Services, and Services, and Services, Oh My!

I am LONG overdue for an update. Majorly. So much has happened lately, and there is so much that I could talk about, but since this is a cantorial school blog, I mostly want to focus on some of the prayer experiences I've had. This will be long, but I promise it will be interesting.

But first, let's talk about my Biblical History class. This class is part lecture and part site seeing. I don't know if that's the correct description, but we go on field trips to some of the sites we've talked about, so I guess that's the best description I can come up with. These trips have mostly consisted of my sweating half my body weight, but there have been some cool things too. We got to see the city of David. I did bring my camera, but I found that the coolest things there happened to be things that you can't really take pictures of. Example: Hezekiah's tunnel. This tunnel was allegedly built by King Hezekiah as a water supply during the rebellion against Syria. It is no longer used for this purpose, which is good, because I bet hundreds of tourists walk through it every day. It's pretty narrow and has low ceilings. Even I had to bend down at one point. There was one point where we were told to turn off our flashlights and be silent. Awesomeness. On another one of these trips, we went to see a bunch of caves. Some of them used to be cisterns. In one of them, we all went inside and sat on the floor. The acoustics were so good that someone started singing the beginning part of "Circle of Life." Followed by a lovely rendition of Ozi V'zimrat Yah. Then, we got to go into burial caves. This is what I look like as a zombie:

But I digress. Two weeks ago, twelve of us went to this moshava (I guess that's Hebrew for town) about forty-five minutes outside Jerusalem to spend Shabbat, or at least the Friday night part of it. We started out by taking a tour of the moshava. It was really interesting. Gedera was settled in the late 19th century by this group called Biluim, people who wanted to settle the land of Israel. There are actually still remnants of the first farm in the town. Even though it was one of the first moshavot, it is still very small. They are in the process of redeveloping the main street to make it more chic. Many people there know each other. They have a community garden, which was gorgeous. There is also a group of Ethiopian Jews who live there, but they have their own neighborhood. The congregation that we went to is a small Reform congregation called Kehillat Yuval that meets in a local elementary school. It was started by a woman who had spent some time in the US and decided that she wanted to be a part of a Reform community in Israel, so she found other families in Gedera who felt the same way, and voila. The rabbi, Myra Hovev, was ordained at HUC in Jerusalem, and she has done a wonderful job of helping this community grow. The service itself was lovely. They have a songleader, and Rabbi Hovev also plays the flute. The focus is mainly on Kabbalat Shabbat and not on Ma'ariv because that is the culture of the community. So, they skipped things like the Barchu and the Amidah because that is what works for their community. The kids got to participate a lot, which is great because the community is basically all families with young children. Two of my friends, Chase and Dan, and I got to play guitar, and we even taught a melody for Oseh Shalom that they didn't know previously, and now the rabbi wants to use it! After services, we went to our respective host families' houses for dinner. I went with Dan and my other friend Leslee to the house of a wonderful couple with a fourteen year old daughter, a ten year old son, and a six year old daughter. The six year old is going into first grade, but she already reads at a second grade level. She even to us from a book of jokes. The son was very nice and friended us on Facebook. The oldest daughter was very sweet, and definitely your typical teenager, complete with magazine posters on the wall. She was telling us all about her favorite music. The food was delicious and included homemade tahini. Yum!!! The best part was that I got to use my Hebrew, and they corrected me when I needed it. I understand Hebrew very, very well, but sometimes when I speak I think way too much and it messes me up, so it is nice to have people who are willing to help me out and won't just start talking to me in English the second I make a mistake. It was a lovely evening and I wish I could have spent the entire Shabbat there. I will have to go back at some point.

Last Saturday morning, I went to the Great Synagogue. You may be asking, "Sara, was it great?" Yes, yes it was. The Great Synagogue definitely lived up to its name. It was also a really interesting experience. If you go to a traditional Orthodox synagogue, the entire first part of the service is led by a lay person. That part was really hard for me to follow. It might have been easier if I was sitting on the bottom floor with the men, but in all honestly, being on the balcony wasn't nearly as bad as I expected it to be. Once they got to a prayer called Shochein Ad, the hazzan (cantor), Hazzan Chaim Adler took over. He led the service with the choir. The synagogue does have a rabbi, but he did not lead the service, and I get the sense that he is mainly responsible for learning and programatic things. The chazzanut was hands down the best chazzanut I have ever heard in my entire life. I wasn't really familiar with most of the melodies that were used, with the exception of the Torah service, so I mostly just listened and followed along in the siddur, which was nice. I like to participate while at services, but sometimes its nice to do that in a more passive manner. It was a really wonderful service, and even though it was so huge, I felt that there was a sense of community there. I am going to have to go back there, definitely on S'lichot if not sooner. After the service, I struck up a conversation with the Rebbetzin (rabbi's wife) and managed to get myself invited over for Shabbat lunch. This was even after I told her I was an HUC student, which I for some reason felt comfortable doing, probably because she's American. It's really interesting how in America the majority of Jews, no matter how they observe Judaism, accept that there are many different ways to observe Judaism, while in Israel there are actually groups of people who think that the way I observe Judaism, including the part about studying to become a cantor, is hilul HaShem (an act profaning G-d). So, when I encounter Orthodox Jews in Israel, I will usually try to gage things before I tell them what I am doing here. Anyway, the lunch was HUGE and very tasty. It's a good thing I don't eat meat because if I had tried to stuff one more thing into my body, I would have been like that guy on Monty Python's "The Meaning of Life." Also invited to lunch were a group of Modern Orthodox 20 and 30-somethings from New York and their Rabbi. They were from this community called Manhattan Jewish Experience, which sounded really cool and like something I might like to check out once I'm in NYC. There was also a young recently married couple, an older couple of which the husband is a well known and talented artist, and another woman. The Rabbi required us to go around the table and say who we are, where we come from, and what we're doing in Israel. And then people asked questions. It was really interesting hearing everyone's stories. Again, no one had a problem with the fact that I am an HUC student. And, again, almost everyone there was American. We also talked a bit about the Torah portion, which was cool. It took me way too long to write this post, so I don't remember what was said, but I do remember that it was really interesting.

This post is getting long, so here is a picture of some waves crashing on the shores of Tel Aviv:

On Sunday morning, I went to Women of the Wall again for Rosh Chodesh Elul. Just as the last time, it was awesome. However, this time, four people got arrested. They didn't actually do anything to disturb anyone; they were simply wearing black and white talitot. They weren't even wearing them like you would wear a talit; they were wearing them more like scarves. So, they shouldn't have gotten arrested, but they did. Since my talit is colorful and feminine, it does not count as a talit as far as the police were concerned, so I did not get arrested. What's really interesting is that the only people their talitot seemed to bother were the police officers. Seriously, I know it's technically a law, but don't the police have anything better to do than to arrest people for wearing talitot? Shouldn't they be out arresting thieves, murderers, and other violent people? If I were an Israeli police officer, I do not think that I could, in good conscience, arrest someone for doing something that causes no harm. Anyway, we ended up doing the Torah service in front of the jail. One of my classmates got an aliyah. It was all a very meaningful experience. It sort of made me realize why I am here. While I know that I cannot change an entire culture in one year, I do think that I can at least do my part to stand up for what I can believe. I care a lot about Israel, but in order for it to survive and not implode, there needs to be more religious tolerance among Jews. As I stated in a previous post, there is no halacha against a woman wearing a tailt; it just makes a small vocal minority uncomfortable, so it became the law. This all made me a few minutes late for ulpan, but my teacher was totally cool with it, and there is no other way that I would have rather spent my morning. Oh, and we all got to blow the shofar at the end because it was Rosh Chodesh Elul, which is the month before Rosh Hashanah. For the first time in my life, I was able to get a sound from a small shofar. Going to keep practicing. . .

This evening, I went to Shabbat services at Shira Hadasha, a feminist Orthodox congregation. I don't know that I would call it egalitarian, as there is still a mechitza (separation between men and woman), but it is as egalitarian as you can get within the framework of halacha. Let it be known that I have absolutely no problem praying in an Orthodox community with a mechitza, I just very much like to feel like I can participate. I have been to services with a mechitza where the women do participate, and I have also been to services where they don't. In this one, not only are the women allowed to sing, they get to lead part of the service. On Friday nights, the women lead Kabbalat Shabbat (psalms and poems to welcome Shabbat) and the men read Ma'ariv (evening service). The amud (podium) where they lead from is in the middle of the mechitza, so both sides are able to participate equally. Kabbalat Shabbat was a lot of Carlebach melodies, so I was able to sing along. It was quite spirited and enjoyable. Ma'ariv was led by the men and was a little bit less sing-y and more daven-y, but it was still also enjoyable. I had a moment where I realized that as long as I know the liturgy and the nusach (which in this case, I did), I can pretty much walk into any Ashkenazi synagogue and participate. It was nice. I will go back at some point. I want to go to a Shabbat morning service. . . the women there get to chant Torah!

Whew! That's all for now. Signing off!