, and the context of a congregation that respects, encourages and indeed welcomes in its egalitarian yet traditional way, all of us to do reach and grow and do as much or as little as each of us ready for to fully participate. For some of us it has been precisely that aspect of the BEKI culture that drew us in here and made us want to learn mo…
…It turns out that this same person was indeed conniving, deceitful and scheming in business and family life, most of which, thankfully, had absolutely nothing to do with me. This life-lesson comes to me when I see the frequent references made to Israel’s purported “genocide,” “ethnic cleansing,” “eradication of an entire people” and “population expulsions” past, present and planned. During Jordanian rule of Judea & Samaria (the “West Bank”), the p…
…Greece and Rome.” Perhaps there is another way to understand this text? We might begin by examining the words: “as one lies with a woman.” What might this mean – to lie with a man as one lies with a woman? Perhaps we read that when one is lying with a man, one must not pretend that one is not doing so. One must face facts, despite fear and communal disapproval. Maybe you’ve seen the t-shirt that reads: I’m not gay but my boyfriend is. I’m not a le…
…ated their own work, leaving the lovely small painting “Rabbi” by Judith Aamidor as the only woman created artwork that was purchased by a donor. We chose to honor the many missing people with a large empty frame. Our call to contemplation also includes phrases scattered throughout the exhibition. We invite BEKI members to send us their thoughts on the exhibit. For further reading, we suggest the 2008 JTS blog post by Marc Wolf, Nostalgia, Memory…
