I composed this quarterly rabbinic message immediately after dismantling our sukkah, and there is nothing quite like making me feel that the extended fall holiday season has come to an end as packing up the sukkah kit. Several years ago, Beverly wisely suggested that we buy a kit, and I’ve been delighted ever since with our purchase from the Sukkah Project (https://www.sukkot.com/). We also always buy a fresh lulav and etrog set through Sy Stange who handles the sales for members of the Los Alamos Jewish Center. Beautifying these two mitzvot, dwelling in a sukkah and taking the lulav and etrog have never been easier and can enhance one’s joy during this most joyous of holidays.
Of course, we didn’t start the holiday season with Sukkot. In fact, I had an unexpected trip to New Zealand this past quarter which reminded me that it is only in the northern hemisphere that we asso-ciate the period from Tisha B’Av through Simchat Torah as summer turning to fall. I arrived in New Plymouth, New Zealand, in mid-August the day after a snowfall, and it’s fortunate that Beverly re-minded me to take warm clothing. While I didn’t do any itinerant rabbi-ing on this short trip, I do hope to return and have made a connection with what seems to be a truly welcoming congregation, Temple Sinai, the Wellington Progressive Jewish Congregation.
The summer is not only an opportunity to begin the process of teshuva, examining our past year’s behavior in anticipation of Yom Kippur, it is also opera season in Santa Fe. This year we held “Wednesday Night is Minyan Night” at the Santa Fe Opera (see photograph), and offered people a chance to recite kaddish. Kudos to Beverly on her efforts to snag Jews in the crowd. Dov and I took a road trip transporting his belongings up to Vancouver, BC, where he is now relocated, and we spent a lovely Shabbat at Temple Emek Shalom in Ashland, Oregon under the leadership of Rabbi Joshua Boettiger. We also visited with a good friend at the Vancouver JCC (spelled “Centre” of course in Canada).
I managed to bounce around (the globe) for the holidays – Selichot with HaMakom in Santa Fe, and then Rosh HaShanah and Yom Kippur again with the wonderful folks at Kehillat Beijing. This trip was only two weeks long because of pressing business back at Los Alamos National Laboratory, but I thoroughly enjoyed meeting new congregants and reconnecting with people we met two years ago and last year. In addition to services at the Capital Club with assistance from several volunteers (Leon, Amitai, Zhu, Amy, and others), we conducted a staged reading of Merle Feld’s powerful play, The Gates Are Closing, and I spoke to a group at the Moishe House on the Ten Commandments. Upon my return, we celebrated various Sukkot and Simchat Torah services with the Los Alamos Jewish Center, HaMakom, and Kol Beramah in Santa Fe. Just before heading to China, I gave a talk at Fuller Lodge in Los Alamos in conjunction with a New Mexico Jewish Historical Society event. My presentation was entitled “A Manhattan Minyan – Ten Jews Who Were Part of the Manhattan Project in Los Alamos 1943-1945.”
I’ve hardly bought any books lately (shocking), but I did acquire a copy of The Jews in Harbin as a treasured gift while in China. Below are some books I read this past quarter – my favorites are marked with an asterisk.
The joy of the end of the holiday season is always tempered by the reality that life is finite; this is one of the reasons that we read Kohelet (Ecclesiastes) on Sukkot. For the friends and family of Allen Cogbill, his unexpected death on Simchat Torah forced us to remember the teaching that each day is a gift. I was honored to officiate at Allen’s funeral and already miss his regular presence on Friday evenings. May his memory serve as a blessing.
B’shalom,
Rabbi Jack
Honor Thy Father and Mother – Gerald Blidstein
Hotel Savoy – Joseph Roth
Abraham:The World’s First (But Certainly Not Last) Jewish Lawyer – Alan Dershowitz
Where We Find Ourselves: Jewish Women Around the World Write About Home – Miriam Ben-Yoseph and Deborah Nodler Rosen
Adam Resurrected – Yoram Kaniuk
From That Time and Place: A Memoir, 1938-1947 – Lucy Dawidowicz*
Inside the Hornet’s Head: An Anthology of Jewish American Writing – Jerome Charyn
Becoming Freud – Adam Phillips
The 5 Love Languages: Jewish Marriage Initiative SPECIAL EDITION – Gary Chapman
Mystic Tales from the Zohar – Aryeh Wineman*
The Mezuzah in the Madonna’s Foot – Trudi Alexy
Arguing with the Storm:Stories by Yiddish Women Writers – ed Rhea Tregebov
Neuland – Eshkol Nevo*
The Character of Physical Law – Richard Feynman* (Not a Judaica book as such but wonderful and contains a thought-provoking passage about the roles of religion and science)