From The Rabbi’s Study…Shabbat, November 8, 9, 2024/7,8, Cheshvan 5785
This Shabbat is Kristallnacht “ Night of Broken Glass”…
Pogrom (mass riots with police not protecting the Jewish people and their properties and synagogues) unleashed by the Nazis (National Socialist German Workers’ Party Pact) controlled Germany and then European countries from 1933-1945 under Adolf Hitler and advocated totalitarian government, territorial expansion, Anti-Semitism, Aryan Supremacy and all these lead to the Holocaust.) This happened on November 9-10 1938. All over Germany and Austria, synagogues and other Jewish institutions were burned down; Jewish stores were destroyed; and their contents looted. At the same time, approximately 35,000 Jewish men were sent to Concentration Camps. The “excuse” for this action was the assassination of Ernst Von Rath in Paris by Herschel Grynzspan, the Jewish teenager whose parents were rounded up by the Nazis.
If you had relatives that perished during the Holocaust, you may light a Yahrzeit candle for them and recite the mourner’s Kaddish in their memory. Then light your Sabbath candles.
The Torah portion continues when Abram is called to leave his family and the city of Haran in Mesopotamia. G-d appears to Abram in Canaan and tells him that this land will be assigned to him and his heirs. Later there was a famine in Canaan, and Abram goes to Egypt for a time to live there. Abram then separates himself from his nephew Lot by remaining in the land of Canaan, while Lot journeys eastward, ultimately settling near the wicked city of Sodom. Lot becomes involved in a war with enemy chieftains, and Abram comes to Lot’s rescue. Then later G-d makes a covenant with Abram in which G-d promises him that Canaan shall be the land of the generations of Hebrews to come.
Keep in mind Abram and his wife Sarai had no children, so he takes Hagar (Sarai’s maidservant) to be his wife and with her bears a child named Ishmael. G-d makes a covenant (requiring circumcision of every male on the eighth day) with Abram, whose name is now changed to Abraham, which translates to “father of a multitude of nations.” G-d also changes Sarai’s name to Sarah, which translates to “princess”, and soon she is told that she will bear a son. Abraham now is in his ninety- ninth year and circumcises himself, while Ishmael his son is circumcised at age thirteen.
There are a myriad of concepts and values to drash. One is circumcision
(Genesis 17:10), we are informed that circumcision is to be the external sign of the covenant between G-d and Abraham. Jewish men and women of all ages were ready to lay down their lives in its defense. Many nations forbid the Jewish people to practice their faith. The result was the Jewish people lost their lives because they refused to give up their Judaic practices. The Maccabean martyrs died for it. King Antiochus sent officers to punish mothers who initiated their children into the covenant of circumcision by putting them to death and hanging their babies about the neck (I Maccabees 1:61). Hanukkah is the Jewish people fighting for our religious freedoms of praying, the Sabbath, rituals, teaching our children Judaism, and our ways of life.
When one reads the Torah and the Haftarot, please keep in mind the timeframe and circumstances during the ancient world. Some Jewish men did marry more than one wife. Today, if an infant is ill or under a certain weight (twins) the circumcision is not performed on the eighth day, but when the infant is healthy. A convert to Judaism who was circumcised goes through a symbolic circumcision. According to Jewish law, by drawing a drop of blood from the place where the circumcision is ordinarily performed. The convert that is not circumcised goes for surgery before becoming a Jew.
While reading the Torah one finds that many individuals had their names changed. Names and naming are important for the Jewish people. First Samuel (25:25) says,” As his name, so the man.” The Pirke Avot (4:17) teaches that “there are three crowns: the crown of Torah, the crown of priesthood, and the crown of royalty, the crown of a good name excels them all.” There are other examples in the Torah when the name was changed for a specific reason. No spoiler alert, so you will have to wait until that chapter and parsha will be drashed!
After every Presidential election we as Jewish people pray that the new leaders have health and wisdom as they govern our nation’s people. We recite prayers daily and on the Sabbath for our government leaders, community, and Israel. The Jewish people are the smallest population in the world, and we are stronger when we stand together.
Hazak, Hazak, V’Nitchazek: Strength Strength, and together we are Stronger.
Shabbat Shalom v’ AM Ysrael Chai,
Rabbi Helene Ainbinder
