Rabbi's Ramblings...... 

 

Shalom Congregants and Friends.....    

 

With Rosh Hashanah falling Wednesday night this coming week, I am making this e-shul a combined issue. We will have low-key services this Shabbat... and then I look forward to seeing you all (unless you are somewhere else) on Rosh Hashanah!

 

The High Holy Day season beging with Selichot service on the Saturday evening before Rosh Hashanah. This year, the combined service from Beth El, Emanuel, B'nai Tikvoh Sholom and Beth Hillel will be at B'nai Tikvoh Sholom. Start gathering between 8 and 8:30; services will be approximately 10pm, following an engaging program, "Jewish Selected Shorts."

 

Sincere thanks in advance to our office and custodial staff for the extra "push" in getting ready for the Holy Days, as well as to officers and mrmbers of the Ritual and House Committees who also gave lots of time in getting things prepared.

 

Although they are a couple weeks away, put on your calendars that we will have a special pizza-party evening decorating our sukkah Monday evening, October 3. A flyer will be inckluded in the October Hai-lites, but here's the date now!,. On the first evening of Sukkot, October 12, there will be as special oneg Yom Tov in our congregational sukkah.  (Rabbi Philip and Ruth Lazowski are not having their open sukkah this year.)

 

Israel is very much in the news this week, with a lot of nergotiations and political back and forth at the United Nations and Washington. There are emails and petitions as well as various pundits sharing their points of view. I trust that everyone shares a deep concern for the future of Israel, but there can be strong divisions of opinion as to what the appropriate path should be. I urge you to support your feelings in whatever ways you feel appropriate. Pick up an America-Israel solidarity pin at services! I plan, at this time, that one of my sermons on Yom Kippur will deal with my thoughts on the situation in Israel.

 

A complete calendar listing of High Holy Days services is listed below. Speaking of calendars, we received a donation of a box of them from Big-Y. If you need a 5772 Jewish calendar just stop by the synagogue.

 

On the afternoon of October 4 I am going down to New Haven, joining other JWV members -- a memorial for Jewish chaplains "Killed in Action" is being dedicated at Arlington on October 24, and the plaque is traveling around the country. This is a part of my personal life-history, and I am glad it is finally taking place! The ceremony is a public one at the JCC in Woodbridge... ask me or any Post member for info!

 

Fall formally starts this Friday, early the morning of September 23. The holidays may be later than usual, but they'e close now! All congregants should be receiving a card from Iris and myself, but let me say again, "Shana tova u'm'tuka.... May you have a good and sweet year!"

   

Shabbat Shalom ....... Rabbi Gary and Iris Atkins

 
"All it takes to study Torah is an open heart,

a curious mind and a desire to grow a Jewish soul."  

Shabbat / Rosh Hashanah  Services & Candle Lighting Times
CANDLE LIGHTING     
Friday, Sept. 23, 6:27pm  
Wednesday, Sept. 26, 6:18pm 
Friday, Sept. 30, NLT 6:15pm 

 


SHABBAT SERVICE TIMES    

Friday, Sept. 23,8:00pm 

Saturday, Sept. 24, 9:30am, 6:00pm Mincha/ Maariv

 

Friday, Sept. 30,6:00pm  -- EARLY SERVICE!

Saturday, Oct. 1, 9:30am, 6:15pm Mincha/ Maariv

 

                                       EREV ROSH HASHANAH

Wed, Sept. 28

- Mincha, Ma'ariv, 6:00 P.M.

 

                                   FIRST DAY ROSH HASHANAH

Thursday, Sept. 29

- Services Start 8:30 A.M.

- Services Conclude 1:30 PM - Approximately

- Tashlich 6:00 P.M.REMEMBER! By the stream corner of Wintonbury & Skinner

- Mincha, Ma'ariv, 6:30 P.M.

 

                                SECOND DAY ROSH HASHANAH

Friday, Sept. 30

- Services Start 8:30A.M.

- Services Conclude 1:15PM - Approximately

- Mincha, Ma'ariv 6:00 P.M. (leading into Shabbat)

 

CEMETERY VISITATION

Sunday, Oct. 2

- Beth Hillel Cemetery - 12Noon

- Other cemeteries by personal arrangement

 

                                                  YOM KIPPUR

Friday, Oct. 7

- Services/ Kol Nidre, 6:00 P.M. (CLT is 6:04)

- Services over approximately 8:30PM

Saturday, Oct. 8

- Services Start 8:30A.M. - over Approximately 2:00PM

- Afternoon Break

- Mincha, 4:15PM,

- Neilah, 5:30P.M., Standing before the Aron Kodesh

- Maariv, SOUNDING OF THE SHOFAR, 7:00 P.M. (Approximately)

 

Bring A Shofar - Participate in our Group Tekiah Gedolah after services

9/11 Proclamation by Syd Schulman,

Mayor of Bloomfield  

 

 

WHEREAS on Tuesday, September 11, 2001, America was shattered by cowardly terrorists attacks that killed nearly 3,000 innocent people; and

 

WHEREAS, those terrorists attempted to disrupt, destroy, and forever change our democratic form of government and our way of life; and

 

WHEREAS, the events of that day instantly transformed nearly everyone's lives, some through personal loss, and many others through an unfamiliar sense of individual and national vulnerability; and

 

WHEREAS, an unprecedented, historic bonding of Americans rose from the collective shock, unifying the country in an outpouring of national spirit, pride, selflessness, generosity, courage and service; and

 

WHEREAS, the American spirit of perseverance and the American values of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness will triumph over the hatred and evil that prompted this attack; and

 

WHEREAS, we have withstood pain and loss, but also have grown and nurtured each other and our Nation as a whole; and

 

WHEREAS, let us use this anniversary as an opportunity to not only mourn and reflect but to honor and grow; and

 

WHEREAS, September 11th will never, and should never be just another day in the hearts and minds of all Americans; and

 

NOW, THEREFORE, I, Sidney T. Schulman, Mayor of the Town of Bloomfield, on behalf of the Bloomfield Town Council and all Bloomfield residents, will observe September 11, 2011, the 10th Anniversary of 9/11; and

 

FURTHER, I call upon all citizens and organizations to join in this observance and to engage in activities of tribute, solemn remembrances and charitable service.

 

  Dated at Bloomfield, Connecticut this 11th day of September, 2011.

Joke of the Week  

A guy goes to the doctor's office and the doctor says,

 

"I haven't seen you for awhile."

 

The guy says, "Yeah, I've been sick."

Social Action Updates    
 

Become involved!!.... The Bloomfield Clergy Association has become the Bloomfield Interfaith Association, open to all interested participants. Note the next meeting,  Tuesday, October 4, 12 noon here at Beth Hillel Synagogue. Light lunch will be provided, so please let Rabbi Atkins know of your interest in attending.

 

Make a donation to MAZON to help the hungry in  our communities....

 

Gather food to donate to Project Isaiah before Yom Kippur!......

 

Be aware of those less fortunate than we are!! Carry out the mitzvah of tikkun olam!

 

A mitzvah we can ALL DO: Visit a friend in a nursing home or assisted living center or who otherwise can't get out! Or bring someone to a service here who couldn't get here on their own!
Community Events    

JCC Annual Memorial Service for the Six Million.

At the JCC Sunday, September 18, 2pm.

 

Save the date:
Monday, October 24, Special showing: Nuremberg - Its Lessons for Today.... the suppressed film! Sponsored by Voices of Hope

Beth Hillel Synagogue Library    

Lots of new books and videos......

 

 Read contemporary newspapers and magazines!!
 
New for this year: The Revised Edition of the Encyclopedia Judaica!
Donated to our Library by the Bloomfield Prosser Library.....
a great read!!
Upcoming Synagogue Events    

Selichot, Saturday Evening, Sept. 24, 8:30pm

at B'nai Tikvoh Sholom

 

Rosh Hashanah starts Wednesday evening, Sept. 28

Schedule of High Holy Day services above

 

Sukkah-decorating pizza party, Monday evening, Oct. 3, 6:30pm

 News from Israel...

 

A Palestinian state? Don't count on it

by Jeff Jacoby  The Boston Globe
September 21, 2011

IF THE PALESTINIAN AUTHORITY genuinely desired international recognition as a sovereign state, Mahmoud Abbas wouldn't have come to New York to seek membership in the UN General Assembly this week. There would have been no need to, for Palestine would have long since taken its seat in the United Nations.

Were Palestinian statehood Abbas's real goal, after all, he could have delivered it to his people three years ago. In 2008, then-Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert proposed the creation of a sovereign Palestinian state on territory equal (after land swaps) to 100 percent of the West Bank and Gaza, with free passage between the two plus a capital in the Arab section of Jerusalem. Yet Abbas turned down the Israeli offer. And he has refused ever since even to engage in negotiations.

 

"It is our legitimate right to demand the full membership of the state of Palestine in the UN," Abbas declared in Ramallah on Friday, "to put an end to a historical injustice by attaining liberty and independence, like the other peoples of the earth."

 

But for the better part of a century, the Arabs of Palestine have consistently said no when presented with the chance to build a state of their own. They said no in 1937, when the British government, which then ruled Palestine, proposed to divide the land into separate Arab and Jewish states. Arab leaders said no again in 1947, choosing to go to war rather than accept the UN's decision to partition Palestine between its Jewish and Arab populations. When Israel in 1967 offered to relinquish the land it had acquired in exchange for peace with its neighbors, the Arab world's response, issued at a summit in Khartoum, was not one no, but three: "No peace with Israel, no negotiations with Israel, no recognition of Israel."

 

At Camp David in 2000, Israel's Prime Minister Ehud Barak offered the Palestinians a sovereign state with shared control of Jerusalem and billions of dollars in compensation for Palestinian refugees. Yasser Arafat refused the offer, and returned to launch the deadly terror war known as the Second Intifada.

 

There is no shortage in this world of stateless peoples yearning for a homeland, many of them ethnic groups with centuries of history, unique in language and culture. Kurds or Tamils or Tibetans -- whose longstanding quests for a nation-state the world ignores -- must find it maddening to watch the international community trip over itself in its eagerness to proclaim, again and again, the need for a Palestinian state. And they must be baffled by the Palestinians' invariable refusal to take yes for an answer.

 

It is no mystery, however. The raison d'�tre of the Palestinian movement has never been the establishment and building-up of a sovereign Palestinian homeland. It has always been the negation of a sovereign Jewish homeland. That is why well-intended proposals for a "two-state solution" have never come to fruition, no matter how earnestly proposed by US presidents or UN secretaries-general. That is why the basic charter not just of Hamas but even of Abbas's supposedly moderate Fatah vows to continue the "armed struggle" until "the Zionist state is demolished." And that is why Abbas and other Palestinian leaders insist that a Palestinian state would be explicitly Arab and Muslim, but adamantly refuse to acknowledge that Israel is legitimately the Jewish state.

 

"Palestinian nationalism," Edward Said told an interviewer in 1999, "was based on driving all Israelis out." Sadly, it still is.

 

Last week, to kick off its campaign seeking UN recognition as a state, the Palestinian Authority staged a highly publicized march to the UN offices in Ramallah, where a letter was delivered for Secretary General Ban Ki Moon. Officials named Latifa Abu Hmeid to lead the procession and hand over the letter. "She was chosen," reported the Palestinian daily Al-Ayyam, "because she is a symbol of Palestinian suffering as a result of the occupation."

 

What the paper did not mention is that Abu Hmeid is the mother of four murderers, whose sons are serving a total of 18 life sentences for their involvement in multiple terrorist attacks. According to Palestinian Media Watch, this is not the first time Abu Hmeid has been honored. Last year, the Palestinian Authority awarded her "the Plaque of Resoluteness and Giving," and a government minister publicly extolled her virtues: "It is she who gave birth to the fighters, and she deserves that we bow to her in salute and in honor."

 

It is this grotesque and bloody culture that Palestinian leaders want the UN to affirm as worthy of statehood. The wonder is not they make the request, but that anyone thinks it should be granted.

 

 No to the Palestinian 'State' 
 
NATIONAL REVIEW ONLINE       

www.nationalreview.com        NRO Editors   September 19, 2011 4:00 A.M.

There is no such thing as a Palestinian state, and the United Nations can't conjure one into existence. That apparently won't stop the Palestinians from seeking recognition as a state in the Security Council this week. We should veto the Palestinian effort without hesitation.

On top of its legal nullity, the push for recognition at the U.N. trashes the spirit of the Oslo Accords, which commit both the Israelis and the Palestinians to addressing their differences through negotiations. Thwarted at the Security Council, the Palestinians will likely go to the rabble in the General Assembly, where we don't have a veto and they will presumably succeed in putting a fig leaf on a fraud.

The General Assembly can change the status of the PLO from an observer "entity," as it is now, to a "non-member state" observer, like the Vatican, and thereby recognize it indirectly as a state. But this won't create a real state, either in law or in fact. Under international law, the Montevideo Convention of 1933 explicitly provides that the existence of a sovereign state is independent of recognition by other states, and further provides that a state must have a permanent population, a defined territory, a government, and the capacity to enter into relations with other states. The Palestinians arguably have none of those things. By their own admission, they don't have a defined territory. Their government, meanwhile, is riven: Terrorists control one half of the territories and the other half is controlled by a former terrorist whose term of office expired two years ago.

Nobody would like to see the Palestinians under a functioning state of laws more than the Israelis. But a state must have a monopoly of violence, and Hamas has always rejected the monopoly of violence in favor of the inherent individual right of resistance to occupation. The Palestinians have barely managed to maintain political institutions of any kind, and a declaration of statehood will do nothing to solve that problem.

Any action in the cause of Palestinian statehood at the U.N. will serve to isolate Israel further, and could make its government subject to international legal proceedings. But the main danger is the effect it could have in the Muslim world, including the occupied territories. Another intifada would force Israel to resort to military measures, giving Egypt and Turkey another excuse to express their growing hostility to the Jewish state.

The Middle East has come to this pass despite President Obama's blithe belief at the inception of his administration that he could forge an Israeli-Palestinian peace. From the start, Obama cast his role in the Middle East as one of impartial mediator, not realizing that America's influence among the Palestinians requires Israel's confidence that we will protect the Jewish state come what may. Anyone can play the role of mediator, but only America can underwrite the risks of a negotiated settlement for both sides. The strategic prerequisites for Israeli-Palestinian peace are the same as they were for peace between Israel and Egypt in the 1970s: We must convince the Arabs that they can get what they want from the Israelis only by going through us, and we can deliver Israeli concessions only if we can guarantee Israel's security.

Yet the Obama administration has reprised the Clinton administration's childish schoolyard spats with Israeli prime minister Bibi Netanyahu. By embracing the Palestinian insistence on a halt to settlement construction as a precondition for talks, Obama encouraged the Palestinians to dig in their heels. Now the Palestinians think they can get what they want by forcing the issue at the U.N. and encouraging Egyptian and Turkish belligerence.

The new government of Egypt is seeking legitimacy by embracing the worst anti-Israeli sentiments of its populace. The army recently stood by as a Cairo mob ransacked the Israeli embassy. The Camp David Accords of 1979 are starting to crumble. Because no combination of Arab states could afford to go to war with Israel without Egypt's help, Henry Kissinger realized that peace between Israel and Egypt would end the era of Arab-Israeli wars. The fraying of the Camp David Accords, which preserved a tenuous peace for more than three decades, is ominous. So is the reemergence of Turkey as a regional power. Turkey has pledged a military escort for the next "humanitarian flotilla" aimed at forcibly breaching the Gaza blockade, a fully legal blockade even according to the United Nations.

The Middle East is again on the cusp of crisis, with the U.N. about to stoke the flames and the Obama administration caught in a self-imposed impotence.
 
 

GILAD SHALIT...... OVER 1900 DAYS IN CAPTIVITY....

NO CONTACT ALLOWED BY HAMAS...... 

 Weekly Torah Portion Commentary.....

This week's commentary written by Rabbi Daniel Nevins, Dean of the Division of Religious Leadership, JTS.

 

We have certain aspirations for the last day of a beloved person's life. When that person has lived to a ripe old age and his or her death is expected, then we like to imagine them surrounded by family and friends, quietly reminiscing about the meaning of their life and offering encouragement to the next generation. When such a scene plays out-and I have witnessed it more than once-there is consolation even before grief and a sense of peace at the passing.

 

If anyone deserves such a peaceful and comforting death, then surely it is Moses. This man has spent his final four decades serving the people of Israel in the most punishing and unforgiving of circumstances. We could certainly understand if Moses were to delegate final decisions to Joshua, lie back on his couch, and reminisce with his family. But that would not be Moses. No, he spends his final day worrying, speaking, haranguing, writing, singing, and, apparently, pacing (va-yeilekh:"he paced"). His family is not mentioned, but he is now the spiritual father of a nation, and his thoughts are with that enlarged family and its uncertain future.

 

In the first parashah, Nitzavim, Moses tries multiple strategies to protect his legacy, the Torah, which gives substance to the covenant between God and Israel. He opens with a populist line, addressing the entire nation, including the weak, poor, and powerless: this Torah belongs to all of you! Next, Moses tries to terrorize the people with horrific predictions of calamity should they abandon the Torah.

 

Then he swings back into a comforting mode, predicting restoration of the covenant, and reassuring the people that it really is not too much to ask of them.

Having finished with the sermons, Rabbi Moses turns into Teacher Moses. In our second parashah, Va-yeilekh, he literally bombards Israel with his message, using every medium that he can muster. He writes the Torah, giving copies to his own tribe of Levi as well as to all the elders of Israel. He devises a public recitation ceremony to be played out every seven years on Sukkot. He commands the people to write their own copies of the text. Finally, he reads all the words of his song to the elders "until their end" (Deut. 31:30). (It is interesting that a very similar verse describes the thoroughness of his successor, Joshua, but Joshua's zeal is for warfare. He pursues his defeated enemies, striking them "until their end" [Josh. 10:20]). In the next and penultimate parashah, Moses will break into his hortatory song before finally climbing Mt. Nebo and dying a solitary death, attended only by God.

 

Poor Moses is anxious until the very end. While one can be wistful about the lack of tranquility in his final hours, in truth we know that this is how he wants it. Moses is a loner. Once he has become God's companion, he is isolated from other people. Remember, he has been wearing a mask in public for the 40 years since Sinai. Even Joshua seems to be more of an attendant than a confidante. In his final hours, there is no wife, no son, no sibling or friend around to comfort Moses. Indeed, in the final verses of the Torah we learn that even at the age of 120, Moses was clear-sighted and vital. He died "by the mouth of God," which the Rabbis understand to be the gentlest of deaths, a divine kiss (Avot D'Rabbi Natan A 12, among many other places). As the Psalmist says so powerfully: "Though my father and mother abandon me, the Lord will gather me up" (Ps. 27:10).

 

If this is so, then perhaps we need not fret that Moses missed his opportunity for a beautiful death. He was vibrant until the end, extending his message with passion and brilliance, and attended by God in his last breath and burial. Still, we may ask whether it worked. Did this final flurry of intense activity by Moses work? Did the people indeed treasure God's word as he demanded?

 

Yes and no. Obviously, you and I are still engaged in this book, studying its nuances by electronic means several thousand years after the death of Moses, our teacher. This week, we will reenact the very process of repentance described in Deuteronomy 30:2: "Then you will return to the Lord your God, and heed His voice as I have commanded you today, you and your children, with all your heart and all your soul." Yet we also have fulfilled the most pessimistic predictions of our prophet: we have collectively committed every sin in the book; we have abandoned the Torah, cast off our obligations and even spited them. But here we are, back again. Moses understands us very well-our rebellious streak and our yearning to reconcile with God. The beauty of his teaching is that he assures us that we will also have a way back to God. No matter how far we flee, we can always come home again.

 

Perhaps this is the reason that Moses dies an isolated death, buried by God in a place unknown to mortals. Moses is separated from people. He is denied the ability to settle down in the Promised Land. He is truly a nomad, a man of the desert, not of the homestead. He does not have a domestic death scene, surrounded by living family. Yet his death is more comforting for that. Even in his isolation, he is connected, not only to God but to us. He remains our teacher, and we remain his disciples. Moses is not alone, but surrounded by the souls of all who lived in his day and all who were yet to come. This is so because he lived for a message of holiness, a message whose significance has never expired.

 

What about you and me? When our time to depart this life arrives, how can we make it a beautiful parting? We cannot control the physical circumstances, but we do have the ability to impart meaning to them. What is our Torah, our teaching? How are we communicating it, and to whom? Are we investing our Torah with insight and urgency? Are we prepared to sing it with pride and purpose?

 

Look at the last day of Moses. See a man who is superficially isolated but profoundly connected to all of us. This week, make a plan to live just a bit like Moses and, when it's your time, to leave this world with a legacy that brings blessing and life for generations to come.