Now that the weekend with Rabbi Hoffman is over, what do think? Which of the ideas that Rabbi Hoffman talked about resonated most with you? How specifically might our congregation and what we do change in response to those ideas?
Now that the weekend with Rabbi Hoffman is over, what do think? Which of the ideas that Rabbi Hoffman talked about resonated most with you? How specifically might our congregation and what we do change in response to those ideas?
We attended all three of the public sessions, and found that Rabbi Hoffman easily lived up to the very high expectations set by Rabbi Jaffe. He is a wonderful communicator, but more importantly he has thought deeply about the issues on which he lectures, and has developed many thought-provoking insights.
I asked a question on Saturday, and was promised an answer within the context of the talk on Sunday. I don’t think a full answer was forthcoming.
My question, roughly: Accepting his premise that ethnicity as the basis for our Reform Judaism is dead, and that as rational people we approach Jewish conceptions of God and Bible stories as “truth” rather than fact, why practice Judaism, an inconvenient minority religion, as the platform for our search for meaning when there are – according to Rabbi Hoffman – other valid alternatives available?
Rabbi Hoffman made the case, I think, that Judaism is sufficient, but not that it is necessary. He observed, for example, that each of our holidays expresses a different aspect of our search for meaning: RH-YK for facing ourselves; Pesach for community; Sukkot for gratitude, and so forth. True, but then there’s Easter, Christmas, Thanksgiving, etc. meeting those same needs, and probably more equivalents in Islam and Hinduism. If it’s all about the search for meaning now, the Buddhists have a big head start.
As a devotee of science I must conclude that the Exodus didn’t happen; the archeological and historical record that should support it isn’t there. I can still celebrate it sincerely at Passover, because the message of the Exodus is important. But then why not (instead or also) celebrate the rising of Jesus from the grave a few days later, which I also don’t believe happened, but which also carries a profound message?
On Friday Rabbi Hoffman said that the sound of our prayers in Hebrew is more important than their meaning, implying that English translations may be a bad idea because they expose us to the actual content, with which we probably don’t agree. This is one answer to objections to prayers of praise and supplication that seem out of touch with our modern understanding of God, but what do we do? Switch to meaningless mantras? Speak in tongues? Does actually learning Hebrew instead of sounding it out undermine our faith?
Rabbi Hoffman ended with a rousing call to join the revolution, but I didn’t hear him say what that entails. Perhaps he believes it’s enough to point out that our current institutions aren’t meeting our needs, but that leaves a big hole. Do we fill it by appealing to taste – being Burger King to Christianity’s McDonalds – or by drawing a genuine distinction between Reform Judaism and other liberal faiths? If the latter, how do we do it without fundamentalist appeals to the supernatural, or by resorting to the vanishing allure of stuffed derma?
All that said, I must repeat that it was a joy to be exposed to this great thinker of our Movement. We’ve signed up for more: He’s going to be in conversation with Blu Greenberg and Diana Eck at the Newton JCC on November 19th:
http://www.bostonjcc.org/CalendarDetails.aspx?EventID=4468
The weekend with Rabbi Hoffman was a stimulating and valuable experience. I assume that most well educated, enlightened, assimilated people such as members of our conversation rarely wrestle extensively with the concept of “God”. In response to the simplistic question, “Do you believe in God?” many Jews may respond “Not if God is the type of personal God described in our prayer book.” Many view organized Judaism as limited to the historic conception of a personal God of the type frequently described in the prayer book and do not buy into this conception. As Rabbi Hoffman discussed, for many Jews the more you know the meaning of prayers, the more alienated you may feel. One may choose to avoid attending services if one considers it hypocritical to spout the words of the prayers. Those whose attendance is limited to the high holidays may have these feelings of alienation reinforced because of the portrayal of God in those services.
One useful outgrowth of the weekend might be to promote within our “conversation” about Judaism a broad range of valid definitions of God, beyond the troubling traditional characterizations. These might include ideas from Einstein, Spinoza, Mordechai Kaplan and other Jewish scholars and thinkers. If presented with an extensive “menu” of definitions of God, some who are troubled by their concept of the “accepted” definition might be able to respond “Yes, I can believe in that kind of God” and feel greater comfort with organized religion. Perhaps one project for the Temple leadership and the committee working with the ideas of Rabbi Hoffman could be to develop and publish a broad “menu” of acceptable definitions of God for the benefit of our congregation.
We began this year in Sisterhood asking ourselves how we will assess our programs and experiences in Sisterhood. As the programming year begins every year at Temple, we follow the cycle through holidays, events, and meetings taking little time to reflect on why we do what we do or if we are doing it well. Rabbi Hoffman spoke to Sisterhood’s initial work on reflection.
When we asked this question at our first Sisterhood meeting, I expected people to want to measure success via attendance, Jewish content, meaningful teaching, drawing women of different ages and life stages…. and while these criteria are important, the overwhelming and critical question that came up was ARE WE WELCOMING EVERYONE.
After listening to Rabbi Hoffman, I will expand this question by asking ARE WE INCLUDING EVERYONE IN THE CONVERSATION. When someone walks into a meeting, a program, a service – are they greeted, do we know their name, have we asked about him/her and the family, have we connected the person to someone in the room.
This is practical stuff – this is person to person – this is connection and conversation. I want to address a practical aspect in our lives at Temple Isaiah keeping the practical in mind. That is our Friday Night Shabbat Service Oneg. I have worked and served as a helper, a Oneg coordinator, and an Oneg Adminstrator. This is a thankless and difficult job. Everyone should stop and thank Ceci Warsawski every time you see her.
The coordinator calls people who have received a letter – no one calls back, few show up. Some B’nai Mitzvah families bring cookies for a Friday night oneg who have never been to a Shabbat service. We are missing connection with the parents of our school children. We are missing a sense of responsibility to the congregation. We are burdening few with a task that needs everyone. What is also missing is a meaningful conversation – Do we need to have onegs? Do we need cookies? Should we pay someone to do this for us? Do our congregants have responsibilities after they pay their dues? Are families with school age children the right ones to ask to provide cookies for us? As a child prepares to become a b’nai mitzvah, do his/her parents also have a responsibility to prepare and if so, for what? What can we do for parents to make this time one of connection and conversation? Can we make life a bit easier for people?
This entire oneg conversation may seem out of place in this discussion but IT IS a discussion about how to assess and address a practical issue through the lens of creating community, creating conversations, our responsibilities to each other.
I am hoping that our time with Rabbi Hoffman will spark discussion about our mission, our criteria for reflection and assessment, and practical steps to make every family feel welcomed.
I would love to read comments from people, especially parents, about how they are feeling about their connection at Temple at this incredibly busy time in their lives. Do they feel welcomed, or burdened, or included, maybe all or nothing. If anyone is interested in connected through cookies – a metaphor about contributing to, serving, and participating in a Shabbat experience, let me know and I can help you make that connection.