25 Elul 5777 / 15-16
September 2017
Parashat Nitzavim -
Vayelekh
Torah: Deuteronomy
29:9 – 31:30
Haftarah: Isaiah
61:10 - 63:9 (Seventh Haftarah of Consolation)
Rosh Hashanah begins at sundown on Wednesday,
September 20. Please submit your Membership/High Holy Day ticket forms ASAP! Check
your tickets or contact the synagogue office for details on service times and
parking. All religious services and programs are at Temple B’nai Hayim, 4302
Van Nuys Blvd., at the corner with Benefit Street.
IMPORTANT INFORMATION ABOUT PARKING!
There is often street parking available in the
neighborhood around Temple B’nai Hayim. However, we have arranged for parking and a shuttle at the overflow parking lot of the
Sherman Oaks Methodist Church. Because of extremely heavy rush hour traffic,
the best way to get to the lot is, from Ventura Blvd., go south (up the hill)
on either Hazeltine or Stansbury. Turn right on Dickens, and the lot with its
white brick wall is on your right at the northeast corner of Dickens and
Beverly Glen, before you get to Beverly Glen. Turn right from Dickens into the
lot. Please do not park behind the church - the lot is across Beverly Glen from the church. Do
not come up Beverly Glen – there is no left turn onto Dickens permitted before
10 am. If you prefer to walk, the walk from the lot to the synagogue is less
than 10 minutes. Allow yourself extra
time to get to weekday morning High Holy Day services.
TBH Religious
School and TBH Pre-school have open enrollment. Enroll your children now!
Contact the TBH office for information.
And be sure to
tell your neighbors, friends, and relatives about our warm and welcoming
community and our programs!
We are looking
for volunteers for the High Holy Days: chant Torah and Haftarah,
daven, lead English readings, and, have aliyot and other Torah/bimah honors.
Contact Rabbi Flom or Susan Burke by e-mail for details and to sign up!
We are now well
into the month of Elul, the final run-up to Rosh Hashanah. Jewish tradition
teaches that in Elul, we are to engage in “cheshbon hanefesh”, literally
“an accounting of the soul” -self-evaluation. As I do every year, I have
prepared a Cheshbon Hanefesh worksheet to prepare you for the
High Holy Days. For this year’s edition, see: http://rav-rich.blogspot.com/2017/08/cheshbon-hanefesh-worksheet.html
Dedications and
calendar follow below.
Please feel free to
pass this on to a friend, and please cite the source.
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YOU’VE GOT A SECRET!
“The secret things
belong to the Lord our God; and those things which are revealed belong to us
and to our children forever, that we may observe all the words of this Torah.”
Deuteronomy 29:28
A number of Midrashim
say this verse concerns sins committed in private – we cannot hide them - God
still knows about them (and so does our conscience!). Some Chasidic teachers
say that a person of great modesty and humility is a “tzaddik nistar”, a hidden tzaddik, who conceals his/her
righteousness and good deeds from others, by doing them in secret - but God
still knows about them. Both of these understandings tie in quite nicely with
the traditional theological theme of Yamim Noraim - the Days of Awe that we are
about to enter. That is, God takes an accounting of us, toting up the good, the
bad and the ugly, and deciding what to do with us in the coming year.
The great Chasidic
teacher Menachem Mendel of Kotzk takes a slightly different tack, and applies
the verse to “cheshbon hanefesh”, the
self-examination, literally the accounting of the soul, that tradition teaches
we are to do at this time of year. He says that the tzaddik nistar is one whose righteousness is hidden from the very
self - this is someone who has no idea of their own righteousness.
The lesson, as I see
it, is that each and every one of us is potentially a tzaddik nistar. The trick is not to think that you really ARE such
a tzaddik - there's a certain lack of humility. But, by being totally honest
with ourselves in our self-evaluation, we may be able to learn how to continue
to behave as well as how not to behave, and we can pass on all of that
information to our children, directly and by example. If we do something wrong,
we teach our children from our mistakes. And if we do something right, then
they see it and we encourage them to follow. In short, don’t be overly hard on
yourself - you just might be better than you think you are!
SHABBAT SHALOM!
L’SHANAH TOVAH
U’METUKAH TIKATEIVU V’TIKHATEIMU!
MAY YOU BE INSCRIBED
AND SEALED FOR A GOOD AND SWEET NEW YEAR!
Rabbi Richard A. Flom
Visit me on Facebook
Twitter: @DrahcirMolf
"שתיקה כהודאה
דמיא"
"Silence in the face of wrongdoing is consent.”
BT Yevamot 87b
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Candle lighting: 6:41 pm
Friday – Shabbat Evening Service – 7:30 pm.
Saturday – Breakfast and Torah study - 8:45 am. Shabbat
Morning Service – 9:30 am. Kiddush luncheon follows. Selichot Program and Service – 8:00 pm
– havdalah, desserts, screen and discuss the film “The Quarrel” – 10:00 pm –
Selichot service conducted by Rabbi Flom and Rabbi van Leeuwen.
Sunday – Religious School – 9:30 am. Sign up the kids and bring ‘em on down!
Tuesday – NO Lunch and
Learn – resume 9/26.
This d'var torah is offered for a refuah
shleimah for Avi Shmuel Yosef Hakohen ben Bella, Ze’ev ben Adeline, Yudit bat
Hannah, Yaakov Rani Ben Margalit, Eilite bat Miryam, HaRav Tzvi Hersh ben
Frimet, Sarah bat Devorah, Hiroe Andriola, Susan Arbetman, Stuart Barth,
Ken Bitticks, Elsbet Brosky (Serach bat Miriam), Stana Cooper, Jerry Daniels,
Maya Fersht (Maya bat Esther), Dr. Samuel Fersht (Shmuel Natan ben Gittel),
Leonard Foint (Eliezer Moshe ben Esther), Jerry Forman, Bernard Gavin, Myra
Goodman, Simon Hartman, Brandon Joseph, Philip Kovac, Tonya Kronzek (Zlata
Malkah bat Sarah Emanu), Florence Levinson, Lyndia Lowy (Leah bat Sarah), Stuart
Lytton, David Marks, David Pearlman, Deborah Schugar Strauss (Devorah bat Chaya
Feiga), Helen Schugar (Chaya Feiga bat Kreina), Alexis Woolfson, Simon
Woolfson, and Meagan Yudell.
Please let me know if there is anyone you would
like to add to this list or if there is anyone who may be removed from this
list.
My weekly divrei torah are available through
free subscription to the Cyber Torah e-mail list. No
salesman will call!
Cyber Torah list management:
To subscribe to Cyber Torah,
send an e-mail from the receiving address to: ravflom@sbcglobal.net with the heading “Subscribe Cyber
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Torah”.
To dedicate a Cyber Torah in
honor of a simchah in memory of a loved one or for a refuah shleimah, send an
e-mail to: ravflom@sbcglobal.net with the heading “Dedicate Cyber Torah”
and provide details in the message body.
