Summery of the conference:

• Panel exploring what Judaism adds to our understanding and ability to respond to climate change
• Two rounds of workshops, each of which will provide concrete information about a specific way to respond to the threat of climate change and to connect with others
• Opportunity to speak with community organizations and businesses involved in environmental work
• Special workshop for teens and tweens
• Short wrap-up program highlighting what has been accomplished and providing a send off
• Facilitation of informal gatherings for dinner at nearby restaurants those who want to continue the conversations.

A schedule and descriptions of workshops and bios of workshop leaders can be found at http://www.jewishclimate.org/may-2015-conference.html

When: Sunday, May 17, 3-7 PM

Where: Hebrew College, Herrick Road, Newton
Registration: https://secure.hebrewcollege.edu/form/uncertainty-action-what-you-can-do-about-climate-change

Cost: $18 donation (optional); students are free.

Co-sponsors include: Hebrew College, Center for Global Judaism, Hazon, LimmudBoston, Shomrei Bereshit: Rabbis and Cantors for the Earth, and others.

By Rabbi Arthur Waskow

This past Shabbat, in the same mail–delivery to my door,  there arrived both a copy of Rabbi David Seidenberg’s magnum opus Kabbalah & Ecology (published by Cambridge University Press), and the in-print Fall 2015 issue of Tikkun magazine, including an article of mine  on “Prayer as if the Earth Really Matters. ”  

My article encodes into liturgy an explicitly unconventional eco-Jewish theology. It joins a series of articles in that issue of Tikkun that are a kind of anthology of eco-theologies in various traditions: Buddhism, Hinduism, Islam, Judaism, Christianity, and several strands of spiritually open secular thought. 

Rabbi Seidenberg’s book  and my article (a distillation of much of my own eco-theology) present two new theologies, both rooted in Torah, looking at different aspects of Torah yet both reframing the relation of God to Earth and human earthlings.

David’s work, as his title announces, draws chiefly on Kabbalah and addresses its way of understanding tzelem elohim, the Image of God. He brilliantly shows that many Kabbalists extended the sense of the Image not only to the human species but to the universe as a whole and therefore all the beings within it. And he wonderfully explores the implications of this finding — intellectual, spiritual, scientific.

 My work is much more rooted in Tanakh, the Hebrew Bible — as the spiritual explorations of an indigenous people of shepherds & farmers

who are close to the land. To understand God at the heart of this, I hear— literally hear —  YHWH as YyyyHhhhWwwwHhhh – the Breathing/ Interbreathing Spirit of the world –  ruach ha’olam – and I hear the shmei rabbah / Great Name of the Kaddish as a Rabbinic continuation of this outlook — weaving together all the names of all beings, including galaxies and quarks, rabbis and rabbits.

So it felt utterly fitting that on the day that they arrived in my mailbox was not only Shabbat but also the 8th day of Passover, Its fervently messianic Prophetic reading – “The wolf shall lie down with the lamb; in all my holy mountain nothing vile or evil shall be done; the intimate knowing of the Breath of Life shall fill the Earth as the waters cover the sea””) gives it the name of “the Passover of the Future.”.

My outlook begins with the spiritual findings, parables, and teachings rooted in one people’s experience of one sliver of a multi-ecosystem land on the eastern edge of the Mediterranean,  and I midrashically extrapolate from there/then to the planet as a whole in an era when what we extract and consume from the Earth is no longer only edible food but also burnable fossil fuels.

 Whereas the Image of God that draws David comes from the first Creation story, I focus on a crucial thread of Torah starting from the second Creation story –– adam birthed from adamah, and YHWH breathing life into the newborn human species as a midwife breathes life into the newborn human individual. (“Earthling” and “Earth” are the closest we can get in English to the richness of “adam and adamah” in Hebrew.)

 From there I see a crucial thread of concern for Earth-earthling relationship that runs through Tanakh — beginning with a parable of the disaster of failed adam/ adamah relationship in Eden, and then yearning toward a series of  sacred efforts to repair the disaster: the parable of bountiful Manna that comes with restful Shabbat; the attempt to make shared bounty practical through the Sabbatical/ Shmita Year and its hope of  the Jubilee/ Homebringing Year; and ultimately the vision of the Song of Songs  –  Eden once again, this time for a grown-up race of human earthlings and our well-beloved Earth.

I am delighted that both these new Jewish theologies are emerging in response to the planetary crisis we are in. Indeed, they both point to the ways in which the world we actually live in, and the policies and practices we develop to address it, call us to re-imagine God –-  that is, to create new theologies.

I had time on this past  Shabbos/ Yontif & Maimouna to begin perusing David’s book– which I had not been able to do in any thorough way via electrons. (My eye-brain connections still live in the 20^th century.)

I’m very impressed indeed.   Extraordinary breadth of scholarship, both in Jewish texts and in ancillary readings on e.g. evolution and other related fields. And a strong thread of Akiba’s “Study is greater ––  if it leads to action.”

I was especially tickled to see David’s comments on the Great Chain of Being. (The “Great Chain of Being” is a theory of the world as a hierarchy from “inanimate objects” like rocks up to the Divine King and Lord.)

In my Tikkun article I explicitly took on the GCB thus –

It is both factually and theologically notable that this liturgical song [“We Have the Whole World in Our Hands”] transforms an older hymn in which the refrain was, “He has the whole world in His hands.”

That assertion — He is in charge of the world —  is closely related to a major traditional metaphor in most Jewish, Christian, and Muslim prayer. In that metaphor,  God is King, Lord, Judge —  above and beyond the human beings who are praying.  In regard to the Earth, this metaphor crowned a series of hierarchies:

The “Great Chain of Being” is a theory of the world as a hierarchy from rocks and rivers up to vegetation, thence up to animals and then to human beings and finally up to the Divine King and Lord. 

Today we know that the relationship between the human species and the Earth is ill described by these metaphors of hierarchy.  Not only do we know that what we breathe in depends upon what the trees and grasses breathe out; now we know that within our own guts are myriads of microscopic creatures that occasionally make us sick but far more often keep us alive and healthy.

…  So  those metaphors of ordered hierarchy are no longer truthful, viable, or useful to us as tools of spiritual enlightenment.

If we are to seek spiritual depth and height, the whole framework of prayer must be transformed.

I hope that many of us will read both David’s book and the whole issue of Tikkun. My own essay is also at  –

 <https://theshalomcenter.org/content/prayer-if-earth-really-matters>. And the Introduction to David’s book is posted at <neohasid.org/KAE>, together with instructions on how to order it.

 From our different perspectives, David and I are both especially interested in efforts to synthesize ancient wisdom with post-modern science. 

 For him, the question is how Kabbalah and modern Science (especially an ecological-scientific frame of mind) may track each other.

 From my different focus on the Tanakh, I am interested in –

• connecting the warnings of Lev 26 with modern ecological predictions;
• connecting YHWH as  Interbreath of Life with the Oxygen/CO2 interchange so that the “climate crisis” – resulting from a catastrophic overdose of CO2 –  can be seen as a crisis in “YHWH” Itself – a crisis in God’s Name;
• seeing paragraph 2 of the Sh’ma as a  proto-scientific statement about the relationship between idolatry (“carving out” only a part of the Breath/Flow/ Great Name to worship as ultimate) and eco-catastrophes;
• seeing Pharaoh, enslavement,  and the Plagues as a teaching affirmed by modern political/ economic science that top-down arrogant power oppresses both human beings and the Earth, requiring struggle for eco-social  justice. (So for me, eco-theology flows smoothly into political activism.)

In short, I bring “social science” and “political science” and biological/ climatological/ ecological science into relationship with the early “science” of shepherds and farmers observing their own relationship with the Earth, making systemic theory from their observations  — and treating that relationship itself as sacred and our understanding of that relationship as Torah.

I take great joy in the simultaneous emergence of two eco-theologies – one that begins with the Image of God in the first Creation story, and another that begins with the Earth/ earthling relationship in the second Creation story. (David’s work does not ignore the second story, but his focus on the Image and on Kabbalah draw him in a different direction.)

May we be able to weave the two stories together as does our earliest Torah!

Last chance to help us make Israel a greener, environmentally healthier land: Until the end of April you can vote online for the upcoming World Zionist Congress. The results determine, among other things, the division of power at the Jewish National Fund’s international board.

For the past decade I have sat on the JNF board, largely because of the support and intervention of the Green Zionist Alliance – a wonderful group of young environmentalists who decided to get involved and improve Israel’s environmental performance. This support has allowed me to represent them and pursue any number of important green initiatives which include:

· creating new sustainable forestry policies for the JNF,

· putting bike lanes on the organization’s agenda,

· creating a brand new “affirmative action” program to systematically reach out to Israel’s Arab minorities to finance environmental projects,

· increasing the organizational commitment to green building and solar energy,

· leading the fight to prevent JNF funding over the green line,

· expanding funding for forestry and agricultural research as well as river restoration projects, and

· fighting for good government and transparency.

There is a lot more that needs to be done. Whether or not I can continue depends on whether the “GZA” – or Aytzim as they call themselves these days gets enough votes. It only takes ten dollars to register and 3 minutes online to vote. (The polls close this Thursday April 30th). Here’s a link to Vote Green Israel: www.worldzionistcongress.org

Please don’t hesitate to contact me if you have any questions. And thanks to all of you who have already voted green for the support. – Alon Tal

(Considered by many to be the leading environmentalist in Israeli history, Alon Tal is a co-founder of the Green Zionist Alliance)

We dreamed, you and I,

my brother and my sister,

interpreter it has none,

an ancient dream it is,

as the days when we went forth from exile,

but you forgot it or did not elucidate it for yourselves,

and I did not recount it to you.

Grand is the dream,

vast like the void of the universe,

and we long for it with our souls,

but I will not remind you of it this time,

except for a small fragment/excerpt.
Now, please hear, my brother,

please hear my dream, my sister,

and remember that you also dreamed as I did.

 
In my dream–and here it is,

I arrive at the land.

And the land is neglected and desolate

and is in the hands of foreigners,

and the destruction darkens the light of her face

and destroys her spirit,

and an alien government corrupts her.

Distant from me and strange to me

is the land of my ancestors,

and I, too, am distant from her and a stranger to her.

The single connection that ties me to her,

and the lone memory that reminds me

that she is my mother and I am her son,

is–because my soul is also desolate

like her,

for it, too, fell into the hands of foreigners,

to destruct it and destroy it.

I feel the destruction and I ponder the ruins

with all my soul

and with every ounce of my being,

and a divine voice goes forth from the ruins and declares,

“Mortal! Consider these ruins,

and consider them once again,

turn not a blind eye to them.

And you shall know and gain insight

to what you already understand,

that the destruction is the destruction of your soul,

and the destroyer is the destroyer in your life,

in the midst of which you lived in foreign lands

and which clung to you until this time.

Remember this,

for your redemption requires this!

And as you continue to ponder and to dig deeper,

you shall see that from below the ruins

an orphan cinder still whispers,

saved by hiding from the spirit of that life,

and the spirit of the land breathes upon it

to bring it to life.

And when it totally abandoned that life,

which others created,

when you left their land and arrived here

to create a new life for yourself, your life–

then cinder smoldered and lived,

glowed and brought forth its flame,

and you returned and lived,

and your people and your land returned and lived.

Rabbi Katy Allen is a board certified chaplain and serves as a Nature Chaplain and the Facilitator of One Earth Collaborative, a program of Open Spirit. She is the founder and rabbi of Ma’yan Tikvah – A Wellspring of Hope, which holds services outdoors all year long. She is a co-convener and coordinator of the Boston-based Jewish Climate Action Network.

Download the free “Haggadah of the Inner Seder” (18 pp.). PDF, RTF, and DOC versions, along with a brief guide to the haggadah’s features, can be found at: http://neohasid.org/zman/pesach/InnerSeder/.
You can also go to neohasid.org for Omer Counter apps, and for information about David Seidenberg’s new book, Kabbalah and Ecology: God’s Image in the More-Than-Human World, published by Cambridge University Press.

You can support the Israel you want to see. All American Jews can vote in the World Zionist Congress election going on right now. One of the most common questions, we get is why it costs $10 to vote. As Mirele Goldsmith, a Green Israel slate member answers: “The American Zionist Movement has contracted with an independent company to run the online election.  This is to insure that the election is fair.  The registration fee is being used exclusively to pay for the election.  It is not a donation to the WZO.  I wish there was no fee, but it is a small price to pay to make a real difference in the future of Israel.”

Green Israel Platform: Peace for All • Green Energy • Sustainable Development • Diaspora Relations • Air Quality • Ecological Ecology • Animal Rights • Food Justice • Water Conservation • Schmita • Recycling • Encourage Environmental Start-Ups

Green Israel Slate: Eli Bass, Ellen Bernstein, Fred Scherlinder Dobb, Karin Fleisch, David Fox, Matthew Frankel, Ilana Gauss, Brett Goldman, Mirele Goldsmith, Wendy Kenin, David Krantz, Frances Lasday, Evonne Marzouk, Hody Nemes, Morgan Prestage, Shira Rosen, Richard Schwartz, Jacob Schonzeit, David Sher, Garth Silberstein, Marc Soloway, Lawrence Troster, David Weisberg, Eric Weltman, Laurie Zoloth

Please vote Green Israel. Go to http://jewcology.org/2015/03/votegreenisrael/ or worldzionistcongress.org for more info.

“May the merciful One turn our hearts toward the land,
so that we may dwell together with her in her sabbath-rest the whole year of Shmita.”

Harachaman hu yashiv libeinu el ha’aretz
l’ma’an neisheiv yachad imah b’shovtah, kol sh’nat hash’mitah!

הָרַחֲמָן הוּא יָשִיב לִבֵּינוּ אֶל הָאָרֶץ לְמַעַן נֵשֵב יָחַד עִמָהּ בְּשָׁבְתהּ, כָּל שְׁנַת הַשְׁמִיטָה

The words of this blessing were written by Rabbi David Seidenberg. Nili Simhai made it into a singable liturgy by setting the words to the “Sosne Nigun” by Jonah Adels, z”l. (Listen to the song at www.neohasid.org/resources/shmita-harachaman.)Harachaman blessings come after the main part of the blessing after the meals, and they ask for special blessings, including blessings related to Shabbat and holidays. Sing it at your Tu Bish’vat seder and at every meal this whole Shmita year!

Shmita means “release”, and the Shmita year is about release or liberation for the land, liberation between the people and the land, and liberation between people themselves. This Harachaman blessing references all three kinds of liberation, and it does that by using three different verbs that include the letters Shin ש and Bet ב. The first, yashiv, comes from the word “turn”, lashuv, לשוב, and it refers to our returning to a right relationship on a heart level with the Earth. The second, neishev, comes from “to settle” or “dwell”, lashevet, לשבת, as in shevet achim gam yachad — how good it is for brothers and sisters to dwell together, and it refers to liberation between individuals in the year of release, when debts are canceled and food is shared. The third, b’shovtah, comes from lishbot, לשבות, to rest, and it refers to the shabbat that the land itself enjoys in the Shmita year, as it says, “the land will enjoy her sabbaths”. This is the true nature of tikkun olam: tikkun, repair and restoration, on all these levels together. That is what must happen to fix the world.

You can download the PDF at neohasid.org/pdf/Shmita-Harachaman.pdf or get a PNG graphic of the blessing at neohasid.org/resources/shmita-harachaman/ (there are 8 Harachamans per page) to use at your Tu Bish’vat seder and for every meal during this Shmita year.

The words fit into the song like this:

Harachaman hu yashiv libeinu
el ha’aretz, el ha’aretz
Harachaman hu yashiv libeinu
el ha’aretz, el ha’aretz 

l’ma’an neisheiv yachad imah
imah b’shovtah
neisheiv yachad imah
imah b’shovtah

kol sh’nat hash’mitah
kol sh’nat hash’mitah
kol sh’nat hash’mitah
kol sh’nat hash’mitah

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

Ordering Information

Place your order online at www.growandbehold.com, where you can see what we currently have in stock, what we offer, and our prices.

Or, give us a call at 888-790-5781 Mon – Thurs. from 9am-5pm EST and Fridays from 9am-12pm EST

Any questions can also be sent to info@growandbehold.com

Our Story

While working on organic farms, we fell in love — with each other, and with the work of feeding people good food produced by farmers who love the work and the land.  We knew that the meat raised on pasture was not only of the highest quality and flavor, but also produced in a balanced ecosystem, with care for the land and the animals.  This was critical for Anna, a former vegetarian, who would only eat meat produced sustainably and ethically.  Naf, a serious carnivore from a young age, wanted pastured meat not just for the ethics, but for the unparalleled flavor of sustainably produced meats.

After serving kosher, pastured lamb, chicken, and goat at our wedding to rave reviews, we realized it was our calling to bring the delicious taste of kosher pastured meats to the wider Jewish community.  Naf learned the kosher meat business from the ground up, including training as a shochet. And in 2010, we founded Grow and Behold Foods on the same principles that guided the farm where we first met: delicious, nutritious food comes from farms that treat the entire ecosystem with respect.  It is our pleasure to bring the wonderful taste of pastured meat to your table.

We look forward to feeding you soon!
Naf and Anna Hanau

This ia a free opportunity for young adults 19-29 to come together in an interfaith setting for Jews, Christians and Muslims to live, farm and study together from June 1st – July 23rd 2015 at the Stony Point Conference Center in Stony Point, NY, with time for mentoring and vocational discernment. It is a Multifaith, Peace, Justice and Earthcare program. We seek students who are grounded in their religious tradition, serious about spriiuality and the state of the planet, and open to learnig and living in an intentional community setting. This is our 6th annual program run by the Community of Living Traditions on the Stony Point Center 32 acre campus.

For more details and to apply go to: www.stonypointcenter.org/SummerInstitute Deadline is March15, 2015

17 Cricketown Rd, Stony Point, NY 10980 845-786-5674

On this last night of the Festival of Re-Dedication, we light all eight candles, we complete the “Litany of Harm” and the “Call to Action,” and we add one last item to our list of promises to ourselves for the year to come.

Hanukkah Night 8:

The Litany of Harm:

For all those in island nations, where rising sea levels and superstorms threaten their very existence. We stand in witness!

For all coastal cities and villages, where storm swells and flooding put lives and homes at risk. We stand in witness!

For all those who suffer from tropical diseases, and those at risk from spreading diseases and heat waves. We stand in witness!

For farmers and all who eat, as droughts ruin crops, incomes, and food supplies. We stand in witness!

For people of color around the world, who are at risk from climate change and environmental injustice. We stand in witness!

For the human populations, plants, and animals who are losing or have lost access to enough fresh water. We stand in witness!

For the countless animals who suffer in factory farms, in a system that causes misery and carbon pollution. We stand in witness!

For all the habitats already lost and which are disappearing. We stand in witness!*

For the endangered mammals, plants, birds, insects, and all the species we will never discover. We stand in witness!

For the burning rain forests. We stand in witness!

For the warming oceans and the dying choral reefs. We stand in witness!

For the mountaintops removed, water supplies poisoned, and oceans spilled with oil. We stand in witness!

For all who make their living from our addiction to fossil fuels.We stand in witness!

For our own roles in using and wasting energy. We stand in witness!

For all of us, and our children and their children, who are living and growing up on a changing Earth. We stand in witness!

For the courage and strength it takes to face climate change with love and hope. We stand in witness!

The Call to Action:

We’re ready to act because we have a favorite place on Earth that we want our great-grandchildren to experience. With love in our hearts, Compassionate One, move us to action.

We’re ready to act because somewhere we heard John Muir’s voice, reminding us that in the beauty of nature we see the beginning of creation. With beauty in our hearts, Creator, move us to action.

We’re ready to act because someone in our life once shared something with us – something we needed; something we could not live without – and we want to do the same for the next generation and beyond. With generosity in our hearts, Holy One of Blessing, move us to action.

We’re ready to act because we’ve read texts we consider sacred, and they make clear that the Earth is a gift, and we are stewards of that gift. With responsibility in our hearts, G!d of Judgment, move us to action.

We’re ready to act  because the blessing of life has allowed us to see the ways our lives are all connected with one another in a web of mutuality. Affirming the web of life, Mysterious One, move us to action.

We’re ready to act  because the most basic moral instruction at the core of every world religion is the call to love our neighbors as ourselves; … and we regard future generations as no less our neighbors than those who live next door to us today.  Affirming all people alive – and yet to be born – as our neighbors, G!d of Life, move us to action.

We’re ready to act  because we want to be part of the solution.  Affirming the gift of creativity, Almighty, move us to action.

We’re ready to act  because the G!d of Many Names is a G!d of hope, and as people of hope, we will not stop until the people of the world embrace new habits, new practices and new aspirations that will extend to countless generations the bountiful creation into which we were born.  As people of hope, G!d of Many Names, move us to action.**

We add the last item to our list.

For this last night, we consider how we behave toward those around us. What can we do better in our individual relationships? Where are our weaknesses? Our strengths? What do we wish we could do better when we are interacting with family, friends, co-workers, neighbors, and others around us?

Here are my thoughts for this last night of Hanukkah:

Eloheinu v’elohei avoteinu v’imoteinu, Our G!d and G!d of our ancestors, give me strength on this last night of Hanukkah, and help me to re-dedicate myself to remembering that I am created in the image of the Holy One of Blessing, to eating organic, local food, to speaking out about racism, to maintaining my values in my finances, to writing to my representatives or local paper about climate change and social justice issues, to supporting the hungry, to matching my words and actions to my beliefs and values, and to treating others as I wish to be treated.

What does your complete list look like?

As you go forward through this year, I invite you to keep your list with you. When you are feeling in need of strength, recite the prayer you have created to ask G!d for help. When you are feeling on top of the world, recite it to remind yourself of the work you have to do. Reflect on your successes. Feel gratitude for what you have been able to do. Search for the strength to go ever deeper in bringing light and joy and goodness into the Universe, and making G!d’s presence manifest in the world.

Hanukkah Sameach – Happy Hanukkah,

Rabbi Katy

* by Rabbi Shoshana Meira Friedman

** by Rev. Jim Antal, adapted

On this penultimate night of Hanukkah, we light seven candles, we continue the “Litany of Harm” and the “Call to Action,” and we consider a seventh way to strengthen our resolve to change the world in positive ways.

Hanukkah Night 7:

The Litany of Harm:

For all those in island nations, where rising sea levels and superstorms threaten their very existence. We stand in witness!

For all coastal cities and villages, where storm swells and flooding put lives and homes at risk. We stand in witness!

For all those who suffer from tropical diseases, and those at risk from spreading diseases and heat waves. We stand in witness!

For farmers and all who eat, as droughts ruin crops, incomes, and food supplies. We stand in witness!

For people of color around the world, who are at risk from climate change and environmental injustice. We stand in witness!

For the human populations, plants, and animals who are losing or have lost access to enough fresh water. We stand in witness!

For the countless animals who suffer in factory farms, in a system that causes misery and carbon pollution. We stand in witness!

For all the habitats already lost and which are disappearing. We stand in witness!*

For the endangered mammals, plants, birds, insects, and all the species we will never discover. We stand in witness!

For the burning rain forests. We stand in witness!

For the warming oceans and the dying choral reefs. We stand in witness!

For the mountaintops removed, water supplies poisoned, and oceans spilled with oil. We stand in witness!

For all who make their living from our addiction to fossil fuels.We stand in witness!

For our own roles in using and wasting energy. We stand in witness!

The Call to Action:

We’re ready to act because we have a favorite place on Earth that we want our great-grandchildren to experience. With love in our hearts, Compassionate One, move us to action.

We’re ready to act because somewhere we heard John Muir’s voice, reminding us that in the beauty of nature we see the beginning of creation. With beauty in our hearts, Creator, move us to action.

We’re ready to act because someone in our life once shared something with us – something we needed; something we could not live without – and we want to do the same for the next generation and beyond. With generosity in our hearts, Holy One of Blessing, move us to action.

We’re ready to act because we’ve read texts we consider sacred, and they make clear that the Earth is a gift, and we are stewards of that gift. With responsibility in our hearts, G!d of Judgment, move us to action.

We’re ready to act  because the blessing of life has allowed us to see the ways our lives are all connected with one another in a web of mutuality. Affirming the web of life, Mysterious One, move us to action.

We’re ready to act  because the most basic moral instruction at the core of every world religion is the call to love our neighbors as ourselves; … and we regard future generations as no less our neighbors than those who live next door to us today.  Affirming all people alive – and yet to be born – as our neighbors, G!d of Life, move us to action.

We’re ready to act  because we want to be part of the solution.  Affirming the gift of creativity, Almighty, move us to action.

We add a seventh item to our efforts toward re-dedication.

For the seventh night, we consider our integrity. Do our actions match our words? Do our words mirror our deeply-held beliefs? Do we say and do what we know is right? What can we do to ensure that the answers to these questions are YES as much of the time as possible?

Here is how my list is shaping up on this seventh night of Hanukkah:

Eloheinu v’elohei avoteinu v’imoteinu, Our G!d and G!d of our ancestors, give me strength on this third night of Hanukkah, and help me to re-dedicate myself to remembering that I am created in the image of the Holy One of Blessing, to eating organic, local food, to speaking out about racism, to maintaining my values in my finances, to writing to my representatives or local paper about climate change and social justice issues, to supporting the hungry, and to matching my words and actions to my beliefs and values.

What are you adding to your list tonight?

Chag Urim Sameach – Happy Hanukkah,

Rabbi Katy

* by Rabbi Shoshana Meira Friedman

** by Rev. Jim Antal, adapted

Tonight we light six candles, the lights in our home grow ever brighter, but as we add to the “Litany of Harm,” we know that there is darkness in many corners of the world, and so we add also to our “Call to Action,” and consider a sixth way to move our lives forward in a way that adds light to the world.

Hanukkah Night 6:

The Litany of Harm:

For all those in island nations, where rising sea levels and superstorms threaten their very existence. We stand in witness!

For all coastal cities and villages, where storm swells and flooding put lives and homes at risk. We stand in witness!

For all those who suffer from tropical diseases, and those at risk from spreading diseases and heat waves. We stand in witness!

For farmers and all who eat, as droughts ruin crops, incomes, and food supplies. We stand in witness!

For people of color around the world, who are at risk from climate change and environmental injustice. We stand in witness!

For the human populations, plants, and animals who are losing or have lost access to enough fresh water. We stand in witness!

For the countless animals who suffer in factory farms, in a system that causes misery and carbon pollution. We stand in witness!

For all the habitats already lost and which are disappearing. We stand in witness!*

For the endangered mammals, plants, birds, insects, and all the species we will never discover. We stand in witness!

For the burning rain forests. We stand in witness!

For the warming oceans and the dying choral reefs. We stand in witness!

For the mountaintops removed, water supplies poisoned, and oceans spilled with oil. We stand in witness!

The Call to Action:

We’re ready to act because we have a favorite place on Earth that we want our great-grandchildren to experience. With love in our hearts, Compassionate One, move us to action.

We’re ready to act because somewhere we heard John Muir’s voice, reminding us that in the beauty of nature we see the beginning of creation. With beauty in our hearts, Creator, move us to action.

We’re ready to act because someone in our life once shared something with us – something we needed; something we could not live without – and we want to do the same for the next generation and beyond. With generosity in our hearts, Holy One of Blessing, move us to action.

We’re ready to act because we’ve read texts we consider sacred, and they make clear that the Earth is a gift, and we are stewards of that gift. With responsibility in our hearts, G!d of Judgment, move us to action.

We’re ready to act  because the blessing of life has allowed us to see the ways our lives are all connected with one another in a web of mutuality. Affirming the web of life, Mysterious One, move us to action.

We’re ready to act  because the most basic moral instruction at the core of every world religion is the call to love our neighbors as ourselves; … and we regard future generations as no less our neighbors than those who live next door to us today.  Affirming all people alive – and yet to be born – as our neighbors, G!d of Life, move us to action. **

We add a sixth action to our commitment to ourselves.

For the sixth night, we consider our neighbors, those in our own communities and those around the world, who are mired in poverty, who go to bed hungry at night, and whose children die of starvation. What can we do to help them? How are we able to assist one person, a family, or a community? What are we able to give, financially or through our talents and skills, to change the plight of those with little or nothing?

Here are my commitments on this sixth night of Hanukkah:

Eloheinu v’elohei avoteinu v’imoteinu, Our G!d and G!d of our ancestors, give me strength on this third night of Hanukkah, and help me to re-dedicate myself to remembering that I am created in the image of the Holy One of Blessing, to eating organic, local food, to speaking out about racism, to maintaining my values in my finances, to writing to my representatives or local paper about climate change and social justice issues, and to supporting the hungry.

How is your list shaping up?

Chag Urim Sameach – Happy Hanukkah,

Rabbi Katy

* by Rabbi Shoshana Meira Friedman

** by Rev. Jim Antal

On this fourth night, half way through Hanukkah, we light four candles, continue the “Litany of Harm” and the “Call to Action,” and consider a fourth way to move our lives forward in a way that adds goodness to the world.

Hanukkah Night 4:

The Litany of Harm:

For all those in island nations, where rising sea levels and superstorms threaten their very existence. We stand in witness!

For all coastal cities and villages, where storm swells and flooding put lives and homes at risk. We stand in witness!

For all those who suffer from tropical diseases, and those at risk from spreading diseases and heat waves. We stand in witness!

For farmers and all who eat, as droughts ruin crops, incomes, and food supplies. We stand in witness!

For people of color around the world, who are at risk from climate change and environmental injustice. We stand in witness!

For the human populations, plants, and animals who are losing or have lost access to enough fresh water. We stand in witness!

For the countless animals who suffer in factory farms, in a system that causes misery and carbon pollution. We stand in witness!

For all the habitats already lost and which are disappearing. We stand in witness!*

The Call to Action:

We’re ready to act because we have a favorite place on Earth that we want our great-grandchildren to experience. With love in our hearts, Compassionate One, move us to action.

We’re ready to act because somewhere we heard John Muir’s voice, reminding us that in the beauty of nature we see the beginning of creation. With beauty in our hearts, Creator, move us to action.

We’re ready to act because someone in our life once shared something with us – something we needed; something we could not live without – and we want to do the same for the next generation and beyond. With generosity in our hearts, Holy One of Blessing, move us to action.

We’re ready to act because we’ve read texts we consider sacred, and they make clear that the Earth is a gift, and we are stewards of that gift. With responsibility in our hearts, G!d of Judgment, move us to action.**

We add a fourth promise to ourselves.

For the fourth night, we consider our finances. Where do you spend your money and how? What does the cost of an item say about the wages of the people who made it? What resources went into making it? If you have money invested, do you know how it is being used? How does your bank use your money? Are the ways your money is invested consistent with your values? (Click here for some resources with changes you might make.)

Here are my thoughts for this fourth night of Hanukkah:

Eloheinu v’elohei avoteinu v’imoteinu, Our G!d and G!d of our ancestors, give me strength on this fourth night of Hanukkah, and help me to re-dedicate myself to remembering that I am created in the image of the Holy One of Blessing, to eating organic, local food, to speaking out about racism, and to maintaining my values in my finances.

What do you feel moved to add to your list tonight?

Chag Urim Sameach – Happy Hanukkah,

Rabbi Katy

* by Rabbi Shoshana Meira Friedman

** by Rev. Jim Antal

On this third night of Hanukkah, we light three candles and continue to add to the “Litany of Harm” and the “Call to Action,” and we provide a third action to our personal list of ways in which to increase the sanctity of our lives and the lives of those around us.

Hanukkah Night 3:

We continue the Litany of Harm:

For all those in island nations, where rising sea levels and superstorms threaten their very existence. We stand in witness!

For all coastal cities and villages, where storm swells and flooding put lives and homes at risk. We stand in witness!

For all those who suffer from tropical diseases, and those at risk from spreading diseases and heat waves. We stand in witness!

For farmers and all who eat, as droughts ruin crops, incomes, and food supplies. We stand in witness!

For people of color around the world, who are at risk from climate change and environmental injustice. We stand in witness!

For the human populations, plants, and animals who are losing or have lost access to enough fresh water.*

We continue our Call to Action:

We’re ready to act because we have a favorite place on earth that we want our great-grandchildren to experience. With love in our hearts, Compassionate One, move us to action.

We’re ready to act because somewhere we heard John Muir’s voice, reminding us that in the beauty of nature we see the beginning of creation. With beauty in our hearts, Creator, move us to action.

We’re ready to act because someone in our life once shared something with us – something we needed; something we could not live without – and we want to do the same for the next generation and beyond. With generosity in our hearts, Holy One of Blessing, move us to action.””

And we add a third item for increasing holiness.

For the third night, we focus on our responses to people of color. Do we see the differences in how white people and people of color are treated? Do we see how our days are different from those who are different from ourselves? Are we ready and able to recognize and acknowledge our white privilege? And what do we do about all of this?

Here are my thoughts for this third night of Hanukkah:

Our G!d and G!d of our ancestors, give me strength on this third night of Hanukkah, and help me to re-dedicate myself to remembering that I am created in the image of the Holy One of Blessing, to eating organic, local food, and to speaking out about racism.

What do you feel moved to add to your list tonight?

Chag Urim Sameach – Happy Hanukkah,

Rabbi Katy

* by Rabbi Shoshana Meira Friedman

** by Rev. Jim Antal

On this second night of Hanukkah, we continue to increase in holiness by lighting two candles and by adding to the “Litany of Harm” and the “Call to Action,” and by adding a new action to our personal list of ways in which to re-dedicate ourselves. (See Night 1 for a full introduction.)

Hanukkah Night 2:

We continue the Litany of Harm:

For all those in island nations, where rising sea levels and superstorms threaten their very existence. We stand in witness!

For all coastal cities and villages, where storm swells and flooding put lives and homes at risk. We stand in witness!

For all those who suffer from tropical diseases, and those at risk from spreading diseases and heat waves. We stand in witness!

For farmers and all who eat, as droughts ruin crops, incomes, and food supplies. We stand in witness!*

We continue our Call to Action:

We’re ready to act because we have a favorite place on earth that we want our great-grandchildren to experience. With love in our hearts, Compassionate One, move us to action.

We’re ready to act because somewhere we heard John Muir’s voice, reminding us that in the beauty of nature we see the beginning of creation. With beauty in our hearts, Creator, move us to action.**

And we add to our list of actions to which we re-dedicate ourselves.

For the second night, we focus on food. What are the ways in which you are prepared to change your eating habits to better protect the Earth and farm workers? What can you give up or what can you take on that will make your food healthier for both you and the planet?

Here are my thoughts for this second night of Hanukkah:

Eloheinu v’elohei avoteinu v’imoteinu, Our G!d and G!d of our ancestors, give me strength on this second night of Hanukkah, and help me to re-dedicate myself to remembering that I am created in the image of the Holy One of Blessing and to eating organic, local food.

What will you add to your list tonight?

Hanukkah Sameach – Happy Hanukkah,

Rabbi Katy

* by Rabbi Shoshana Meira Friedman

** by Rev. Jim Antal

Why don’t we light eight candles on the first night of Hanukkah, and work our way down to one? Why do we start with one candle and work our way up to eight? So familiar are we with our traditional way of lighting the candles and increasing the light, that imagining doing it the opposite way is almost impossible. Reduce the amount of light each night? No way!

Yet, in ancient times this custom seems to have been practiced. In the Talmud, the School of Shammai said, “On the first day eight lights are lit and thereafter they are gradually reduced,” but the School of Hillel said, no, no, no! “On the first day one is lit and thereafter they are progressively increased.” We all know who won that argument! Hillel’s reasoning? “We increase in matters of holiness but we do not decrease.” (Shabbat 21b)

Thus, we learn from Hanukkah – the festival of re-dedication – that in regard to holiness, we are never to decrease, only to increase. So, this is what happens when we light the Hanukkah candles – we increase the light, the holiness, the positive energy, the goodness, in the universe.

I think of that game, “I’m going to my grandmother’s and I’m taking with me…” Each person “takes” their own new item, but also all those named previously, so that the list grows longer and longer and longer. This is what happens with increasing holiness. Each night we bring into the room, into the universe, into our lives, all the goodness and holiness of this particular candle-lighting, as well as the goodness and holiness from each previous one.

This week, we will post a bit of holiness for you to bring to your candle-lighting, and each night we will add a new bit, eight pieces of a puzzle to fill in and create something whole over the eight nights of Hanukkah. Each night we will add two verses from a “Litany of Harm” to the planet, written by Rabbi Shoshana Meira Freidman, to help us stand in witness and solidarity with all those who are being harmed by climate change. It will also include one verse from “A Climate Change Call and Response to Action” written by Rev. Jim Antal. And at the end of each of these sets of verses you will find ideas and questions to help you decide to what to re-dedication yourself that night. Each day will provide a different theme.

I invite you to keep adding on, as we do with lighting the candles and with the “I’m going to my grandmother’s…” game, so that on the 8th day of Hanukkah, you read the entire Litany of Harm, the entire Call to Action, and re-dedicate yourself to all of your actions.

Hanukkah Night 1:

We first the candles and recite the traditional blessings.

We then begin the Litany of Harm to our Planet:

For all those in island nations, where rising sea levels and superstorms threaten their very existence. We stand in witness!

For all coastal cities and villages, where storm swells and flooding put lives and homes at risk. We stand in witness!

We begin our Call to Action:

We’re ready to act because we have a favorite place on Earth that we want our great-grandchildren to experience. With love in our hearts, Compassionate One, move us to action.

We start to act:

For the first night, we focus on the spiritual. What are the ways that you want to re-dedicate yourself to your spiritual life? How do you want to continue to strength and deepen your relationship with the Holy One? Prayer? Meditation? Spending time outdoors? What will enrich your spiritual life the most? You may want to consider these questions alone, or discuss them with those lighting candles with you.

Here are my thoughts for tonight:

Eloheinu v’elohei avoteinu v’imoteinu, Our G!d and G!d of our ancestors, give me strength on this first night of Hanukkah, and help me to rededicate myself to remembering that I am created in your image, in the image of the Holy One of Blessing.

What are your thoughts? For the last part of tonight’s Hanukkah meditation, put your intention about spiritual re-dedication into words and share it with those around you.

Chag Urim Sameach – Happy Hanukkah,

Thirteen Jewish organizations, under the umbrella of the Green Hevra, have issued the following joint statement today publicly calling on the U.S. government to reject the Keystone XL pipeline:

It has become abundantly clear that we are consuming far too many fossil fuels. In this Sabbatical/Shmita year, when the Torah calls for deeper gentleness toward the Earth, we are especially conscious of the dangers to the Earth from the drilling, transporting and burning of tar-sands oil. The resources that would be devoted to the Keystone XL pipeline should be devoted instead to initiatives in clean energy, a fast-growing field in which we hope the United States will take a leading position.

Climate change, worsened by burning more and more oil that the Keystone XL pipeline would permit, poses a grave threat to the security of the United States, Israel and the world.

Jewish tradition is not monolithic, and the issues around the pipeline are complex. But the Jewish community has consistently sought to take a stand in favor of creating a better world for all. It is hard for us to believe that building the Keystone XL pipeline could possibly do so.

This is not the first time that Jewish organizations have taken a stand against Keystone XL and we call upon fellow Jewish leaders to join us in encouraging President Obama and Congress to reject the Keystone XL pipeline.

Signed by the following members of the Green Hevra:

Amir

Aytzim: Ecological Judaism

Eden Village Camp

Energiya Global

Habonim Dror North America

Hazon

Jewish Climate Action Network

Jewish Farm School

Jews Against Hydrofracking

NeoHasid.org

Reconstructionist Rabbinical College / Jewish Reconstructionist Communities

The Shalom Center

Shoresh Jewish Environmental Programs

Connections. Everything is about connections. Connections across space. Connections across time. Connections in thought and spirit. Connections between. Connections among. Just connections, nothing else. That’s what prayer is about. That is what faith is about. That is what life is about.

In this week’s parashah, Chayyei Sarah, “Isaac went forth to [lasuach] in the field toward evening.” (Gen 24:63) The rabbis teach us that lasuach has the meaning, “to pray,” and they provide a connection to Psalm 102:1, which begins, “A prayer for a poor man when he enwraps himself [lishpoch sicho] to pour out his heart before the One.” Isaac was pouring out his heart, pouring out his words, his conversation (sicho) to G!d.; he was praying.

As Isaac prayed a deep heart-felt prayer, the medieval commentator, Sforno, says that “he turned away from the public path so as not to be interrupted by wayfarers, and went into the field to pray, even though he had already prayed in Be’er lachai-ro’i. But before he prayed he was answered.”

What!? Yes, Sforno is saying that Isaac’s prayer was answered even before he spoke it. Wow! What is the basis for this ancient teaching? What does this mean? Could our prayers also be answered before we speak them?

The answers begin with a connection to the previous verse, “Isaac was on his way, coming from Be’er lachai-ro’i” (Gen. 24:62). Just prior to his wandering in the field, Isaac had been in a place whose name, according to another medieval commentator, Rashi, (Gen. 16:14), means, “a well upon which a living angel appeared.” The name by which Hagar calls G!d in the previous verse, Gen. 11:13, is El Ro’i, “the G!d of seeing,” connecting thus the name of the well also to the Divine Presence. This place through which Isaac passed is the same place where Hagar’s prayers were answered, where she experienced G!d seeing what was happening to him, and where G!d told her that she would conceive and give birth to a son, Ishmael. (Gen. 16:11)

Is there something special—magical almost—about this well? Is Be’er lachai-ro’i a place to go to when we want our prayers answered? Maybe. After all, since prayers were answered for Hagar, the rabbis reasoned that therefore prayers could be answered in the same place for Isaac, too.  And maybe for others as well?

The sages cite other evidence that Isaac’s prayer could already have been answered—evidence from other people for whom this happened. They remember the prophet Daniel, who reported on his vision: “And he said to me “Fear not, Daniel, for since the first day that you set your heart to contemplate and to fast before your God, your words were heard;” (Daniel 10:12) They cite Isaiah, “Thus G!d said to Isaiah that it will one day come to be:  ‘And it shall be, when they have not yet called, that I will respond; when they are still speaking, that I will hearken.’” (Is. 65:24) If prayers could be answered before they were spoken for Daniel and Isaiah, why not for the patriarch Isaac?

But perhaps the answer is deeper. The verses about Hagar’s prayers, Genesis 16:11-14, give us connections to Ishmael as well as to Hagar, for this is the place where the reality of his conception entered Hagar’s consciousness. In this instance, the connection to Hagar and Ishmael is through the place, Be’er lachai-ro’i. But the sages make another connection between Isaac’s prayer and Hagar and Ishmael with Gen. 21:15, when Hagar and Ishmael have been sent away by Abraham at Sarah’s behest, and in Hagar’s despair she “cast the child [Ishmael] under one of the bushes [hasichim].” The two words lasuach and sichim, have the same three-letter root. They have different etymologies, and different meanings, but because of the similarities, the rabbis find meaning, as they often did, by noting and strengthening the connection, in this case connections within the family.

Isaac’s meditation in the field has a connection to his father, too. From the Talmud (Berachot 6b), we learn that Abraham instituted the morning prayers, Shacharit, Isaac the afternoon prayers, Mincha, and Jacob the evening prayers, Ma’ariv. But the Biblical commentators (e.g. Rach, Gen. 24:63) don’t credit Isaac alone for bringing the Mincha prayer service into being; they tell us that the Mincha prayer originated with Abraham, but was brought to fruition and named through Isaac. The innovation of the afternoon prayer had to be passed from one generation to the next in order to secure for the tradition a place into the future. Connections to past generations.

Connections to the past don’t end with Hagar and Abraham. They go all the way back to Creation. Rashbam, in his commentary on “Isaac went forth to pray in the field [lasuach basadeh] toward evening” focuses on the words lasuach basadeh, and he refers us to Genesis 2:5 and the creation of every “bush/herb of the field (siach hasadeh),” for which he provides the association, “to plant trees and to see the fruits of his efforts.” The fruits of the planter’s efforts, the answers to the pray-er’s prayers—the connection to Creation offers additional evidence that our prayers, our pouring out of our hearts in time of need, are answered.

The verse Rashbam comments on comes from the second creation story and in its entirety it reads, “Now no tree of the field was yet on the earth, neither did any herb/bush of the field yet grow, because the Lord God had not brought rain upon the earth, and there was no man to work the soil.” (Gen 2:5) It is followed by, “A mist ascended from the earth and watered the entire surface of the ground.” (Gen 2:6) Two verses later, G!d “planted a garden in Eden” (Gen 2:8). Although we understand from the ancient rabbis that there is no “before” and “after” in the Torah, nevertheless, here in this narrative we find that even before rain began falling, there was mist rising to water the plants!

How often do we understand the rising mist as the answer to our prayer for falling rain? When rain has not yet been created, we must expand our minds and our hearts to be able to see that the rising mist may indeed be how our prayer is answered. A mist that rises from the ground may be the precursor to the rain that falls from the sky, or it may even have the same function.

So can our prayers be answered before we speak them? What would it mean if they were? The answer I believe,  is ultimately about allowing connections. Isaac was physically alone in that field, but in his heart and mind he was connected across time and space to Hagar, Ishmael, a special well, G!d, Earth, and Creation. And, perhaps most importantly, his heart was open to receive a message, the message that G!d was ready to send him.

When we open our hearts and allow ourselves to be connected to those in our lives—living and dead, near at hand and far away—to G!d, to the Earth, to the past, to all of this and more—then our prayers are answered. We may not always see and recognize our answers as easily as Isaac did—he lifted up his eyes and there was Rebecca coming toward him, his new love, his wife to be. But if we listen closely to our hearts and souls, if we keep them open, despite whatever obstacles get thrown our way, if we stand beside a well with a seeing or seeable angel upon it, then, we, too, can feel or see or hear an answer coming to us, too.

Many prayers of petition are built into our tradition, such as the blessings of the weekday Amidah (Shmoneh Esreh) and the prayer for healing recited during the Torah service. Many of the petitionary blessings end with a chatimah, a closing signature, sort of a summary of what the blessing is about.  However, if we look closely at these, we see that they are, in essence, statements of what G!d does. For example, the morning blessing for the body ends with “Blessed are You, Adonai, healer of all flesh and worker of miracles.” This is a statement of who and what G!d is and does, as much as, or more than, it is a request for what we hope will be.

Hope, what does this word really mean? Dictionary.com defines the verb “to hope” as “to look forward to with desire and reasonable confidence,” but also as, “to believe, desire, or trust.” If we take all those closing signatures of blessings as statements of reality, they can give us faith, faith without an indirect object. Not faith IN something or someone, just faith—the sense, the knowledge, the understanding, the trust, that whatever happens, there will still be meaning, we will still be able to find meaning and well being and self-integrity. We will, on some very basic and fundamental level, be OK.

This, I believe, is what it means to have our prayers answered before we pray. Our prayers are not a request for something to happen, but a statement of our faith, and therefore they are answered even before we say them, for if not, we wouldn’t even say them.

What makes it possible for us to have this kind of faith? Lawrence Hoffman in his book The Art of Public Prayer, discusses patterns. The anthropologist Gregory Bateson spoke of “the pattern which connects” and described the patterns upon patterns that are present in the living world, their increasing complexity, and how they all connect. Lawrence Hoffman refers to Bateson’s description of the levels of patterns  He asks us to think of connections between patterns in the universe and, as we compare more and more sets of patterns, how quickly they become so complex that they are beyond the capacity of the human mind to fathom. He suggests that these infinite levels of patterns are not only evidence of order in the universe, but are also a way of seeing a Divine Presence in the universe.

Faith is about connecting all the patterns, and trusting that those we cannot understand really exist. It is about certainty and knowing, combined with humility, something we feel in the pit of our stomach. It is about knowing our smallness in the vast sweeps of space and time that constitute the Universe—and beyond. It is about knowing our importance and the difference we can make in this world when we say YES to the still small voice we hear within us. Faith is about feeling the rightness of that choice in the deepest recesses of our soul.

Faith is about knowing—through the myriad connections between us and all that surrounds and encompasses us—that we are part of, not separate from, all of Creation, the natural world that surrounds us.

Patti Ann Rogers, in her poem “The Family Is All There Is,” begins: “Think of those old, enduring connections found in all flesh–the channeling wires and threads, vacuoles, granules, plasma and pods, purple veins, ascending boles and coral sapwood (sugar- and light-filled), those common ligaments, filaments, fibers and  canals.” She goes on to lyrically express all kinds of connections with the world around us that wouldn’t have come readily to my mind, reminding us that we are very much a part of all that is, and not separate. Faith is about opening our hearts to all these unseen connections and trusting that they—and others exist.

Faith is about embracing the Butterfly Effect, the concept in chaos theory that a small change at one place in a complex system can have large effects elsewhere. It is about believing that there is meaning in our lives and in our existence, and that we have a meaningful impact.

Faith is about the “Supposition” Pattiann Rogers writes about: “Suppose the molecular changes taking place in the mind during the act of praise resulted in an emanation rising into space….Suppose benevolent praise, coming into being by our will, had a separate existence, its purple or azure light gathering in the upper reaches, affecting the aura of morning haze over autumn fields, or causing a perturbation in the mode of an asteroid. What if praise and its emanations were catalysts to the harmonious expansion of the void? Suppose, for the prosperous welfare of the universe, there were an element of need involved.” Faith is about knowing that our own faith has a positive impact on the Universe.

We need to pray, not so that we will get what we pray for, but in order to understand that the answers—the connections—are already present, which is why the answering of our prayers is in the praying. The answers are in the connections, and they are always available for us to see, understand, and accept into our hearts and souls. All we need to do is open our eyes, as Hagar did, our hearts, as the poor man in the Psalm did, and our bodies and minds, and as Isaac did when he walked out into the field, under the open sky, surrounded by G!d’s creatures, where the connections could flow without impediment. For, as Pattiann Rogers tells us: “I’m sure there’s a god in favor of drums…. [and] the heart must be the most pervasive drum of all. Imagine hearing all together every tinny snare of every heartbeat in every jumping mouse and harvest mouse, sagebrush vole and least shrew living across the prairie; and add to that cacophony the individual staccato ticking’s inside all gnatcatchers, kingbirds, kestrels, rock doves, pine warblers crossing, criss-crossing each other in the sky, the sound of their beatings overlapping with the singular hammerings of the hearts of cougar, coyote, weasel, badger, pronghorn, the ponderous bass of the black bear; and on deserts, too, all the knackings, the flutterings inside wart snakes, whiptails, racers and sidewinders, earless lizards, cactus owls; plus the clamors undersea, slow booming in the breasts of beluga and bowhead, uniform rappings in a passing school of cod or bib, the thidderings of bat rays and needlefish.” Faith is in connecting to all these heartbeats, our own, and countless others across space and time.

Faith is knowing that our prayers are answered. Before we speak the words.

Rabbi Katy Z. Allen is the founder and leader of Ma’yan Tikvah - A Wellspring of Hope inWayland, MA, and a staff chaplain at the Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston. She is the co-convener of the Jewish Climate Action Network, a member of the Jewcology.org editorial board, a board member of Shomrei Bereishit: Rabbis and Cantors for the Earth, and the co-creator of Gathering in Grief: The Israel / Gaza Conflict.

We lived with the wild animals once, rather than carving out separate spaces for us and our domesticated fellow travelers. According to the Torah, that is the real truth, and all the owning and property and buying and selling is an illusion. We can return to that truth during Shmita, when we get to root ourselves in a real way in the land – not by owning it by being with it. Not by fencing it but by taking down fences. Not by hoarding but by sharing everything, with all the creatures.

Here are the relevant verses about eating:

In the garden of Eden, “God said: Here, I have given to you all every plant seeding seed which is on the face of all the land and every tree which has in it tree-fruit seeding seed, for you all it will be for eating, and for every wild animal of the land and for every bird of the skies and for every crawler on the land in which there is a living soul (nefesh chayah), every green plant for eating. And it was so.” (Genesis 1:29–30)

In the story of the flood, “God said to Noah: …from all life from all flesh, two from all you will bring unto the ark to keep them alive with you, male and female they will be. From the bird by their species and from the animal by her species from every land crawler by their species, two from all you will bring unto you to make them live. And you, take for you from all the food which is eaten, and gather unto you, and it will be for you and for them for eating.” (Genesis 6:19–21)

And in the laws of the Shmita or Sabbatical year, it says, “YHVH/Adonai spoke unto Moshe in Mt. Sinai, saying: You all will come into the land which I am giving to you, and the land will rest, a Shabbat for YHVH/Adonai…And the shabbat-growth of the land will be for you all for eating: for you and for your male servant and for your female servant and for your hired worker and for your settler living-as-a-stranger with you; and for your animal and for the wild animal which is in your land, all of her produce will be to eat.” (Leviticus 25:6–7)

There is a debate among the the earlier rabbis, about whether the tree fruit in Eden was just for the human beings and the grass for the animals, or whether it was all for all of them. Nachmanides says that humans dined separately, but Rashi says that it truly was one family sharing one food supply. As for the ark, according to the midrash Noah had to create one great store of every kind of food, because each animal needed its own sustenance, and Noah and his family had to spend every hour of the day feeding the animals, since some ate at dawn and some during the day, some at dusk and some at night.

After the flood, in between the ark and Shmita, comes the tragedy of human history. The wars and usurpations, enslavements and empires, the amassing of gold and land by some and the impoverishment of others. And in between the two are also the tragedies of our relationship to the wild animals: not just using but abusing, extinguishing whole species, and losing touch with our own wild selves.

That’s reflected in the flood story: when Noah and family emerge from the ark, they are told that “a terror of you and a dread of you will be over every wild animal of the land and every bird of the skies, everything which crawls the ground and all the fish of the sea, into your hands they are given. All that crawls which lives, for you it will be for eating – like green plants I have given all to you all. Just don’t eat flesh with its soul, its blood.” (Genesis 9:2–3)

This is no blessing but a curse. And it is no dominion: according to one interpretation, the meaning of dominion in Eden was that when Adam would call to the animals, they would come to him. Now it would be the opposite – they will run away in terror. (“Rashi” on B’reishit Rabbah 34:12)

One question for us today, in this year of Shmita, is: how can we get ourselves back to the garden? Back before our fellowship with the animals was lost? That can’t mean turn the hands of the clock back on history. Shmita answers a slightly different question: how do we get back to the garden as grownups, after having eaten from the tree of knowing good and evil? It’s not about feigned or renewed innocence, but rather about knowing our power to destroy, and not exercising that power. It’s about finding fellowship with the land and the other animals. And above all, it is about finding rest – rest from ourselves, and rest with each other, with all the other ones that inhabit the land.

A midrash says that during the twelve months in the ark, Noah “did not taste the taste of sleep, not in the day and not in the night, for he was busy feeding the souls that were with him.” (Tanchuma Kadum Noach 2) Another midrash, says that when God was setting up the world, the earth heard God say, “It’s not good, the human being alone” and she realized this meant that human beings would begin to reproduce. Then the earth “trembled and quaked”, saying, “I do not have in me the strength to feed the flocks of humanity.” God promised the earth to feed humanity at night with sleep, and so share the burden with her. (Pirkei d’Rabi Eliezer ch. 12)

In our society, where almost everyone is racing to keep their jobs or make money or outcompete, we don’t really let ourselves sleep. As a society we never rest. We don’t get enough of this divine food. And it’s not because like Noah we are feeding all the creatures. But here’s what this midrash teaches us: a humanity that never rests is a humanity cut off from the unconscious, cut off from its divine sustenance, and it is a humanity that will destroy the earth.

It is time for us to rest, and to dream, as a whole society: Shmita.

It says in Proverbs 11:30, “The fruit of the righteous is a tree of life, and one who acquires souls is wise.” These souls are the animals, the midrash teaches, and it was because Noah was capable of caring for them that he was worthy of being saved from the flood. (B’reishit Rabbah 30:6) Are we worthy?

It also says in Proverbs 12:10, “A righteous person knows the soul of his animal.” It is time to practice this righteousness. Not just with the other animals, but also with ourselves. How will we know the soul of this animal within us? How will we make peace within, with each other, and with the land? How will we dream our animal dreams again? That is the door Shmita opens for us. That is the ark Shmita builds for us. And I believe that is how we get back to the tree of life in the garden.

Cranberry Shabbat 

Saturday, October 25,  Raindate, November 1

Wachusett Reservoir, Boylston

Join us for our annual Cranberry Shabbat. We will intermix songs and prayers with wild cranberry picking, and share a picnic lunch at the end. Please bring something to share and your own drinks and utensils. (Warm soup sounds good for a picnic in October!) Also bring containers for the cranberries. Most of our pickings will be given to a homeless shelter for their Thanksgiving dinner. There may be muddy spots, so be prepared footwear-wise, and it could be windy and chilly along the water. Please RSVP to Ma’yan Tikvah for details.

contributed by all the organizations and initiatives on “the Map” http://jewcology.org/map-of-initiatives/

Here’s a quick bit of Sukkot Torah to start us off: “The four species of the lulav represent the four types of ecosystems in the land of Israel: desert (date palm), hills (myrtle), river corridors (willow), and sh’feilah, the lowlands (etrog). Each species has to be fresh, with the very tips intact – they can’t be dried out, because they hold the water of last year’s rain. Together, they make a kind of map of last year’s rainfall, and together, we use them to pray for next year’s rains.” I hope everyone enjoys the wonderful array of activities and ideas we are generating. We are a strong and beautiful network. Please add more to this list if you like: write to rebduvid86@gmail.com and I’ll update this page. I will also be updating the format and fixing the fonts — I don’t have time Erev Yom Kippur to do more than simply share this content. Thank you to everyone who shared, and g’mar chatimah tovah! Rabbi David Seidenberg, neohasid.org

Resources

from Judith Belasco, Hazon

http://hazon.org/educational-resources/holidays/sukkot/ Hazon also has an incredible array of resources on Shmita linked at: http://hazon.org/shmita-project/educational-resources/resource-library/

from the Religious Action Center

“Eco-Friendly Sukkot”  http://resources.rj.org/Articles/index.cfm?id=1369

“Table Texts about Food Justice” http://rac.org/pdf/index.cfm?id=23602

from Max Arad and Rabbi Carol Levithan, The Rabbinical Assembly

“The Sukkah as Shelter: A Source Sheet” http://www.rabbinicalassembly.org/sites/default/files/public/jewish-law/holidays/sukkot/sukkah-as-shelter.pdf See also: http://www.rabbinicalassembly.org/jewish-law/holidays/sukkot

 from Jeffrey Cohan, Jewish Vegetarians of North America

“Sukkot, Simchat Torah, and Vegetarianism” http://www.jewishveg.com/schwartz/hlydysu.html

from Rabbi Katy Z. Allen, Ma’yan Tikvah

Ushpizin for an Ecological Sukkot by Laurie Levy https://docs.google.com/file/d/0BzF1ISt_50TyVG9lWE0zOXJpd1k/edit

from Rabbi Arthur Waskow, Shalom Center

14 articles on Sukkot at: https://theshalomcenter.org/treasury/114 including “Reb Zalman’s Prayers for the Earth on Hoshana Rabbah” and “Spread over all of us a Sukkah of shalom, salaam, paz, peace!”   from Rabbi David Seidenberg, neohasid.org “How-to Build a Sukkah For Under $40” http://www.neohasid.org/sukkot/a_simple_sukkah/ more links at: http://neohasid.org/zman/sukkot/ including “Eco-Torah for Sukkot”, “Hoshanot, the Original Jewish Earth Prayers”, and “Egalitarian Ushpizin with a Prayer for the Earth”

 from Canfei Nesharim via Rabbi Yonatan Neril

resources can be found at http://canfeinesharim.org/sukkot/ and on Jewcology http://jewcology.org/resources/sukkot-shemini-atzeret-resource-and-program-bank/

 also from Rabbi Yonatan Neril, for Jewish Ecoseminars

http://www.jewishecoseminars.com/let-the-land-rest-lessons-from-shemita-the-sabbatical-year/

 from Nati Passow, Jewish Farm School

Two resource sheets for Shmita to be posted on Jewcology – look for them on Monday before Sukkot

 from Anna Hanau, Grow and Behold Foods

Recipes (meat): http://growandbeholdblog.wordpress.com/tag/sukkot/

Events

We have three big regional festival events going on, Sukkahfest, Sukkot on the Farm, and Sukkahpalooza, and lots more local events:

 from Judith Belasco, Hazon/Isabella Freedman

Oct 8-Oct 12, Sukkahfest at Isabella Freedman Retreat Center http://hazon.org/calendar/sukkahfest-2014/

 from Pearlstone

Oct 8-Oct 12, Sukkahpalooza http://pearlstonecenter.org/signature-programs/sukkot/

 from Sarai Shapiro, Wilderness Torah

Oct 9-Oct 12, Sukkot on the Farm, Green Oak Creeks Farm, Pescadero CA http://www.wildernesstorah.org/programs/festivals/sukkot/   local events and projects:

from Hazzan Paul A. Buch, Temple Beth Israel, Pomona CA

Our synagogue will break ground during Sukkot on a 1/2 acre urban farm on our property, in cooperation with a local NGO. The farm will be fully managed by the NGO at no cost to us, and all workers are paid a living wage. The produce grown will be available for purchase to our congregation and sold at farmers markets in the area. A portion will be dedicated to those who are food insecure. Question for everyone: Do you know of any other synagogues who have dedicated their land in a similar way?  Please note this is not an urban garden, but a functioning not-for-profit commercial project.

from Becky O’Brien, Boulder Hazon

Oct 6, at 5:30 pm, family sukkot program, in partnership with the south Denver JCC Oct 12, at 4:00 and 7:00 pm, screenings of “Road to Eden”, co-sponsored with the Boulder JCC Oct 16, Sukkot Mishpacha, a program for young families at a local organic farm Rabbi Julian Sinclair stopped in Denver/Boulder on his recent book tour promoting Shabbat Ha’aretz; we hosted five programs with him earlier this month. We are leading a shmita hike for local staff of Jewish organizations to help them decompress from the hectic time of the high holidays. We expect that many shmita-related programs will arise throughout the year but we don’t yet know what they will be.

from Helen Bennet, Moishe Kavod House

Fri Oct 10, Shabbat in the sukkah Tues Oct 14, Sukkot Festival dinner, co-hosted with Ganei Beantown (Leora Mallach). Moishe Kavod is planning to run a series of learning and DIY sessions on shmita starting in November, with focuses on economic justice, food and ag system, and chesed/caring community principles.

 from Gail Wechsler, St. Louis Jewish Environmental Initiative (JEI)

Sun Oct 12, 4-6 PM, screening of the film “Fire Lines”, about joint Israeli and Palestinian fire fighting efforts during the Carmel fire of December 2010. The film includes environmental themes as part of the reason for the fire was overforestation of the affected area. The director, Avi Goldstein, will speak after the film.  In partnership with the Jewish Community Relations Council, Webster University and the JCC.

followed by:

Sun Oct 12, 6-7:30 PM, organic potluck Sukkot dinner. In partnership with the JCC and its Garden of Eden, a community garden that grows organic fruits and vegetables to benefit the clients of the nearby Harvey Kornblum Jewish Food Pantry. Both events at the Jewish Community Center Staenberg Arts & Education Building.

from Michael Rosenzweig, Boulder JCC

We have a great event each year called Sukkot Mishpacha, where we partner with a local farm so the children and families can learn about environmental issues, do fun arts and crafts projects, and pick their own gourds. http://www.boulderjcc.org/events/2249/2014/10/14/boulder-jcc-events-calendar/sukkot-mishpacha/ Note: I have not included narrative detail in general here, but I found Rhonda Ginsberg’s description so delightful to imagine and I just didn’t think I could condense it. So here is what she wrote to me, with some minor editing:

from Rhonda Ginsberg, teacher, Carmel Academy, Greenwich CT

For Sukkot we do a 4 year rotation focusing on different aspects of the holiday.  The first year of the cycle we invite the ushpizin and have the 7 species at a festive meal.  The second year we look at wind with kite flying as a major activity, the third at rain and water, and the last year at stars and shade. Each exploration is done both from the Judaics side with text study and from the science/experiential side. This year we are looking at water.  For the K to 3rd graders, teachers act out the story “Why Does it Rain on Sukkot”, MS. Frizzle (science teacher) comes to teach about rain & why it’s needed, then students rotate through stations that are led by 4th graders and teachers.  At the stations they investigate kosher tops for pipework sukkot, create rain sticks, have various water activities & races, sing songs & learn the dance “Mayyim”.  For the 5th to 8th graders, they start with an appropriate text study.  Then, the 6th through 8th graders become the instructors teaching the other grades about the aspect of water that they researched and created a project for.  6th graders look at the water cycle, which they present through posters, dioramas, etc.  They also perform a song and skit on the water cycle.  7th graders research water pollution – causes, effects, and possible solutions.  8th grade engineering students investigate flooding – causes, effects, how engineers have created solutions.  8th grade honors biology students investigate droughts, concentrating on trouble spots in the Western US, Israel & the Middle East, and Africa.  They also look at causes, effects, & possible solutions.  Then we have a Simchat Beit HaShoava – the biblical Water Libation ceremony which took place during Sukkot in Temple times, with students singing, dancing, juggling, filling pools with golden pitchers, etc.

Outdoor High Holiday Services with Ma’yan Tikvah – A Wellspring of Hope

Rosh HaShanah Day 1, Thursday, September 25, 9:30 AM, Cedar Hill Camp

265 Beaver Street, Waltham, (accessible by MBTA bus)

Click here to carpool to this service.

Rosh HaShanah Potluck Dinner and Shmita Seder, Thursday, September 25, 6:30 PM, Location TBD, in Wayland

Rosh HaShanah Day 2, Friday, September 26, 10 AM, Greenways Conservation Area, 60 Green Way, Wayland

Kol Nidre Service, Friday, October 3, 6:45 PM, Church of the Holy Spirit, 169 Rice Road, Wayland

Click here to carpool to this service.

Yom Kippur Morning, Saturday, October 4, 9:30 AM, Cedar Hill Camp, 265 Beaver Street, Waltham, (accessible by MBTA bus)

Click here to carpool to this service.

Neilah Service and Break-fast, Saturday, October 4, 6:30 PM, Church of the Holy Spirit, 169 Rice Road, Wayland; Break-fast will be at a nearby private home

Ma’yan Tikvah celebrates the High Holidays in the woods with morning services on Rosh HaShanah and Yom Kippur as well as Kol Nidre services on Erev Yom Kippur. The services are led by Rabbi Katy Allen and are a combination of traditional and nontraditional; they are informal and participatory for those who wish to add their voices. Morning services are held outside, or if the weather requires it, under an outdoor pavilion. There is time to sing, to appreciate the natural world around us, to meditate and pray, to read and discuss the Torah portion, to hear the sound of the Sofar on Rosh HaShanah, and to remember our loved ones during Yizkor on Yom Kippur. On the first day of Rosh HaShanah, our services are followed by a pot-luck lunch and then tashlich.

We will have a very different service on the second day of Rosh HaShanah – a hike interspersed with meditations, prayers, discussion, and the blowing of the shofar, and the day will include a picnic lunch – bring your own. We will through the fields and woods and end with a picnic near the Sudbury River.

Our Kol Nidre service is mostly indoors, but if weather permits we go outside for part of the service. We will also have a short Neilah service at the end of Yom Kippur followed by a pot-luck break-fast. All are welcome, including families with children. The sites for the first day of Rosh HaShanah and Yom Kippur are handicap accessible.

For more information or to register, go to www.mayantikvah.org and click on Shabbat, Holidays, and Classes, or call 508-358-5996 or email rabbi@mayantikvah.org.

Yet for many Jews, climate change is still not seen as a “Jewish issue”. Now, to me it seems obvious that the decimation of life on our planet is as fundamentally important to Jews and Judaism as any explicitly Jewish issue. And the possible extent of impoverishment, disaster, and famine that could be brought on by climate change must be a Jewish issue if justice is a Jewish issue, which it surely is. But in case that simple logic doesn’t work for you, let’s be absolutely clear about what the specific Jewish implications might be.

According to a Ben Gurion University study, if we enter an era of what scientists consider extreme climate change – meaning an increase in average global temperature of more than 2 degrees – the Negev desert will expand 200 km northward. That means the desert will stretch far beyond Beersheva, beyond Raanana and Haifa, all the way into Lebanon. Almost all of the sh’feilah – the agriculturally productive lowlands – could be gone. On top of that, Tel Aviv will be under water due to rising sea levels. If that’s not an existential threat to Israel than nothing is.

So if you’re a Zionist or you care about the Jewish people and you think that the issue of climate change is not as important as “energy independence”, you have your values upside down. If you think the natural gas boom caused by fracking is good for Israel, or tar sands oil is good for Israel, then your picture of the world is missing some essential facts. Protecting Israel doesn’t just mean getting off of Arab petroleum, it means getting off of all petroleum. If you’re not advocating for that, you might as well be calling for the destruction of the state.

This week we will be praying for another year of life. We will blow the shofar to recall God’s original act of creation, and to herald the yearly renewal of Creation. This week we will also be ushering in the next Sabbatical year, the Shmita, when debts are canceled, the land is released, and the power that comes from possessing the land is lifted. And yet we still live in a world where mountains, along with all their ecosystems, are torn off in order to tear out coal. We still live in a land where polluted water is not considered too high a price to pay in order to extract oil and gas that will pollute our atmosphere. Where the debt to nature we incur will be paid by future generations, or, to use the Torah’s expression, where “we eat the flesh of our sons and daughters”. (Lev. 26:29)

Let’s make this Rosh Hashanah, and this Shmita, the year when all of that changes. Let’s get our institutions and portfolios to divest from Big Oil. Let’s get our synagogues and communities to stand up for the Earth. Let’s repay our debt to the planet with blessings and gratitude and right actions. Let us listen to the wake up call of the shofar and respond: “Hayom harat olam!” – “today, a new world is conceived!”

Rabbi David Seidenberg is the author of Kabbalah and Ecology: God’s Image in the More-Than-Human World, published by Cambridge University Press, and the creator and director of neohasid.org. An earlier version of this article appeared in the Los Angeles Jewish Journal.

I am in my favorite place at my favorite time: in the garden, in the morning, before the cars have started up, before the noise of lawnmowers and leaf blowers. The crickets are singing, the birds responding. The rising sun’s light filters through the leaves. A beginning.

It has been a tough year in the garden. An endless winter caused a late start and temperatures have been cooler than usual. A call from critter to critter that I cannot hear lets them know there is bounty on my corner. Maybe it’s because the peach tree lost its flowers in a hard spring rain, but squirrels have eaten a fair amount of my produce this year, taking a bit of a turnip and leaving the rest (yeah, I’m not surprised). Mice, too, have traversed here. I have never seen one, but my garden helpers have. Let’s not forget the birds.

At the same time, the blackberries went wild. Literally. I have cut them back and dug up new plants several times. Cucumbers abound. Arugula sings its symphony. The carrots are fat and rich. I could go on. But what hits me this year is the contrast between disappointment and satisfaction; the moments of wondering why I do this at all, pitched against the incredible feeling of gratitude when I bag up 4 bags of produce filled with veggies, fruits and herbs, for our local food pantry. When neighbors come by and tell me they’ve been feasting on the blackberries. Who wouldn’t?

This is the rhythm of the Elul and High Holy Day season, the time when we take stock. How many things did not turn out the way we wanted them to this year? How many grapes did we plant that turned sour? (Most have mine have been chomped on by critters.) What do we do? Do we become depressed or disheartened? Angry? Do we give up? Or do we plant more seeds?

Perhaps we do all of the above. Perhaps we need to feel the grief and disappointment of our losses and our failures. Perhaps we need to feel the frustration. But Elul and the High Holy Day season tell us this is only part of the process. For us to fulfill the essence of this time of year demands that we somehow find a way to get to the other side. Maybe that includes a change of project, or maybe it means finding a new way in the same project.

I sometimes think that it is all the difficulties involved in growing food that inspired our Jewish ancestry to move away from its agricultural roots. This was revived, however, with the kibbutz movement in Israel’s pioneer days, and is experiencing further revival all over the Jewish world today. As we demand more sustainable lifestyles and healthier, more affordable foods, we are revitalizing our synagogue and neighborhood networks to feed ourselves and the hungry around us.

Even as I write this I observe a critter that has found her way into the grapevines. I go over to see the culprit. A squirrel. She takes her time untangling herself from the vines, climbs up the adjacent telephone pole, and when far enough away from me to rest in safety, turns. I see the bulge in her mouth. She takes out her dessert – a nice, fat purple grape, and eats it in front of me.

Not all of our plans will fruit the way we hope or plan. But this is the season to harvest the best of our works this year, and to plan and plant again, for a fuller, richer, more bountiful harvest in the year to come.

May your Elul and the year to come be rich with new ideas and renewed energy to plant and see them bear fruit.

Robin Damsky is the rabbi of West Suburban Temple Har Zion in River Forest, IL, (wsthz.org) where in the temple garden’s first year, congregants donated over 120 pounds of produce to the hungry. Rabbi Damsky educates others while cultivating and donating her own food as well from her organic, edible landscape. She is the mother of Sarah.

My King, where do I quest for comfort and consolation

in times of weariness and aching of my soul?

Where do I seek wisdom when the burden of errors

regrets and sadness accompany my hours?

Where do I cherish and find refuge and sanctity

when I am transparent and exposed to myself?

My Lord, Your streams wash over aching,

Your mountains call to look up to You,

Your grasses and undergrowth cushion the heel and every step,

Your flowers bring joyful response to all inquiry,

Your trees are time worn standing presence ,

all are Your reminders and the presence of Your will.

Your sparks in nature both embedded and revealed

remain always as a reminder of Your presence here,

of our connection, oneness and our journey home.

Elohim, Your earth, all nature is both dwelling place

and shared identity as all that is here speaks of You.

My seeking is ever satisfied as You and I are here,

in creation, naturally, forever one.

Copyright 2014 Judith E. Felsen, Ph.D.

Judith Felsen holds a Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology, certificates in hypnotherapy, NLP, Eriksonian Hypnosis, and Sacred Plant Medicine. She is a dancer of sacred circle dance, an AMC kitchen crew , taril information volunteer, trail adopter, and daily student of Torah and Judaism. She is enrolled in Rabbinical Seminary International. She has studied Buddhism, A Course in Miracles, and other mystical traditions. She is a hiker, walker, runner, and lives in the White Mountains with her husband and two large dogs. Her life centers around her Jewish studies and daily application.

We will be the change we want to see

I am squatting

I am wringing laundry with my hands

I am picking chunks of dirt from the soles of my feet

I am learning to smell the open sewer when I breathe in and out

I am walking

I am jostling in a vikram, in a small car that must have the air conditioning switched to off in order to make it up the Himalayan Mountain where love calls

I am exhausted

I am exhilarated

I am joyful

I am fretting as we weave ourselves up the steep slope and you can see where the cars have already fallen off the cliff

I am terrified when I come upon a mighty pack of horses thrown into the road that barely fits one car—

Let alone the screaming families that want to test their fate on these trails that have seen no rain yet— not me

I am sore

I am flexible

I am sleepless and full of thoughts; I need a vacation from my mind

This landscape that changes when I turn the corner now, the next moment and the moment after that, this landscape is heavy and full and I feel that way—

Pregnant, ready to give birth

To ideas and poems and thoughts and love for those that come to share the same dust and dirt—

For a day, a week or months at a time—

One man who will live like a baba

I have found the nomadic family from which I once sprung

We walked and walked looking for a place to set camp

We the family

The agents of change

Aged and ageless are we

Tireless and tired

Policy makers, activists, farmers, and worker bees

We will be the change we want to see

Andrea Cadwell MA, MSc is a consultant for non- profits and NGO’s worldwide. She focuses on sustainable economic development and resiliency in addition to policy development and implementation.

The weekly Haftorah readings follow the story of the Israelites after they crossed the Jordan into the Promised Land.  The writing styles vary greatly, from poetry to historical prose.

Of particular note are writings from the time of the divided kingdom. Conquests of the Northern Kingdom of Israel and the Southern Kingdom of Judah were seen by the prophets as divine punishment for failure to follow the Torah.  The writings from this time are full of harsh rebukes and biting metaphors. This is the type of reading found in the weeks leading up to Tisha B’Av.

Once Tisha B’Av is over and the High Holidays are approaching,  the tone changes. Both Torah and Haftorah readings become infused with literary beauty – the lyrical prose of Deuteronomy accompanied by the lovely poetry of the late Isaiah, filled with images of nature’s grandeur as a reflection of the divine, beckoning us to look around at the world and the heavens and there find G-d.

This turning away from harshness towards hope and tenderness reflects the history of the period.  Seventy years after the destruction of Solomon’s Temple and exile in Babylonia, the ascendancy of Persia brought a king who allowed the Jews to return to their homeland.  Isaiah’s writings from that time offer consolation and hope for a future of life back in the homeland.

Thus Teshuvah – a return from exile to home, from harshness to spiritual comfort, and, for us, a turning from the concerns of ordinary life to a remembering of the divine – is undertaken in a milieu of beauty which awakens the soul to the process of positive change.

We know that the perception of beauty affects us deeply.  We crave beauty, we seek it out, we spend our precious moments dwelling on that which offers it.  So, for example, the harmonies of violin music are so arresting as to bring tears to our eyes.  A Dutch still life entices us with its intricacies and balance; time stops while we gaze at it. Intense patterns on flowers are gorgeous beyond human imagination. Birds’ plumage dazzles us with striking elaborations.  The music of  synagogue prayers draws us in; we sing and the notes hum inside us. We gaze at colors of a sunset sky; we rush outside to see a rainbow.

We perceive beauty and drink spiritual nectar – tasty, nourishing, filling.  Every single human being is endowed with this faculty, through whatever sense functions within them.

On the physical level, there seems to be no biological utility to this capacity we have for deep appreciation of certain “results” of our five senses. Call it a gift from G-d, a blessing.  But still, nothing in biology is maintained unless it endows the species with something positive to strengthen and perpetuate itself.  The biologic utility of the pleasures of food, sex, etc seems obvious. But what about the pleasures of seeing or hearing beauty in nature or in the artistic creations of humankind?

This pleasure feels like an instinctual form of love, an immediate response on a tiny scale.  Suppose you come across a wild iris in the woods.  The iris is existing happily in its own environment; it doesn’t need you for food or water. You find it beautiful, it pleases you.  You have experienced a quantum of love for this little iris. Now you care about it. A connection has been made.

A piece of music stirs us – how beautiful! It was composed by a human being, played by other human beings. We don’t know them; they may look nothing like us. And yet, some of that sense of beauty, that love we felt for the music spills out onto the humans who created it.  A connection has been made.

Look out over a swath of treetops. The pattern of greens and rounded shapes is so pleasing.  We can’t help but love the trees, plus the whole web of nature that sustains them and relies on them.  A connection has been made.

Our ability to take pleasure from the natural world and from artistic creations of humankind creates threads of connections  between each of us and the myriad elements of nature.

Beauty does have biological utility. It is the antidote to narcissism and loneliness.  It connects us to the web of existence in the world, causes us to care about it, love it, and of course, do everything we can to preserve it.

Genesis was right.  We are stewards of the world.  We are the only species that can preserve it or cause large scale destruction of it.  Look for beauty in the world and there you will find the passion to preserve it.

Lois Rosenthal is a member of Temple Tifereth Israel Winthrop where she teaches Hebrew School, does Bar/Bat Mitzvah tutoring, and participates in Shabbat services.