Parashat
Mattot-Mas’ei
Torah:
Numbers 30:2 – 36:13 (Chazak!)
Haftarah:
Jeremiah 2:4-28; 3:4 (Second Shabbat of Admonition)
2
Av 5778 / 13-14 July 2018
Calendar
and dedications follow below. For a full calendar of events and other info
about Temple B’nai Hayim/Congregation Beth Meier, check out:
Please
feel free to pass this on to a friend, and please cite the source.
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A
CITY OF REFUGE, SHINING ON A HILL?
“You
shall provide yourselves with places to serve as cities of refuge to which a
manslayer that has killed a person unintentionally may flee.” Numbers
35:11
According
to the Torah, the purpose of a city of refuge (ir miklat) was to protect
someone who was not guilty of intentional murder from the blood avengers of the
victim’s family. For example, when an axe-head separated from the handle
and struck another person, the one chopping wood was a manslayer, not a
murderer, and was granted refuge.
In
his farewell address to our nation, January 11, 1989, President Reagan said the
following: “I've spoken of the
shining city all my political life, but I don't know if I ever quite communicated
what I saw when I said it. But in my mind it was a tall, proud city built on
rocks stronger than oceans, wind-swept, God-blessed, and teeming with people of
all kinds living in harmony and peace; a city with free ports that hummed with
commerce and creativity. And if there had to be city walls, the walls had doors
and the doors were open to anyone with the will and the heart to get here.
That's how I saw it, and see it still.”
I’ve always admired President Reagan’s vision,
however unfulfilled it might be. Sadly, it seems to me that our country is
further from that vision than we have been in many decades – we are letting it
slip away. Today, we are refusing refuge to people who are actually fleeing
real murder and mayhem and oppression. Rather than an ir miklat, a city
of refuge, the United States has become an ir siruv, a city of refusal,
a city of denial.
Next Shabbat is Shabbat Chazon, the
Shabbat of the Vision of Isaiah – the last Shabbat before Tisha B’Av,
the date commemorating the destruction of Jerusalem, the original Shining City
on a Hill – lost because of the hypocrisy and hatred in the city. Isaiah 1:1-27
is worth reading now – don’t wait until next Shabbat. The prophet gives this
instruction: “Learn to do good; devote yourselves to justice; aid those who
have been wronged. Uphold the rights of the orphan; defend the cause of the widow.”
(1:17)
This is how we create a city of refuge – this
is how we create an American shining city on a hill.
Shabbat Shalom.
Rabbi
Richard A. Flom
Temple
B'nai Hayim/Congregation Beth Meier
Visit
me on Facebook
"שתיקה כהודאה דמיא"
Silence
in the face of wrongdoing is consent.”
BT
Yevamot 88a
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Candle lighting: 7:48 pm
Friday: Shabbat Evening Service – 7:30 pm. Oneg Shabbat
follows.
Saturday: Torah study/breakfast with Reb Jason – 8:45 am. Shabbat
Morning Service – 9:30 am. Kiddush lunch follows.
Tuesday: NO Lunch and Learn while Rabbi Flom
is away. Resumes August 7.
Next time you come to TBH/CBM, please bring some non-perishable
canned and packaged foods and personal items (no glass) for SOVA.
The congregation extends its condolences to our Rabbi Emeritus Sally
Olins, whose husband Jay Olins passed away on July 4. Y’hi zikhro liv’rakhah –
May his memory be a blessing.
This d'var torah is offered for a refuah shleimah for Ze’ev ben
Adeline, Eilite bat Miriam, Sarah bat Devorah, Hiroe Andreola, Susan Arbetman,
Ken Bitticks, Jerry Daniels, Maya Fersht (Maya bat Esther), Dr. Samuel Fersht
(Shmuel Natan ben Gittel), Annabelle Flom (Channah Bella bat Kreina), Bernard
Garvin, Leah Granat, Brandon Joseph, Gabor Klein, Philip Kovac, Tonya Kronzek
(Zlata Malkah bat Sarah Emanu), David Marks, Debra Schugar Strauss (Devorah bat
Chaya Feiga), Helen Schugar (Chaya Feiga bat Kreina), Irwin Silon, and Jonathan
Woolf.
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.
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Torah list management (no salesman will call!):
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Send requests
for dedications of Cyber Torah in honor of a simchah, in memory of a
loved one or for a refuah shleimah to: ravflom@sbcglobal.net
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