News and Announcements

Join Us for Shabbat Services 04-24-20 – 04-25-20

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Please join the Rabbi at 5:30 this evening for service on the Temple’s Facebook page, Congregation B’nai Israel. Steve Gordin and Carl McArn will have music, and below are the words to two of the songs for you to follow along.
Don’t forget Torah Discussion tomorrow morning at 10:00 via Skype.
Stay well.
 

 

The Promise Lyrics: S. Gordin/Music :C. McCarn

There is promise as the sun sets low

The week now comes to its close

The candles are lit and they shine

Inside a feeling of peace at this time

My mind drifts back to the week that’s gone

Things I wished I had said or maybe done

But growth happens no tears need be shed

If I’ve learned to handle what’s ahead

Shabbat is time for me to rest

To extend to my family and to my guests

My time and my ear and what I guess

Should allow me to grow to be my best

I hold the cup now say the prayer

Drink the wine and do I dare

Hold a grudge full of strife

Or be renewed and

refreshed in my life?

It’s Shabbat now

time to praise/time to think

Time to rest/time to grow

It begins now/as the sun

as the sun/ as the sun sets low

 

Believe Lyrics: S.Gordin/ Music C. McCarn

 

This life that I chose or did it choose me

It falls apart and now do I see

That somewhere down the line

I was blinded by ennui

And somehow down the line

I forgot to believe

Sitting in this hole I look out to see

A world outside much to my relief

Birds, fresh air, and the happy buzzing of the bees

And all of this makes me think

Why didn’t I stop before to believe?

 

My fathers fought in wars to be free

Against the odds and against tyranny

Through time and again throughout history

There’s a reason to look outside

ourselves to believe

 

Bridge:

 

So look inside

it’s not that hard

No need to look very far

Deep down inside we know we need

in good times and bad a reason to believe

 

One day the story it will be told

About the time we learned ten fold

That no matter how well off

we think we may be

We’re one heartbeat away beat away from

a reason to believe

A Message from Rabbi Liebowitz

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Dear members,

I hope that you and all your loved ones are well and doing as best as possible given the difficulties we are experiencing with this pandemic. I am aware of some of the challenges that our members are facing along with other members of the community.

As with many of my fellow rabbis I am glad to contribute to the well being of our respective synagogues and temples. I have decided to tithe a portion of my income back to the temple some 10% each month. I am aware of the ongoing generosity of many of our members at this time and in times past to keep our congregation solvent. I ask you to consider doing whatever you can with respect to tsedaka, Jewish and communal. Carrie and I have included in our giving back pack lunches for children.  In the past  few weeks we are also glad to contribute to American Friends of Magain David Adom   (Israel’s version of the Red Cross) for Israel which also has many sufferers and deaths from this pandemic. We also favor the ASPCA. Those commercials have gotten to us! 

As antisemitism has become more prevalent, we also give to the Southern Poverty Law Center which thwarts prejudice nation wide.

Should you wish to help out in this regard or to help some of our members that I am aware of who are strained financially do contribute to the rabbi’s discretionary fund which is monitored by our president and our treasurer.

I do hope that you have been able to catch up with us through Facebook live services regularly offered on Friday afternoon at 5:30 and our Torah study at 10 o’clock Saturday morning. The latter Torah study is through Skype and you can easily get on my contact list which is ezrabbi.  We are preparing for a virtual Bar Mitzvah for Reuben Falcon this mid May. It too will be offered via Facebook live. Mazal Tov Reuben!

This coming Monday, April 27, at 5:30 pm, in honor of Israel Independence Day Yom Ha’atsma’ut, I will be offering a Facebook live with some songs, poetry, and prayer in celebration of the Jewish state.

Once more thinking of you and looking forward to the time when we can greet one another in person.

Prayers for our people!
Prayers for our nation!
Prayers for the world!

B’ Shalom
Rabbi Yossi Liebowitz  D.D.

Solace from Rabbi Liebowitz

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Dear Members,
Best wishes on this Passover Holiday time. I share with one and all the anxiety and worry as we try to cope with this modern plague. Below are the ways we will connect virtually for our services and our discussions. (See below!) I am thinking of you and missing you all very much!  I am thankful to our leaders who have stepped forward to maintain the health of our synagogue and for the patience of so many members. Should you wish to talk by phone (621-5539) or skype (go to ezrabbi to connect with me and create a contact) please do so. It would be nice to “see” you!:
In the meantime here is a small poem at this holiday time :
Let those who are ill find healing – Dayenu
Let our worries be calmed – Dayenu
Let the weak and the vulnerable be protected – Dayenu
Let all healers find paths to bring healing – Dayenu
Let scientists grasp a higher knowing
That will lead to a cure – Dayenu
Let there be an end to this plague, God – Dayenu
Fill our hearts with hope
And our souls with faith,
Our bodies with health
And our homes with love.
Unite our world to bring on a day of freedom
Let the seeds of rebirth take root tonight
And grow in blessings
In Your light.
Dayenu – Enough, God.
Amen.
Rabbi Naomi Levy
This is the link for Torah study Saturday the 18th at 10 a.m.  https://join.skype.com/DNZ0Os2LsdUp
Yizkor at 11 a.m. Thursday on Facebook live  Congregation B’nai Israel
Friday night live Shabbat service at 5:30 Congregation B’nai Israel
 
Rabbi Liebowitz

From the Heart With Rabbi Liebowitz

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Hezekiah taught (Jeremiah 50:17): “Israel is like scattered sheep” – Why is Israel lik- ened to a sheep? Just as a sheep, when hurt on its head or some other body part, all its body parts feel it. So it is with Israel when one of them sins and everyone feels it. (Numbers 16:22): “When one man sins [will You be wrathful with the whole communi- ty].” Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai taught a parable: Men were on a ship. One of them took a drill and started drilling underneath him. The others said to him: What are sit- ting and doing?! He replied: What do you care. Is this not underneath my area that I am drilling?! They said to him: But the water will rise and flood us all on this ship. This is as Job said (Job 19:4): “If indeed I have erred, my error remains with me.” But his friends said to him (Job 34:37): “He adds transgression to his sin; he extends it among us.” [The men on the ship said]: You extend your sins among us.

 

Dear Friends,

I recall seeing a cartoon when I was very young. It showed a boy looking up to his mother and

complaining: “Mom, every time I ask Dad for a quarter, I get a lecture on the depression.“ In my youthful head I understood that cartoon, but not in my heart. I knew nothing from such poverty growing up middle class in the ‘60’s. My dad was a depression kid. I recalled during our “Friday Night live” Facebook “service (5:30 – Congregation Bnai Israel) how my father would place cardboard in the bottom of his shoes to make them last just a few more months until the tops had worn off. This pandemic has assaulted all of us for we are all in the same boat! Financially, psychologically, and socially! The isolation that many of us are experiencing can be as wounding as anything. Just recall how our GI’s in Korea faced that kind of torture which broke many a strong soldier.

I have always favored congregational rabbinate because I have had faith in the power of community. As I am well into my second decade of service to you in this congregation, I am still impressed by the efforts of our congregants to reach out, if only through phone, skype, and zoom Oh my! I am thinking of Sandy Smiley who just days before her procedure pulled herself together to go visit some of our homebound with me and Nancy Rosenberg. What a job they do! I think also of two relatively new members Karen Greenberg and Kim Pickett; Karen who offered to go shopping for anyone and in the second instance, Kim who baked Challahs for those in want. And there are many others!

 

The calls I have made and received are buoying and sustaining of the spirit. They are the glue that keeps us together spiritually. I am also grateful to those who generously support this Temple through thick and thin. I do not name them as their giving is from the heart and is private. Thank you!

I hope, as possible, you will continue to give to our food barrel to support those in need. A little bit can go real far! Jan, who is working mostly at home, can receive the donations when she is present, or you may leave them under the overhang in the portico near the door.

As I write to you today, I am preparing for our services to continue, including Torah study through Zoom. The passages we are reading from our weekly portion about sacrifices are from Va-yikra meaning “and He called!” We are called to be patient and caring to one another during this very difficult time. The word for sacrifice in Hebrew is Karban. The English translation does not adequately convey its deeper sense, as Karban means to “draw near!” As we sacrifice, we draw nearer to God and to our more spiritual selves. Even as Tseda- ka does not mean charity exactly, but “righteous giving,” so may we reach out to one another! Alas! No longer with our physical hands but with our spiritual hearts! I look forward to the time when we can hug each other once again.

B’shalom
Rabbi Yossi J. Liebowitz D.D.

April 2020 Service Schedule

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Until further notice, services will be via Facebook Live on the Congregation B’nai Israel Facebook page. If you cannot make the “live” service, it will be available to watch any time at your convenience. This is the link to the Temple’s Facebook page.  Simply go to the page at 5:30 and click on the live video to view.

You should have received an email explaining Skype and how to access the Saturday Torah Study, which will be at 10:00 on Saturday mornings for the time being. Visit skype.com, follow instructions on how to create an account, and add the Rabbi as a contact using his screen name, ezrabbi.

April Yahrzeits

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4/1 Sam Reichel

4/1 Getzel Robkin

4/1  Henry Vogelstein

4/2  Etta Goldman

4/2 Seindel Koser

4/2  Beckie Witz

4/3  Harry Liebowitz

4/3  Sharon Massey

4/4  Louis Blumenfeld

4/4 Fannie A. Levin

4/6  Anna P. Reichel

4/7  Sylvia S. Cooper

4/7  Blanche Lyon

4/8  Harry Packer

4/9  Samuel Lazarowitz

4/9  Mary Vogelstein

4/10  Aladar Hirschler

4/11  Helen Levenson

4/12  Nancy Geller

4/12 Samuel Packer

4/15 Herschel Levy

4/15 Jack Minsky

4/16 Richard J. Horn

4/19 William M. Price

4/20 Sandra Greenfield

4/20 Bella Rabinowitz

4/20 Kurt A. Stern

4/20 Joseph Taffet

4/21 Anne Schultz

4/21 Andrew Blum

4/21 Morton Mooney

4/21 Marvin Sperling

4/22 Irving Unger

4/23 Pearl Skolnick

4/23 Moshe Stemberg

4/24 Goldie Stemberg

4/25 Abraham Moglin

4/25 Dena S. Sachs

4/25 Irving I. Witz

4/28 Maurice Moss

4/30 Mary L. Busch

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