From the Rabbi's Desk

This past Tuesday, we began the period of time known as the “Three Weeks”. Each summer, the Jewish people observe a three-week period of semi-mourning through which we mourn something that, for our ancestors, once existed, and for us was never a reality. To mourn the destruction of the Temples in Jerusalem is to be a Jew and is to be a part of our community that recognizes communal grief matters. In 70 CE, we lost our national identity...Read more...

Are we ready for what tomorrow may bring us? Do we have our affairs in order? Do we have a chain of succession? Are we even willing to make ourselves prepared to face what’s in front of us now, let alone what will be in front of us in the future? These questions are of great importance in every generation because we’re a people of continuity. We’re a people who live by the value of לדור ודור/L’Dor v’Dor (in each and every...Read more...

Anyone with even a limited understanding of Jewish prayer knows well that our prayers are very “fixed,” as in scripted and liturgical. On the surface, it would seem that the model of praying with a liturgy gives little room for the interjection of one’s own personal and heartfelt prayers. This being the case, it’s fair to ask, “What place do my own personal prayers have in a fixed, liturgical prayer?” 

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