Congregants and Friends,
Wondering what to do on Friday the 13th? Come to Beth El tonight, December 13 at 7pm.
Also, Shabbat morning services will be tomorrow morning, December 14. We start at 9 am with the Torah service around 10am. Again, we look forward to seeing you all. We would like to thank Bob Halperin in advance for making a very special and delicious cholent, using an old Hungarian recipe from Israel. If you haven’t been to services for a while, stop on by and get your spiritual boost.
Cantor Ben-Moshe’s Weekly message: On Shabbat and Festival eves, parents traditionally bless their sons with words from this week’s parshah, Vayehi-“May God make you like Ephraim and Menashe”. This is taken from the patriarch Ya’akov’s blessing of his grandsons, the sons of Yoseph, predicting that one day all sons in the People of Israel would be blessed in their names. The Sages tell us that Ephraim and Menashe merited this honor, as well as the honor of having tribes named after them, because they were the first brothers in the Torah between whom there was no contention over inheritance. May we indeed all be blessed like these two brothers-may there be no contention or enmity between us, and none among all the House of Israel. Shabbat Shalom.
Rabbi Tarlow’s Weekly Parashah is brought to you by: The Center of Hispanic-Jewish Relations at Texas A&M Hillel
This week, we bring our reading of the book of Genesis to its conclusion. Parashat Vayechi (Genesis 47:28 – 50:24 /and meaning: “and he lived/will live”) acts as a summary of the Joseph stories. In these final tales we learn that Jacob comes to realize that Israel’s fate would not rest in Joseph’s hands but in Judah’s. These final chapters also serve as a summary of the entire book.
This week’s parashah deals with Jacob’s death and Jacob’s refusal to name Joseph as the head of the clan. The political message is carried through Jacob’s final blessings of his (Jacob’s) sons and and grandson’s (Joseph’s sons). We read about the mourning period for Jacob, the reconciliation between Joseph and his brothers, and finally we read about Joseph’s death with the words “Vayachantu oto vayesem ba’aron b’Mitzrayim/they embalmed him (Joseph) and placed him in a coffin in Egypt,”
This pharse raises a number of questions: Is it important because it hints at the true character of Joseph? Does it show the reader that Joseph lived more as an Egyptian than as an Israelite? Is the word “b’Mitzrayim” a mere question of geography or an indication that Jacob knew that Joseph had been lost to Israel (or in reality was never part of Israel)? Was it always Joseph’s intention to live as an Egyptian? Does this phrase a foreshadow the cultural battles that Israel would have in order to maintain its culture in a strange land; a place where it would reside for another four centuries?
Genesis ends as it began with more questions than answers, more doubts than certainties, and with wanderings of the mind and body. From Adam and Eve’s expulsion from Eden through our patriarchs’ and matriarchs’ journeys, to an assimilated Joseph who would die in a foreign land and seems to have striven to be more Egyptian than Israelite, the theme of seeking wisdom to find oneself and to find order in a chaotic world remains a constant leitmotif. This, the first book of Hebrew Scripture teaches us that all actions (or non actions) provoke reactions; that there are desired or not desired consequences to our actions. Is Genesis warning us about seeking chance without a plan?
In Genesis to be alive is not to be to be comfortable. Rather this book teaches us that to live is to struggle and grow. Genesis is a realistic book, it does not deny death nor does it portray any of its characters as models of perfection or as gods. The characters in Genesis are human. We see that they are flawed, fail and begin again. These were people who had flaws and learned to overcome these flaws or suffer the consequences.
Genesis argues that creation and creativity come from the depths of “tohu va’vohu” (total chaos): both within us and within the physical world. The book suggests that one way to understand the force that is G’d is by understanding G’d to be “the reverse of entropy.” Genesis hypothesizes that G’d is the force in the universe that makes sense of a world designed in a stochastic fashion. In a like manner, we who are created in the Divine image (shadow) must find a way to bring order to the chaos in our lives; to our own private universes.
This book then is a realistic book open to a myriad of interpretations. Is it teaching us that to live creatively we must first realize that we will never have everything? Is this book’s message that we are but fragmented streams of creativity flowing into oceans of eternity? Would do you think?
Community News: The Austin Jewish Business Network (AJBN) is hosting a Winter Happy Hour next Tuesday at Blackfinn Ameripub in the Domain. Attached is a link to the Meetup Group as well as a Press Release with all the details.http://www.meetup.com/Austin-Jewish-Business-Network/
Austin Chapter of Hadassah
Installation of Board Officers for 2014- Join us at the home of Paz Goldberg on Sunday, December 15 at 10:00 a.m. as we install our future leaders for the upcoming year. Contact Rachel O’brien for rsvp and directions: rkr888_2000@yahoo.com / 512.775.8585 Please join us–Friday Brunch Bunch meets the 3rd Friday of each month. Time: 10:00 am – 12 noon
