Midway Jewish Center
57 Years Going Strong: 1953-2010 !
THE CYBERSHUL

330 South Oyster Bay Road
Syosset, NY 11791
www.mjc.org
cyber shul archives

This CyberShul has been dedicated by:

Shabbat	hagaDOL—The Great Shabbat—the Shabbat before Pesah is always known as Shabbat HagaDOL or The Great Shabbat. Its greatness was probably related to the length of the rabbi’s sermon which understandably covered the many details of kashering one’s home for the upcoming holiday. Every Shabbat is great, but the one before Pesah anticipates a holiday that has great potential for impacting positively on our identity as Jews. In reflecting on Pesah this Shabbat, we will make this Shabbat a truly great one!
Parashah	Tzav
Secular Date	Match 27, 2010
Jewish Date	12 Nisan 5770
Shabbat Begins	6:54pm
Shabbat Ends	7:56pm
MJCyber Shul Minyan	14021
Last Week’s Minyan	1418
Upcoming Observance	Pesah begins the evening of Monday, March 29, 2010. We remember our enslavement in Egypt and how we were redeemed from oppression by a God who loves us and His gutsy prophet Moshe. The seder is a feast of freedom, a dinner that primarily feeds our hunger for understanding this complicated world, but generally there’s a lot to eat as well. We ask a minimum of four questions for only a free people question. And ultimately we sing Had Gadya, and look forward a world that is free of all sorrow.

TORAH READING

Tzav

TZAV means “command” and refers to Moses commanding Aaron and his sons about various sacrificial procedures. The toRAH or rituals surrounding the proper enactment of the burnt, grain, sin, and guilt offerings are reviewed as well as those for the shelaMIM, the sacrifice of well-being. We learn the extent to which many of the sacrifices were eaten by the priests or the donors, with a relatively small portion burnt entirely upon the altar. The fire upon the mizBEiah burnt 24 hours a day. Those who partake of the sacrificial flesh must themselves be spiritually pure, though specific kinds of fat and blood are prohibited. Moses then washes Aaron and his sons, he dresses Aaron in the garments of the High Priest, and he takes the anointing SHEmen (oil) and sprinkles it upon the mizBEiah seven times and on other items in the mishKAN. He sacrifices a bull as a sin offering, a ram as a burnt offering, and another ram as an ordination offering. The priests stayed in the mishKAN for seven days—that’s some ordination ceremony! 

A SHABBAT THOUGHT

None are so empty as those
who are full of themselves

~~ Benjamin Whichcote ~~

WEB OF THE WEEK

A little music, Maestro, to teach the seven symbols of Pesah…

AURAL TORAH

Good Choice Judaism— A Liberation Movement  

Just click on the picture on the left hear this week’s Aural Torah!

EACH WEEK, THE AURAL TORAH WILL APPEAR IN A NEW BLOG CALLED

WRITINGS-OF-THE-RARA

(thanks to the Kolodny’s for their clever crafting)

just paste this url into your browser and leave your comments— http://writingsoftherara.blogspot.com/

The Most Creative Minds in America Read the MJCyberShul

Hmmmm… Maybe I would have faired better had I laid off the Egyptian Times and just read the CyberShul…?

Pharaoh comes to an alarming conclusion— Holy Moses!!

Honor or Memorialize Loved Ones for a New Lower Price

THIS IS THE CYBERSHUL ECONOMIC STIMULUS PLAN!!

For a Few Dollars You can Touch Someone in a Beautiful Way
A CyberShul Dedication—Only:

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Midway Jewish Center
330 South Oyster Bay Road
Syosset, NY 11791

ATONING FOR A DROPPED TORAH

On Monday, March 22, close to 100 people filled our sanctuary for a special service designed to atone for the mishap of a Torah that toppled off a chair onto the bimah floor, on Shabbat haHodesh (March 13). Whether one witnessed the Torah fall or merely heard the thud of impact, it was an upsetting experience and we all felt the need to respond in some tangible way, to say as a community that the Torah remains as sacred and special to us as ever.

This is how we responded, and I believe the statistics are incomplete as not everyone contacted us with their intentions:

Full Fasters (no food or water for the duration of the day): 56
Partial Fasters (no food but water, coffee would be ok): 41
Symbolic Fasters (giving up a certain food for the day): 32
Good Deed Doers: 62
Tzedakkah Collection for Torah Fund: $216
Tzedakkah Collection for Hatzilu: $128

Somehow this startling and upsetting mishap brought our community together in a very positive way. Everyone was talking about the dropped Torah and everyone was exchanging views as to whether they would be part of the atonement rituals. At the service, we recited Avinu Malkeinu, a prayer you might recognize from Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, but one recited on fast days in which we ask God to remember us for good and to forgive us of our sins. We studied Torah as a sign of our firm commitment to the principles of Torah. We prayed and we removed the Torah from the ark to allow everyone an opportunity to give it a kiss. A kiss, after all, is what we give a sacred book after it falls to the ground, and a kiss is a beautiful way to make up. We concluded with a break fast in the ballroom—wraps for everyone.

Monday was a good day. We made up with the Torah and on top of all that, we are now going to honor someone with the task of holding the Torah when it is not in use. After all, the Torah is “a tree of life to all who hold fast to it,” and from now on, we are all going to hold onto it a little faster.

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GOTTA QUESTION?
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SEND YOUR QUESTIONS TO rafirank@mjc.org
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DEAR CYBERAV… I’VE GOTTA QUESTION

BEG ME FOR A BABY

Dear Cyber Rav,

I was bothered when I found this in a site I was reading about Prayer. The Gemara (Yevamot 64a) says, "The Matriarchs were barren only because God desired their prayers." Sometimes God may send us troubles because He desires to hear our voice, “[f]or your voice is sweet, and your appearance lovely" (Shir Ha-Shirim 2:14).

I read the passage and found its concepts very troubling -- how could one pray to a God that demands prayer to such an extent as to send troubles in order to induce prayer? I would like to hear your take on this passage. Thank you.

Reeling from the Idea That God Extorts Prayer

CYBER RAV ANSWERS

Dear Reeling,

That's an interesting section of Gemara. A couple of reactions--

The quotation as you have it is almost accurate, though it seems as if the Gemara speaks not only of the matriarchs, but the patriarchs as well. In any event, the sentiment, as expressed by Rabi Yitzhak, is one that I disagree with. More specifically, I do not believe that God makes people barren in order to move them to prayer, and I do not believe that the heart-wrenching prayers of the barren are prayers that God craves, as if it were some delicious chocolate desert on which He is hooked. The theology here, in my opinion, is wrong and I would never espouse it or promote it.

What I might counsel people who sadly find themselves faced with infertility is that nature is woefully imperfect and that they are permitted to challenge the status quo by seeking the best medical treatment possible. I would further advise them that this is not only their God-given right, but this is precisely what God wants them to do. Should they, in addition, pray to God? Absolutely. In prayer, they will find hope, and in hope, they will find some solution. It may not be the solution they originally hoped for, but it will nevertheless be some resolution to this predicament of which God takes no pleasure.

Having said all this, one might ask whether my rejection of Rabi Yitzhak's words in Yevamot 64a point to heresy on my part, or in some other way a brutal rejection of Jewish law or lore. To that I would reply--of course not. To the contrary, I am delighted to have read and studied Rabi Yitzhak's words, and am grateful that they have found a place in our sacred scriptures. He was struggling with a deep question which was how could the righteous of the Bible be so punished as to live with the pain of infertility? And in asking that question, he touched the hearts and souls of many a Jew who in spite of their pious ways, also faced the pain of infertility. And so Rabi Yitzhak arrived at an answer, albeit his own, but nevertheless ingenious, that the infertility itself was only a machination to inspire the prayers of the righteous and in this way bless them with deeper and richer rewards. Let's say that you don't like that answer. That's understandable. But you are not everybody, and someone out there just might have taken deep comfort in Rabi Yitzhak's words. Rabi Yitzhak found a way of saying--"Yes, you are barren, but you are special, you are righteous and God, far from abandoning you, is trying to draw you even closer." Someone must have taken great comfort in this approach.

But not you. And not me. Nor are we beholden to his perspective. He has expressed an opinion and the Talmud does not discriminate. It brings us the answers of the Sages, whether we like those answers or not. If Rabi Yitzhak were alive today, you would not go to his shul and you might take issue with his sermons. Perhaps I would as well, but his viewpoint, however wayward it may be, has nevertheless found a home in the Talmud, because his was a voice within the Jewish community and we welcome all those voices to join in the study of Torah.

My two cents-- Be well.

Rabbi Rafi Rank
CyberRav

Shabbat Shalom and Hag Same'ah Everyone!!

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