Asking the right question
Last week I met up with fellow facilitators of Neo-Socratic dialogues whom I know from my days as a lecturer in philosophy. The methodology for these kinds of dialogues was developed in the 1920s in Germany, and came to Britain with refugees in the 1930s. They allow for intense conversations about a single question and can last for a day or even a week.

On this particular evening, we were discussing a question for an upcoming dialogue. We took our time. It is not easy to formulate the question well. It has to encourage people to take part and it should also sustain a philosophical conversation over a long period of time. And at the end of our lengthy session, we were still left pondering.

Anyone who has set an exam question may be able to relate to this experience. Asking the right question is not easy. It is surprising to find out how a seemingly straightforward question can elicit many different responses and interpretations.  Asking a good question is an art.

At our seder, we traditionally have the youngest child ask the four questions. Mah nishtanah, why is this night different from all other nights? This is one of the more memorable parts of the seder meal, as most of us know the tune and can sing along. Interestingly though, the Talmud is quite liberal when it comes to which questions and how they might be asked. Other questions may be asked, it argues, as long as they lead to the telling of the story and to reflection on freedom.

Ma nishtamah is not a simple question and answer session.  At our seder table we should be asking questions that invite us to tell the story as our story and to reflect on our situation, not just in the past, but also in the present and beyond.  This is not easy. Indeed, it can be painful. Our tradition teaches it is an art best developed in conversation.

Our seder meal, even when it comes late as it does this year, invites us to to think about and celebrate new beginnings. To think again about where we have come from and where we go now. To see flowers blossom and plants grow and wonder what will sustain us. What question will keep us going?

I am looking forward to seeing many of you at our communal seder meal on 23 April.

Chag Pesach Sameach!

Hannah

Ki Tisa

8-9 March 2024/29 Adar I 5784

Erev Shabbat – 7.30 short service with study – zoom only 
International Women’s Day

8 March is international Women’s Day. In our Friday service, we will celebrate Jewish women, the sung and unsung heroes who have inspired us. Join the celebration by learning about some of the women and by introducing your inspiration, be that in a short bio, or a sample of their work, a poem, a picture etc.

Everyone welcome to study and start shabbat together. 

Shabbat morning – Ki Tisa
9.45 Beith Midrash/House of Study – Old Meeting House (no zoom)

Purim in 2024 – How do we tell the story this year?

Purim is perhaps the most puzzling and troubling of all our holidays. This year is no exception. We read the story of Esther and wonder if it is a fairy tale or a farce. How can we make this festival of merriment and mischief speak to us today?

The House of Study welcomes all members and friends. 

Shacharit 11.30 Old Meeting House and Zoom.

This month we welcome Rosie Anfilogoff and Bob Hobbs as members of the community.

Torah reading: Exodus 32: 30-33:11 (Torah Reader: Miriam Barnett) Haftarah: 1 Kings 18: 1-19

Half a year ago, I wrote about a very new scroll I was shown in Jerusalem, and I mused about our own scroll and its origin. The sofer (scribe) in Jerusalem told the story of an old scroll he was restoring. A scroll, he argued, is also its history.

On Sunday 4 February, I went to Westminster Synagogue for a celebration of the Czech Scrolls that arrived there 60 years ago. (See also https://www.westminstersynagogue.org/following-our-czech-scrolls-60th-celebration.html)

Throughout the Nazi Occupation, these scrolls had been collected from the different communities in Czechia. Some of these communities had disappeared before the war and others were destroyed during the occupation, yet their many artefacts were collected and stored in the Jewish Museum in Prague. Why such a large collection was saved is not entirely clear. After the war, the scrolls were kept, but not looked after very carefully. They were slowly deteriorating until they were rescued again, thanks to a very generous donation from a London businessman. On 7 February 1964, 1564 scrolls arrived at Westminster Synagogue.

Since then, many of them have been repaired and lent to smaller and new communities which were unable to afford a scroll. Others have gone to larger communities. These communities have been using their scroll for regular shabbats or on special occasions and they have started to research the city from which their scroll came. I was the co-chair of the Czech Scroll Group for Finchley Reform Synagogue for some years, and I am still involved in its annual Czech scroll service. The FRS scroll is long thought to be from Uhříněves and we have built a relationship with people in that suburb of Prague.

Hannah with Finchley Reform Synagogue’s Robert Stone at the Czech Scroll Service.

The most moving moment of the service at Westminster came at the start, when the different scrolls, big and small, were brought in by members of their respective communities. It was a painful moment, as Westminster’s Czech Rabbi Kamila Kopřivová observed. The towns in Czechia, their Jewish communities and synagogues destroyed, no longer had a need for them. And yet, it was also a moment of celebration. Not all is destruction. These scrolls are now part of new communities, which enriches their history further.

Our scroll is not one of the Czech Scrolls, as Byron Simmonds has written.  It is likely that our scroll is one of five which Rabbi Andrew Goldstein purchased from a German dealer. It may have come from Slovakia. (See https://www.norwichljc.org.uk/our-torah-scroll/)

Jeffrey Ohrenstein, the chair of the Czech Scroll Memorial Trust, has been able to tell us a bit more about our scroll. I sent him the measurements of the scroll as well as pictures of the writing. He is in touch with soferim who were able to tell from that, that our scroll is likely to be Sephardi, written probably in Palestine between 1940 and 1950. It may still have travelled to us via Slovakia, but that is more difficult to ascertain.

As our scroll is part of our Community, and our history is part of the scroll, perhaps someone with the time and interest will pick up the thread… a living history and one in the making!

Hannah

Va-eira 
12-13 January 2024/3 Shevat 5784
 
Erev Shabbat – 7.30 short service with study – zoom only 
Yeridat HaDorot – Onwards and Upwards, or is it Downhill from Here?

Rabbinical Literature knows the concept of Yeridat HaDorot, which means ‘the decline of the generations’. Later generations are further away from insight and truth and should challenge the rulings of their ancestors only with great reluctancy, if at all. This concept goes against our progressive tradition, as its name (‘progressive’) already makes clear. Yet, we too claim that we stand in relation to our past. Can we make any sense of this ‘decline of the generations’? All generations welcome to start shabbat together in prayer and reflection.
 
Shabbat morning – Va-eira
9.45 Beith Midrash/House of Study – Old Meeting House (no zoom)

Where do I begin? The New Year of Trees and Other Beginnings.

This month of January knows two New Years: the secular or Gregorian New Year at the beginning and the New Year for Trees, Tu B’shvat, this year on 24-25 January. In our Beith Midrash, we’ll use the latter to reflect on the importance of beginnings in our tradition. Are we natals rather than mortals? 

The House of Study welcomes all members and friends. 

Shacharit 11.30 Old Meeting House and Zoom 
Torah reading: Exodus 6: 14-28
Haftarah: Isaiah 42: 5-17

I am writing this in the week of parashat Lech Lecha. ‘Go forth from your land, your birthplace, your father’s house’, God tells Abram, ‘I will make of you a great nation and I will bless you.’ (Genesis 12: 1-2) 

And so, Abram, 75 years old, goes forth, taking his wife Sarai with him, as well as his nephew Lot and his possessions and people.

Taking up our belongings and moving away from our parental home, our land and our language is a part of our history and of our identity. Last names often tell part of that story. The poet Marge Piercy puts it poignantly in her poem ‘Maggid’, when she honours those who left for their ‘courage to let go of the door, the handle…The courage to abandon the graves dug into the hill… The courage to walk out of the pain that is known, into the pain that cannot be imagined, mapless…We Jews are all born of wanderers, with shoes under our pillows’ (From ‘Maggid’. For the full poem, see https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/57595/maggid)

Yet, our ancestors also left with the dream and the hope that they would be the last to leave their home and that their children could stay wherever they were. Some of them changed their name to express that aspiration. We may regret their decision but cannot but admire their dream.

In parashat Lech Lecha Abram’s journey is not the last one, not even in this parashah. Soon after his arrival, famine makes the family travel to Egypt and later on, Lot will leave for the rich land of the Jordan, with the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah. Later again, Hagar runs away into the desert to escape Sarai’s ill-treatment. She is met by an angel, who tells her to return. Hagar, the slave woman is the only woman to be promised multiple descendants and the only woman to name a place. (Genesis 16: 7-15)

The last few weeks have been very dark for all of us. As individuals and as a community we may feel as if we have no longer a sense of safety. Some of us fear for the safety of loved ones and we are all overwhelmed by the stories of destruction in Israel and Palestine, day by day. Emotions run high. As I told those of you who came to light candles together on Friday, I find myself lost for words – even scared of words, as they so easily now antagonise.

At the same time, I am grateful for a tradition that commands me to light candles every week as an act that brings joy and peace. I am grateful for texts that do not provide easy answers, but instead asks me to hold ambiguities. The mighty patriarch and the lowly slave woman both receive the same promise. The coming weeks, months, perhaps years are going to be hard. We are not without resources and we are not in this alone. I hope that each and everyone of us will be blessed with the courage to look at the unknown and see a better future, sustained by one another and by our tradition.

Hannah