Rosh Chodesh Tevet (New Jewish month will be Tevet) on December 4, 2021
Torah: Miketz (Genesis 41:1-44:17) Haftarah:(I Kings 3:15- 4:1)
Last night of Hanukkah is Sunday night.
Hag Urim, Happy Hanukkah!
Blessings over the Hanukkiah and Shabbat Candles will start at 7pm in person in the Good Shepherd Presbyterian Church’s Fellowship Hall and on Zoom!
Beit Chaverim will be Blessing and Welcoming the New Torah during Shabbat Services!
Our Beit Chaverim will be wishing and blessing our President, Penny Lindenbaum as she moves to her new home in Henderson NV. The New Torah was from her parents’ synagogue in New Jersey.
Goodies of Latkes, dreidels, gelt, sufganiyot/Jelly donuts will be in packages to take home.
May the warmth and glow from the Hanukkiah/menorah candles keep you healthy, happy and safe throughout the coming secular year.
The Torah portion Miketz we read about Joseph interprets Pharaoh’s two dreams, Joseph is rewarded by being put in charge of the land, famine strikes, and Jacob sends his sons, except Benjamin to Egypt, Joseph seizes Simeon and tells the brothers that he will not go free until they return with the youngest brother and Joseph tests his brothers to see how they feel about their wrongdoing of long ago.
There are many concepts and values throughout this Torah portion, and these are some unknown facts. The Ancient eras and the Modern times have historical information of the early Pharaohs having roots from the Sumerian and Akkadian people in Mesopotamia, which were related to Abram.
When Joseph was rewarded by Pharaoh, Pharaoh changed his name (an Egyptian and Hebrew custom)…
Zaphenath-paneah which Egyptologist point out Zaphenath means “food-man”, and paneah “of the life”. The Chief Steward in the realm during the famine. The name change, the clothing Joseph wore and the brothers never dreaming Joseph was alive helped Joseph conceal his identity.
So …Who knows a Jewish person in the Torah that had his name changed?
Answer…Jacob became Israel after fighting with the angel. The Hebrew letters of Ysrael represent all the Patriarchs and Matriarchs, and the Jewish people become a nation called, “B’nai Ysrael” (Children of Israel) The name represents strength that all Jews have within them, just like Jacob!
An important value from this Torah parsha is “Responsibility”. Judah makes himself responsible for the welfare of his youngest brother, Benjamin. A sense of responsibility for individuals in need of special care is one of the marks of maturity. It also stresses, in the rabbinic adage that “kol Yisrael arevim zeh lazeh” (“All Israelites are responsible for one another”), the sense of solidarity that should and does link the Jewish people throughout the entire world.
Today, people can still feel the darkness. However this is HANUKKAH when a small army of Jewish Maccabees fought against a large Greek army against HUGE ODDS and WON our RELIGIOUS FREEDOM! Each Jewish person has that unique spark of LIGHT to give to the world and help rid the Darkness. It is for each person to do just one mitzvah or many mitzvot (righteous actions).
Our unique Mitzvah each December 25th is when I will be offering the opening prayer, and both Michael and I will help serve the holiday luncheon to the needy at the Elks on December 25th!
Shabbat Shalom,
Rabbi Helene Ainbinder
My ICL CLASS “ANTISEMITISM, RACISM AND THE HOLOCAUST” WILL START ON THURSDAY, JANUARY 20TH, 2022 AT 11AM IN THE HAZY BUILDING ROOM 229.
PLEASE REGISTER AT ICL@DIXIE.EDU.
Some books if you would like to read;
Anne Frank’s Diary ( If you read this book when you were young, reread it through an adult lens!)
White Trash, The 400 Year Untold History of class in America by Nancy Isenberg
A Stony Road by Henry Louis Gates, Jr.
Giants, The Dwarfs of Auschwitz by Yehuda Koren and Eilat Negev
Orchestra of Exiles by Josh Aronson and Denise George (The Story about Bronislaw Huberman Jewish violinist who saved One Thousand Jewish musicians)
The New Antisemitism by Phyllis Chesler
America’s Original SIn by Jim Wallis ( a little preachy, however he met extraordinary Civil Rights Leaders)
