My congregation, Ramat Shalom, was founded 46 years ago as a Reconstructionist synagogue. Lots of people are unfamiliar with the Reconstructionist Movement, the theology it embraces and the fact that it falls somewhere between the Reform and Conservative movements. This being said, most everyone knows what a bat mitzvah is. And the bat mitzvah is a product of Reconstructionism. This month, the bat mitzvah turns 100! Most of us consider a bat mitzvah a mainstream Jewish ritual. But, 100 years ago, it was radical, an innovative process developed by Rabbi Mordechai Kaplan whose beliefs lie at the foundation of Reconstructionism. Not just because of the bat mitzvah, Rabbi Kaplan was a pioneer, a boundary pusher, an innovator. Some would say he was a troublemaker – even a heretic. Kaplan was actually excommunicated by the Union of Orthodox Rabbis. Wanting to empower his daughter, Judith, Rabbi Kaplan created the bat mitzvah. As a…
Rabbi Andrew Jacobs and Cantor Debbie Hafetz As your spiritual leaders and as spiritual leaders in the State of Florida, we want to make it explicitly clear that…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kke4gdRV-nk Transcript of video:Good health to you, united country!I did not accidentally say “united.”The seventh day of this terrible war beganA war we feel the same way.We were…
My great-great-grandfather, Shmuel Landesman z”l (pictured above), is buried in Lviv, Ukraine. Records indicate that he died in 1894. Yesterday, for the first time since WWII, air raid…
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Whoopi_Goldberg_by_David_Shankbone_(3026904000).jpgDavid Shankbone from USA, CC BY 2.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0, via Wikimedia Commons On Monday, Whoopi Goldberg, one of the hosts of ABC’s “The View,” was suspended for two weeks…
Yesterday, as the world marked International Holocaust Remembrance Day, we heard the reminders we all know too well: “Remember!” and “Never Again!” The Jewish community knows all too…
Last week, scientists at the University of South Florida’s Genomics program and the Center for Global Health and Infectious Disease Research shared a study that documents how the DNA of…
In honor of Shabbat Shirah and Dr. Martin Luther King’s birthday, I have put together the video above. This Shabbat, Shabbat Shirah (Shabbat of Song), we read Mi…
The Talmud says: “Teach your tongue to say: I do not know. If you don’t, you will become entangled in a web of deceit.” (Berakhot 4a) At the foundation of…
Last Friday, I got to witness something so beautiful. We had grandparent’s Shabbat in our Early Childhood Center. As I looked out at the children, who were so…
There are a reported 15,166,200 Jews on the face of the earth. While this might seem like an impressive number, we all know that we Jews make up a tiny…