This week we celebrate the Bat Mitzvah of

Juliy Abelsky

daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Ilya Abelsky

10 AM

JF&CS, 4549 Chamblee Dunwoody Rd.

We invite your participation

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Rabbi Salkin's Weekly Message

On this week we commemorate the six million....

There are too many stories that emerged from the Shoah, but there is one that has always spoken to me. It concerns a group of Jews who were taken to a work camp in Poland and forced to dig a ditch. They were then told to jump over the ditch. Those that made it to the other side would survive; those who fell into the ditch would be shot.

A rabbi and a notorious apikoris (unbeliever) stood next to each other and prepared to make the jump. The rabbi was quite elderly, and in no visible physical condition to have survived the ordeal. Yet he jumped over the abyss and made it. So did the apikoris, who was considerably younger.

The apikoris asked the rabbi: "How was it possible for you to have made that jump?" The rabbi replied: "I held onto my ancestral traditions -- the texts that I have learned and taught; the holidays and sacred moments of Jewish life that have given my life joy and meaning; the belief in God that I have inherited from my parents. But you, my friend -- how was it possible for you to have made the jump?'

To which the apikoris replied: "I held onto you."

The story reminds us that even in the darkest of times, we can hold onto our faith and our stories and find the ability to leap across the abyss. And even if at the moment we doubt that we have that faith and those stories, sometimes it is enough to find someone who does, and to hold onto that person, and to hope that the faith of the Other will sustain us.

--

Rabbi Jeffrey Salkin

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Shabbat Morning "Mystical Torah" Study Continues on May 9th and May 16th

Our Shabbat Study Circle about "The Mystical Torah - Conversations About Leviticus ", led by our rabbi, the noted teacher, scholar, and author, Rabbi Jeffrey K. Salkin, continues twice each month on Saturday morning beginning at 11:00 AM. Our study text is The Language of Truth, translated and interpreted by Arthur Green.

The date for Rabbi Salkin’s next Shabbat Study Circle at Shema Yisrael is May 9, 2009.

The program which is at approximately 11 AM, follows our Shabbat morning worship, which begins at 10:15 AM, at JF&CS, 4549 Chamblee-Dunwoody Rd, which is at exit 30 off I-285. You may come early for the worship service or just for the study circle. They are separate programs.

The emphasis of our new Torah study program is on how Jewish mystics have interpreted the Torah. "While we will study the Torah through all its diverse lenses," Rabbi Salkin said, "we will primarily be looking at the Hasidic commentators, especially the writings of Sefat Emet, who was the nineteenth century Rabbi Yehudah Aryeh Leib. We will be looking at how the Torah speaks to our inner lives through a different perspective, especially Kabbalah."

More information about Rabbi Jeffrey Salkin's educational offerings are at www.judaismmatters.org

Shema Yisrael - The Open Synagogue

The Shema Yisrael Mission

The Shema Yisrael mission is to be a synagogue embracing all that is Jewish.

We seek to nurture an inclusive and caring spiritual community reflecting Klal Yisrael (The Peoplehood of Israel) and are dedicated to the premise that "we can worship G-D in holiness only as we serve one another in love."

Shema Yisrael is also committed to fostering cooperative efforts to bring together Atlanta Jewry through a wide range of educational, social, and cultural experiences.

Shema Yisrael believes that American Jewry is on the brink of an exciting era. The challenge, as we see it, is whether American Jews, living in the most accepting and generous society in Jewish history, can create dynamic compelling communities that are capable of welcoming everyone.

We seek to be an inclusive and welcoming community for singles, families, and senior adults: for the knowledgeable Jew or the Jew just beginning his or her Jewish journey.

Central to our commitment is the belief that it is possible to create a viable Jewish worship community out of the diverse strands of Jewish experience and that begins with the acceptance of one Jew for another.