About Eden Village Camp: Eden Village Camp aims to be a living model of a thriving, sustainable Jewish community, grounded in social responsibility and inspired Jewish spiritual life. By bringing the wisdom of our tradition to the environmental, social, and personal issues important to today’s young people, we practice a Judaism that is substantive and relevant. Through our Jewish environmental and service-learning curricula, joyful Shabbat observance, pluralistic Jewish expression, and inspiring, diverse staff role models, we foster our campers’ positive Jewish identity and genuine commitment to tikkun olam (healing the world). Our 3 acre educational farm and orchard are based on principles of permaculture, sustainable and organic farming. We produce annual vegetables, perennials, and tend educational gardens as well as animals.

About the Farm Educator Apprenticeship: This is a paid six-month apprenticeship for young adults seeking hands-on experience. In the Spring build your knowledge based on agriculture, farm-based education and Jewish community. In the Summer, work at our 8-week intensive summer camp as Jewish Farm Educators. In the fall, take ownership and integrate your new skills by diving deeper into independent projects.  Live on-site at our beautiful camp, one hour north of New York City. By joining the farm staff at Eden Village, apprentices will hold two main responsibilities – tending our growing spaces and educating in our all of our programming through the spring, summer and fall. Apprentices will also have an opportunity to dive deeper into one of four focus areas: perennials, annuals, animals, and educational gardens. In these specialties apprentices will gain a deeper understanding of certain aspects of farming and will take on leadership and special projects to booster their learning and the learning of campers and program participants.

Details: April 14th, 2015 – October 22nd 2015, Apprentices receive full room and board at Eden Village, as well as a modest stipend. Extensive experience is not necessary but experiential curiosity is required. We recommend you explore our website thoroughly to get more information about our apprenticeship, farm, camp, and more at Eden Village Camp.

More questions? Explore the FAQ page. For all other questions, contact farm@edenvillagecamp.org

(from http://neohasid.org/zman/chanukah/ice_menorah/)

First, here's what's cool about an ice menorah: reflections in the ice; it floats – water is amazing and awesome; renewable resource – and if it's cold enough where you are, just freeze it outside; meditate on climate change and melting glaciers, and resolve to do something about it!

Here's how to do it:

1) Set candles in cardboard brace.

2) Fill loaf pan or any container part way and set brace over it — see diagram. Candles should be immersed half inch or more in water.

3) Shamash (not pictured) — fill dixie cup or any small cup or jar with a few inches of water and set shamash candle in that.

4) Freeze it all.

5) Remove ice with shamash, put it on top of ice in loaf pan. add another half inch or more of water to freeze the shamash to the rest of the menorah.

6) You can carve a little channel for melted water to flow away from the shamash

(idea and execution – Heidi Creamer; diagram and instructions – David Seidenberg; neohasid.org)

for pictures of a real ice menorah, before and after it's lit, go to http://neohasid.org/zman/chanukah/ice_menorah/

You'll notice while the menorah is burning that the melted ice warms up and creates its own channels (see pic above), sometimes making holes through the ice. Among other things, that's a great moment to talk about melting glaciers. Let us know what you do and how it goes!

You can design meditations on water, on climate change and glaciers, on renewable resources, on science, using this project. Send ideas to rebduvid8@gmail.com and I'll post them here.

Don’t we have enough already?

Not according to Jewish Vegetarians of North America (JVNA), of which I am president emeritus. We are working with a coalition of Jewish groups and individuals to restore and transform the ancient and largely forgotten Jewish holiday of Rosh Hashana L’Ma’aser BeHeima (New Year’s Day for Tithing Animals for sacrifices when the Jerusalem Temple stood) into a day devoted to increasing awareness of Judaism’s beautiful teachings on compassion to animals.

These teachings include: (1) “God’s compassion is over all His works [including animals] (Psalms 145:9); (2) “the righteous person considers the lives of his or her animals” (Proverbs 12:10); (3) the great Jewish heroes Moses and King David were deemed suitable to be leaders because of their compassionate care of sheep when they were shepherds; (4) farmers are not to yoke a strong and a weak animal together nor to muzzle an animal while the animal is threshing in the field; (5) the Ten Commandments indicate that animals, as well as people, are to rest on the Sabbath day; (6) and much more, summarized, in the Torah mandate that Jews are to avoid causing tsa’ar ba’alei chaim, pain to animals.

Many religious Jews are properly diligent in “building fences” around some mitzvot. For example, there is great care on the part of religious Jews to fukfil the laws related to removing chumetz before Passover. But other mitzvot, including tsa’ar ba’alei chaim, are often downplayed or ignored.

Perhaps this is not surprising when one considers that, with regard to animals, the primary focus of Jewish religious services, Torah readings, and education are on the biblical sacrifices, animals that are kosher for eating, and laws about animal slaughter, with relatively little time devoted to Judaism’s more compassionate teachings related to animals.

It is essential that this emphasis on the killing and sacrifice of animals be balanced with a greater consideration of Judaism’s more compassionate teachings about animals. Hence the need to convert the ancient, long forgotten holiday into a Rosh Hashanah LaBeheimot, a New Year for Animals.

There is a precedent for the restoration and transformation of a holiday in Jewish History. Rosh Hashanah LaIlanot, a day initially intended for tithing fruit trees for Temple offerings, was reclaimed in the 17th Century by mystics as a day for celebrating nature’s bounty and healing the natural world. Many Jews now regard this increasingly popular holiday, Tu Bishvat, as an unofficial “Jewish Earth Day,”

It is hoped that the transformed New Year for Animals will also serve as a tikkun (healing or repair) for the current widespread mistreatment of animals on factory farms that is far from Jewish compassionate teachings. Some examples are: (1) Egg-laying hens are kept in cages so small that they can’t raise even one wing and part of their beaks are painfully seared off to prevent them from harming other birds by pecking from frustration in their very unnatural conditions. (2) Male chicks at egg-laying hatcheries fare even worse as they are killed almost immediately after birth, since they can’t lay eggs and have not been genetically programmed to produce much flesh. (3) Dairy cows are artificially impregnated annually on “rape racks,” so that they will be able to continue ‘giving’ milk, and their babies are taken away almost immediately, often to be raised as veal under very cruel conditions. (4) Ten billion animals in the U.S. alone are slaughtered annually after being raised under very cruel conditions on modern factory farms, where all of their natural instincts are thwarted.

Making increasing awareness about tsa’ar ba’alei chaim even more important is that animal-based diets and agriculture are contributing substantially to many diseases that are afflicting the Jewish and other communities and to climate change and other environmental problems that threaten all life on the planet. It can be argued that a major shift to plant-based diets is essential to help shift our precious, but imperiled, planet to a sustainable path. In addition, the production and consumption of meat and other animal products arguably violate Jewish mandates to preserve human health, treat animals with compassion, protect the environment, conserve natural resources,
and help hungry people.

Restoring the New Year for Animals would have many additional benefits, including (1) showing the relevance of Judaism’s eternal teachings to today’s critical issues, (2) improving the image of Judaism for many people, by showing its compassionate side, and (3) attracting disaffected Jews through reestablishing a holiday that they find relevant and meaningful.

Rosh Hashanah LaBeheimot occurs on Rosh Chodesh Elul, the first day of the Hebrew moth of Elul (from sunset on August 6 to sunset on August 7 in 2013). Since that date ushers in a month-long period of introspection, during which Jews are to examine their deeds and consider how to improve their words and actions before the holidays of Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, this is an ideal time for Jews to consider how to apply Judaism’s splendid teachings on compassion to animals to reduce the current massive mistreatment of animals on factory farms and in other settings.

Anyone interested in celebrating the New Year for Animals this year can contact me at Schwartz@JewishVeg.com, and I will send background mater, a Haggadah draft, and ritual ideas.

When the Temple stood in Jerusalem, Rosh Chodesh Elul was a New Year for Animals, a day devoted to tithing for animal sacrifices. After the second Temple was destroyed in 70 CE, there was no longer a need for this holiday and today very few Jews have heard of it.

Jewish Vegetarians of North America (JVNA) is working with others to restore this holiday and to transform it into a day devoted to increasing awareness of Judaism’s beautiful teachings about compassion to animals and how far current treatment of animals on factory farms and in other settings is from these Jewish teachings. JVNA hopes the renewed holiday can serve as the beginning of a tikkun (healing) for the current widespread mistreatment of animals that has been discussed in many recent books, including Eating Animals by Jonathan Safran Foer.

Jews are to be rachmanim b’nei rachmanim, compassionate children of compassionate ancestors, and to imitate God, whose compassion is over all His works (Psalms 145:9), JVNA hopes that restoring the New Year for Animals will lead to greater emphasis in the Jewish community in applying these and other Jewish teachings to the reduction of animal suffering.

In 2012 there were celebrations of the renewed holiday in Israel and several US cities, and plans are underway to have some also in 2013. JVNA is preparing background material and proposed rituals and will seek additional supporting statements from rabbis and other Jewish leaders in a major effort to get the holiday onto the Jewish agenda starting in 2014.

JVNA hopes that restoring and transforming the holiday, increasing knowledge of Jewish teachings on animals and how far current realities for animals are from these teachings, will lead some Jews to shift to vegetarianism. JVNA believes that this diet is most consistent with Jewish teachings on preserving human health, treating animals with compassion, protecting the environment, conserving natural resources, and helping hungry people, and they hope that dietary changes will improve the health of Jews and also help shift our imperiled planet onto a sustainable path.

Besides spreading Jewish teachings on compassion, restoring the New Year for Animals would show the relevance of Judaism’s eternal teachings to current issues, thereby helping revitalize Judaism and potentially bringing many idealistic Jews back to Judaism.

For more information about Jewish teachings on animals, please visit the JVNA website (www.JewishVeg.com) and/or contact JVNA (president@JewishVeg.com). There are four articles related to the new holiday at www.JewishVeg.com/schwartz.