Korean klezmer band plays traditional Jewish Yiddish music at Newtown Synagogue in Sydney, Australia

When you think of traditional Jewish klezmer music, you probably think of old Jewish singers crooning away in Yiddish and plucking at their violins.  When I think of traditional Jewish klezmer music, I think of my husband, Rabbi Ben, sweetly singing me “Tum Balalaika” at our wedding.  But I’m pretty sure that nobody, when thinking of klezmer music, thinks of Koreans.

You just don’t expect to see trendy, young, modern Koreans, clad in the latest fashions (yet still tznius, modest), singing in Yiddish.  And you definitely don’t expect them to actually sound the way traditional Yiddish klezmer singers do.  Enter: The Korean Klezmatics!

Painting symbolizing Auschwitz at Culture Day at Newtown Synagogue in Sydney, Australia

On Sunday, Newtown Synagogue in Sydney, Australia hosted Culture Day.  It is the first in a series of Culture Day events, featuring a small Jewish modern art exhibition, complete with the artist, art historians, and other guest speakers.  For the opening Culture Day event, Newtown Synagogue even ordered sushi, sandwiches, and fruit – and hired the Korean Klezmatics!

The Korean Klezmatics did a great job.  They sang the Yiddish songs in a real traditional way and it sounded fantastic.  We also really enjoyed looking at all the artwork, inspired by all sorts of Jewish places and events, from Auschwitz to Tel Aviv.

You can check out Culture Day at Newtown Synagogue again next Sunday beginning at noon!

As we travel, Rabbi Ben and I are constantly moving.  Sometimes, we get the timing just right: we leave at the perfect moment, just when we are tired enough of a place to want to leave, but early enough that we still hold it fondly in our memories and wish to return one day.  But more often than not, and especially because we travel as a couple (and even though we became ‘one person’ under the chuppah, we do still have different feelings about things from time to time), we can rarely strike that perfect balance.  Either we leave too early and depart wishing desperately that we didn’t have to go, missing the place even before we’ve left it… Or we stay too long and we can’t get out of there fast enough, wishing never to see that place again.

Either way, we are leaving one place behind and entering a new one.  To leave one place necessarily means that we are entering another.  There is no alternative.  We leave Israel and enter Jordan, we leave India and enter Nepal, we leave Fiji and enter Australia.  No matter what our feelings about the place left behind, there is always something fresh and new and exciting in entering another place, even if it is one we have visited before.

This week on Simchas Torah we will read Parshas Vezos Haberachah, the last parsha in the Torah.  It is a powerful parsha, a description of Moses’s last day, where he gives his final blessings to all the tribes, gets one last, good, long look at the land of Israel he will never enter, and then dies.  It’s a heavy parsha and could even be understood to be a bit depressing.  After all, as we are reminded in the very last line of the Torah, never again has there been a prophet like Moses.  Yet, we read it on Simchas Torah, a day of joy and celebration of the Torah.  How can this be?

A hint can be found in the tradition that, at the end of the parsha, everyone in the congregation shouts, “Chazak! Chazak! Venischazeik!” (“Be strong! Be strong! And may we be strangthened!”)  We have reached the end and we need to ask Hashem to strengthen us.  And He does: by giving us the Torah and giving us a day to focus on celebrating it.  And so we spend the night of Simchas Torah dancing with the Torah, drinking l’chaims, and being joyful.  The Torah has ended, but yet it endures forever.

This year, Simchas Torah is followed immediately by Shabbat Parshas Bereishis and this too can teach us a lesson or two. First, we see that the Torah, which we “ended” the previous day, has not ended at all! Instead, we have simply started it again. We can learn from that that everything in life that seems to be an ending is not an ending after all… instead it is the start of a new opportunity, a new experience. We go from the death of the greatest prophet of all time to, the very next day celebration the beginning of G-d’s creation of the heavens and the earth.  It’s an amazing transformation!

Second, we see that the yearly Torah readings are cyclical, like our festivals and our holidays.  Indeed, all life events can, through the lens of Judaism, be viewed as cycles. In fact, in Judaism we even have the concept of gilgulim, or reincarnations, where a soul that still needs refinement can begin again as a new life in this world, seeking throughout generation after generation of life spans, to purify and perfect itself.  Even death, in Judaism, is not the end… it is just an opportunity to have a new beginning.

This is the reality of life.  Every end is a new beginning.  We may be leaving behind one place, one city, one relationship, one job or school, one stage of our lives… but we are always entering a new one.  Judaism teaches us that yes, the past is important, it shapes who we are and teaches us important lessons, but we are not to cry over something when it ends.  Rather, we are to look forward to the new beginning that is already starting.

Chag sameach and Shabbat shalom!

Chazak! Chazak! Venischazeik!

Sukkot at the Kotel (Western Wall) in Jerusalem, Israel

Please G-d, tonight, October 17, we’ll be at 8 Kenilworth in Lindfield/Sydney, Australia for a Sukkot, simchat beit hashoeva celebration. The Sukkot party will be around 8:00. I’ll be speaking about some of my travels around the world. All are welcome to join.

What is a Simchat Beit Hashoeva?

On Sukkot there was a ceremony where people would gather outside of Jerusalem and water was drawn from a spring. This was done with much celebration. So much, that the Talmud says, ‘one who did not see the water drawing ceremony on Sukkot, has not seen celebration in his life.’

It must have been quiet a party. I would love to have been there.

The Talmud says that during the “Simchat Beit HaShoeva,” or “The Water Drawing Celebration,” Rabbi Shimon ben Gamliel would juggle eight fire torches. This is quiet impressive. Even today there are only a handful of jugglers who could juggle eight torches. I can juggle three, so I guess I’ve got a long way to go!

Rabbi Shimon ben Gamliel was no ordinary man. At one stage he became the ‘nasi,’ a very high position in Jewish leadership, thus if he found it fitting to juggle than I believe that this was a very important celebration.

I used to go to Crown Heights in Brooklyn, New York as a kid with my father and then alone as a teenager almost every year for the simchat beit hashoeva. The whole street was blocked off, and thousands of people from all over New York would come and dance.  The party went on every night of Sukkot from 9:00pm until 6:00am. I remember staying up every night for a week straight dancing until the sun came up.

It says that in the times of the Temple, people would grow so tired from dancing they’d fall asleep on each others’ shoulders. Because they were compressed so tightly they would keep moving in the circle while asleep.

On Sukkot we have a commandment to be happy and celebrate  and this is what Judaism is all about. Judaism is not about standing in the Synagogue and fasting on Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement. G-d wants us to celebrate and be happy. So find a simchat beit hashoeva to go to, and if not, find a Sukkah to celebrate in, and if not, just dance – you and G-d – because this is how we draw down the blessings for the year.

Moed Tov

Praying with a giant lulav and etrog at the Kotel (Western Wall) in Jerusalem, Israel, on Sukkot

We are at Newtown Synagogue over the Festival of Sukkot.  Rabbi Ben will be leading the services. If you don’t have anywhere to go (or even if you do) you are welcome to join us at the Synagogue on Wednesday and Thursday evenings at 6:30pm and Thursday and Friday 9:30am.

There are two main mitzvot on Sukkot:

1. To dwell in the Sukkah. This means eating and sleeping in the Sukkah. Sukkah is one of the few mitzvot that envelopes the entire body. It is awesome, because just sitting in the Sukkah gets us a mitzvah. This is not the case with most other mitzvot. You can hold matzah all day long, but unless you eat it there is no mitzvah. Thus we try to spend as much time in the Sukkah as possible. You can read a book all afternoon in the Sukkah, and every second you are getting a mitzvah!

2. To shake the four species: Lulav, Etrog, Hadassim, Aravot.  There is so much symbolized in these four species of vegetation. One idea, is that they symbolize the four different types of Jews. With the four species,  some have smell, some have taste, one has both, and one has neither.  The same with Jews. Some have many good deeds and Torah study, some have one or the other, and some have neither. On Sukkot we all come together. We need everyone.

Chag  Sameach!

Recently, Rabbi Ben and I were walking near Darling Harbor in Sydney and we spotted what might just be the coolest playground ever.  If you ever had a Spiderman fantasy, this is the playground to visit.  We were both laughing, though, because you’d never see such a cool playground in America.  Some kid would fall from the top, break his/her neck, and the ensuing lawsuit would be the end of that playground!  Which led us to wonder… what would Judaism say about that situation?

The truth is, there are two conflicting aspects to Judaism.  First, there is personal responsibility.  A person is responsible for his own actions (and presumably parents have responsibility for their kids).  Under this theory, if you choose to play on a playground, or to let your kids use it, then you are assuming a risk.

But even Judaism insists that this risk must be reasonable.  Landlords are not permitted under Jewish law to rent out places they know are unsafe.  They are required to make the necessary repairs. If they fail to, they are liable for the injury that comes from it.

So it seems to be a combination of the two.  The question is actually pretty consistent with American law, although it probably would be a bit more lenient when it comes to really fun playgrounds.  If the ground beneath the toys is soft and the toys are strong and sturdy, the owner probably won’t have any liability.  The rest of the risk is assumed by the person playing or their parent. (Where American law diverges is that an extra burden is placed on landlords who have a “kid magnet” on their property – and playgrounds are definitely kid magnets!)