Eric Marcus

From the Chair – September/October, 2022

Dear Members and Friends,

It’s September 1^st today and the summer is beginning to be behind us. And this auspicious month always reminds me of the approaching of the High Holy Days.

This year we’re fortunate to have Hannah doing a zoom study session on Selichot on Friday September 9^th. This should help to set the scene and get us in the mood for things to come. Then, thanks to our newly formed Rites and Practices group and our wonderful Hannah, we have immaculately organised services for both Rosh Hashana and Kol Nidre.

We also have Toria and Jamie’s baby, Oliver, having his naming on the Shabbat morning service on September 10^th. The service will also include Julisa and Carlos’ admission to Judaism. Julia has bee reorganising the library and you may well find that at services, there are piles of books on the back benches to which you can help yourselves. Big thanks to Julia for doing this!

Ros is organising conversational Hebrew classes online. Ros lived in Israel for many years and had two of her three children there so she’s our resident expert. There is more about this in the newsletter so watch this space and make sure you sign up.

Our annual Interfaith Sukkot is taking place this year on October 15^th. We haven’t been able to hold this for three years so let’s make this a good one. We will be inviting people from our local community of all faiths ad none. Ella will be having her Bat Mitzvah on that day and will be taking responsibility for the decorating of the Sukkah as part of her Bat Mitzvah obligations.

In the next few days you will be receiving all the info you need for the High Holy Days. And shortly afterwards a special invitation to our Sukkot service incorporating Ella’s Bat Mitzvah. So keep an eye on your emails. I will be away for the September service but it promises to be a full action packed weekend, which I hope many of you will attend.

Happy September

Annie

From the Rabbi – May, 2022

In the service of 7 May I used an excerpt from a text by the French philosopher Simone Weil (1909-1943).
Weil is an inspiration for the way she combines her religiosity with very concrete political actions. In this, she touches on some of the central values in liberal Judaism, though Weil’s determination is of a unique kind. It makes her thought so exceptional, but also difficult. Her writing needs to be read slowly and more than once.

What strikes me in the excerpt I have included, is that she holds that there is something in any human being that expects the good from people. This she calls ‘the sacred’ in every human. It is often silenced in those who are powerless. They don’t have words to express injustice being done to them. Their words sound irrelevant, or shrill, or they stumble when they speak. Weil’s text presents a powerful warning against not being swayed by suave words, but also an appeal to listen to uncomfortable or halting speech.

Lastly, as I have to concentrate on work for the college and other responsibilities, I shall have to reduce my contributions to NLJC’s wonderful newsletter. So, you will not see ’From the Student Rabbi’ every month, but I aim to keep contributing from time to time.

The excerpt – I hope it will speak to you too.

From Simone Weil, ‘The Person and the Sacred’

At the bottom of the heart of every human being, from earliest infancy until the tomb, there is something that goes on indomitably expecting, in the teeth of all experience of crimes committed, suffered, and witnessed, that good and not evil will be done to him. It is this above all that is sacred in every human being.

Every time that there arises from the depth of a human heart the childish cry … ‘Why am I being hurt?’, then there is certainly injustice. For if, as often happens, it is only the result of a misunderstanding, then the injustice consists in the inadequacy of the explanation.

In those who may have suffered too many blows, in slaves for example, that place in the heart from which the infliction of evil evokes a cry of surprise may seem to be dead. But it is never quite dead; it is simply unable to cry out anymore. It has sunk into a state of dumb and ceaseless lamentation.

And even in those who still have the power to cry out, the cry hardly ever expresses itself, either inwardly or outwardly, in coherent language. Usually, the words through which it seeks expression are quite irrelevant.

That is all the more inevitable because those who most often have occasion to feel that evil is being done to them are those who are least trained in the art of speech. Nothing, for example, is more frightful that to see some poor wretch in the police court stammering before a magistrate who keeps up an elegant flow of witticisms.

Apart from the intelligence, the only human faculty which has an interest in public freedom of expression is that point in the heart which cries out against evil. But as it cannot express itself, freedom is of little use to it. What is first needed is a system of public education capable of providing it, so far as is possible, with means of expression; and next, a regime in which the public freedom of expression is characterised not so much by freedom of expression as by an attentive silence in which this faint and inept cry can make itself heard; and finally, institutions are needed of a sort which will, so far as is possible, put power into the hands of men who are able and anxious to hear and understand it.

The full text is available here, under a different title: https://lib.tcu.edu/staff/bellinger/rel-viol/Weil.pdf

Dr. Hannah M. Altorf

From The Chair – May, 2022

Dear Members and Friends of the NLJC,

I hope everyone is enjoying this wonderful weather we’re having. We were fortunate to be blessed with sunshine on Saturday the 7th of May, which enabled us to have the community meeting outside. I’d like to thank Paul and Jean for their generosity in setting up tables and chairs for us.

Although we were small in numbers, I think all who were there would agree that we had a good discussion. Not least, it was an opportunity to engage with different members of the community whom we had perhaps not met properly before.

Charley Baginsky, the Chief Executive of Liberal Judaism, introduced the meeting. We considered the following questions and statements in a series of rotating “speed dates” where we each asked and answered, with a different person for each item, the following:

My favourite Jewish memory
What brought you to Norfolk?
What would be in your NLJC treasure box?
What do you want this community to do for you?

Afterwards, people raised their particular concerns and there will be a group of people both from the Council and from the general community, who will take these forward. We agreed to have regular community meetings to build up the engagement and commitment of members.

We also had our first Cheder for a long while and three children attended. My son Adam supported me in doing this and Charley spent some time with us. Both Adam and Charley have a special way with young people. Adam enjoyed working with the children and has agreed to come along on a regular basis. He is also happy to take over from his dad in documenting our community through photography.

Our next service weekend is June 10/11^th at which we will be welcoming Julisa and Carlos as full members of our community. They had a successful visit to the Beit Din in March. Thanks as ever to Hannah for her calm and spiritually uplifting services. SEE YOU ALL in JUNE!

Annie – May 2022